Yes, excellent post. Even for a "dude" :1orglaugh

Anytime! :)

I still say we can get rid of the Nike sweat shops in China and put our prisoners to work making us extremely ugly and overpriced foot apparel. :winkwink:

But I also like the human guinea pigs idea. :thumbsup

KRL:

Under 18 or whatever, they are legally and in all other senses, minors. Ya don't execute kids - or do the slimy path of waiting till they are older before executing them.

Someone I know had the job of "interviewing" some these kids - about 15 years back - not as some "official", but actually trying to hear what they had to say.

She spent time with three... and maintained contact with two until they all were eventually executed.

All three had things in common, prior to their crimes. They were all the subjects of abuse, either mentally or sexually. In all instances, it was their parents who abused them.

Two of them killed either one of both of their parents - the other killed a third party.

I heard some of the details of this abuse - their parents were more than dumb and evil. Tho a law officer and one who is an advocate of capitol punishment, the interviewer considered she would have done the same thing if her parents abused her like this.

The third kid... he was already "closed down" and with no real human face or emotions and was hard to relate to. He was also described as "just evil" in almost every way. Who knows if he was born like this or it developed over his childhood... But this was still a kid of.. think 12 years of age.

This was only a sampling of three children - and may not be representative, most likely is not, of all kids on death row.

If it is "roughly" a representatice sample, there is no way any civilized society can "just execute" them and hope the problem will go away.. it actually starts with the parents and society need to pay the price of it's conduct towards children.

Even the discussion of such a subject by a court is an absurdity. Other civilised countries don't have death penalties - the room for error was too much as has been proven in a considerable number of cases.

At the request of two of these "kids" - the interviewer was asked to be with them as a friend when they were eventually executed years later. She attended both executions.

Opinion? OK you asked for it :)

The federal government shouldnt be allowed to execute anyone.
Death is not the harshest penalty. Life without freedom in suffering is.
The US is one of the last civilized countries to still act like killing someone does anyone any good.

It's the easy way out of suffering, which is why when we talk assisted suicide we talk in terms of "ending suffering" or "putting out of misery". It's not a far leap really. Just a stubborn one.

Thats my opinion. No death penalty.

Note: The Federal government isn't executing anyone.

Tom_PM:

I was actually stunned that any country executes kids years later to have some "acceptable face" to the execution.

I wondered why the US could not ratify the Human Rights Treaty - it's because of exactly this - a big no no...

PS... Also wondered how come my friend ended up with three kids to "research" - the research was not restricted to kids. Turns out that there were more kids awaiting execution at that time than adults - they were "queuing" until they were older. Sounds sick..

Why does it cost so much to execute? Gimme a gun I'll do it.

A bullet only costs .88 cents.

Pine box (w constr): $100.00

Burial $200.00

A piece a shit dead in the ground instead of sucking up my money for 60 years...

Priceless..

I get that a lot.

What is with people fascination with protecting children? If they kill they deserve the same punishment as anyone else I dont get you people!?

MrJackMeHoff:

Let's hope you get real justice if that time ever comes :-)

And yea.. it is priceless... kinda shows the values of society when it comes to justice.

If we were civilized, we wouldn't have people committing murders...

MrJackMeHoff:

Fascination? Don't think so... it's a basic right that children are protected - sometimes even from their parents.

Would you apply the same standards mentioned in your post, to your children?

If so, you don't need to be a parent....

MrJackMeHoff:

Sorry man!! I'm just kinda sick of the flippant attitude some folks have about children.

Considering they are abused, both in the US and elsewhere, and we expect them to be "civilized" and take that abuse as an example of how to live - that's asking a lot.

It is also asking a lot when the "pedo element" of adults abuse their own sons and daughters and visit other countries to abuse the kids there.

There are many, many children in a very bad situation because of the abuse of members of so-called, civilized societies.

For the first time ever, in the last few months, the US actually agreed to "give up" one of it's own citizens to face trial in another country for the abuse of .. don't know the figure.. but a lot of children. At least that is a start and presents some common sense.

Sorry my bad! :1orglaugh

Maybe post a pic and I will remember better for next time. :Graucho

j/j :)

No. The death penalty itself should not be used. The government should not be able to take anything away that they cannot give back.

The law has to be more righteous than the criminals abusing it.

To quote a man who showed peace works "If we all believe in an eye for an eye then the whole world will soon be blind"

Unfair. They committed crimes and should serve their sentence under the same laws when they committed their crime.

NO
According to Amnesty International the United States is by far the worlds worst killer of minors in the name of justice.

So beheadings are okay with you?

DAMN we're in GREAT company!

For a variety of reasons it costs several times more in the US to run someone through the legal process and ultimately execute them, than to imprison them for life without parole. This is a ridiculous situation, but while it is the case, the death penalty makes little practical sense for the community at large.

Were that not the case, I would not only support the death penalty, but extend it to cover many lesser crimes. I couldn't care less about the rights of criminals: they have chosen to break the law and if they do so, knowing the penalties for being caught, that is their problem. Whatever they have done, the law should be such that they don't get chance to do it again.

Nor am I very interested in the argument that sometimes the innocent are wrongly convicted. We live in an imperfect world and there are far more innocent victims of criminals who are left at large, than innocents who are imprisoned or executed in error.

I guess it's all good until you end up being the one wrongly imprisoned or executed, eh?

Self-indulgent emotive rhetoric about miscarriages of justice does not address the issue of the far greater number of victims of criminals who were not kept safely out of society's way.

Since this is an "imperfect world" and we cannot craft a system which protects all the innocent, the best we can hope for is a system which protects the largest number of innocents.