The Death Penalty

No. It is excessively expensive and it's proven not to be a deterrent. There has also been too many cases where innocent people who were on death row were exonerated by new evidence. That suggests to me that our justice system is inadequate. It also goes against my personal values since I don't believe in killing those who can live to repent for their crimes.

 

Yes, for certain crimes like being president of the USA.

No. The Death Penalty has proven itself not to work, and against someone like me* its possibility would be the worst possible idea. It's a much better idea to simply remove them from society, break up any "social groups" that exist inside the gaols and try to rehabilitate.



* If, after having committed a crime that carries the possibility of the death penalty, someone like myself might just say "well fuck it, if i'm going to die, i'm going to die taking EVERYONE out", and then proceed to installing bombs in primary schools, putting nerve gas in public institution air conditioners, and just generally massacre a lot of people.

 

More so than a life sentence in prison?

 

not only crimes they did not commit, but crimes that don't deserve the death penalty (crime of passion rather than of planning), similar to crimes that don't deserve incarceration, such as weed smoking

 

No.

 

or ANY legal system for that matter...everything in this world is fallible, and as long as that is hanging in the midst, real justice is, as far as ethics, just a perception that many people seem to share, but commonality is not a factor for truth (as i think is pretty obvious in THIS society). who is to say that kiling someone is the proper reaction for murder? it's like a parent spanking a child; there are other and far more effective ways to handle the situation, and until these IMHO immature quick fixes are adequately criticized and a SUBSTITUTE proposed and proven, we are just left with an open wound covered in band-aids (it's a parable)

 

As already suggested it isn't a deterrent and there are significant flaws in the legal system, innocent people have been wrongly convicted.

Can be. The cost to the government for the death penalty is substantial, someone sentenced to death needs to be housed in a specialised area of a prison with a lower ratio of prisoners v guards due the potential suicide risk (the state can kill them, they can't ) that’s an additional cost right there. They will generally wait for years and years before their sentence is carried out and in the meantime there are inevitably numerous appeals, it all adds up to an argument that there are no financial gains for killing a prisoner v keeping them locked up for life.

Therefore if it’s not cheaper, and it isn’t a deterrence it must be retribution, add the element of wrongful convictions and it’s bad all round.

They're my logical arguments, my other is no one has the right to take another’s for any other reason than self defence so morally I object also.

 

In the olden days where they would kill people in order to maintain order over the population, death penalty may seem "needed."
In modern society, we have other ways to do things. It's really not necessary anymore, and I really don't like the idea, unless it was some sort of extreme case of 100% certain mass-murdering tendencies...

Either way, though, our prison and justice systems need some serious clean-up...

 

Yes. It costs more to put someone to death in our country than to imprison them for life. In fact, last I heard, it costs about 3 times as much in some states.

 

I don't get why they give someone the death penalty and then let them sit in prison for 20 years.

 

Because it is called a "justice" system and not a "death" system. Being "just" means being fair and allowing those who are convicted to appeal to a higher court just as they would have a right to do if they were convicted of any other offense.

 

I'd be surprised to find an infj who would not be against it (at least in what we call "developed" countries)

 

Dunno Shaz, I think upbringing has a big impact on beliefs like this.

 

I agree with Lurker.

 

The saddest cases are the ones who actually do turn their lives around, or find God or some sort of peace in those 20 years they sit there. And then they get executed because the Governor won't overturn the original judgement. That really sucks.

 

I don't think so, only cause they found some peace. Perhaps that is the reason they are there, when I say reason, I mean in the more cosmic scheme of things, so they can find god or some kind of peace that they wouldn't have found under any other circumstances. And once they found that peace it doesn't make dying any better, but a little easier.

 

You're probably right... Well... Then I probably wouldn't want to meet them:smow:

 

For it. Unequivacably.