How many people truly oppose the death penalty? (fast food, interview, abortion)
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I've always heard it cost more to have an inmate on death row but don't understand why. Can you explain?
Also I almost have to laugh at the rehabilitation comment. Do you truly think inmates aren't being rehabilitated? Even the ones that are, what chance do they stand in society once released from prison with a felony record trailing behind them? It seems to me if they've served their time for the crime, they deserved a clean slate for a chance at a fresh start rather than their past continuing to punish them.
It's a long time ago now, but I had a nephew who ended up in prison for a couple of years, I think for selling drugs (although I don't know that for sure). I had little sympathy for him, but after he had been out for a while he said it just wasn't fair...he had learned to be a cook/chef somewhere along the line. If he put on an application that he had been incarcerated, he wouldn't get the job. If he didn't put it on the application, got the job, and they later found it, he'd get fired. Again, I had little sympathy because he's the one that did the crime, but I could understand his frustration.
It's a long time ago now, but I had a nephew who ended up in prison for a couple of years, I think for selling drugs (although I don't know that for sure). I had little sympathy for him, but after he had been out for a while he said it just wasn't fair...he had learned to be a cook/chef somewhere along the line. If he put on an application that he had been incarcerated, he wouldn't get the job. If he didn't put it on the application, got the job, and they later found it, he'd get fired. Again, I had little sympathy because he's the one that did the crime, but I could understand his frustration.
The question is, though: Do we want them going back to crime? Because shutting ex-cons out of an honest occupation is how you get them going back to crime.
I need to be convinced that there shouldn't be restrictions preventing employers for asking for that information for most positions. Otherwise, just give them all life sentences for everything.
I've always heard it cost more to have an inmate on death row but don't understand why. Can you explain?
Also I almost have to laugh at the rehabilitation comment. Do you truly think inmates aren't being rehabilitated? Even the ones that are, what chance do they stand in society once released from prison with a felony record trailing behind them? It seems to me if they've served their time for the crime, they deserved a clean slate for a chance at a fresh start rather than their past continuing to punish them.
The appeals process. It is long and arduous before someone sentenced to death can be executed. The state must pay for legal counsel through the whole process as well.
Its easy to say "screw the appeals process, execute them!" However, the lengthy appeals process is exactly what has kept us from killing a number of innocent people who mistakenly ended up on death row. Those who oppose this process, in effect, say its all right if the innocent are executed.
The appeals process. It is long and arduous before someone sentenced to death can be executed. The state must pay for legal counsel through the whole process as well.
Its easy to say "screw the appeals process, execute them!" However, the lengthy appeals process is exactly what has kept us from killing a number of innocent people who mistakenly ended up on death row. Those who oppose this process, in effect, say its all right if the innocent are executed.
Also even if you are later found not guilty and charges dropped it's still on your record and getting your record expunged is not cheap, that's why I feel anyone falsely accused just get a lump sum of 100K for every year they sat in prison and a monthly salary from the state for life equivalent to the average salary of a district attorney, why? because they will never be able to find good paying honest work again and many of them had their youth stolen, years they will never get back. like this guy who spent 29 years in prison for a crime he did not commit, what do you even say to this guy, his prime years were stolen, he was locked up in his 20's and did not get justice until his 50's
"That it is better 100 guilty Persons should escape than that one innocent Person should suffer, is a Maxim that has been long and generally approved." -Benjamin Franklin (1706–90)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Dane_in_LA
Depends on one's outlook on society's duty to the individuals who constitute said society, I guess. I'm on Benjamin Franklin's side, here. "Proven guilty" has to be the standard - and both words are equally important.
When you stand accused of a capital crime, you're facing The State, with all of its resources and procedures aligned against you. The very least we can ask is that those considerbale resources and procedures are used to prove the case - convincingly. Rounding up the usual suspects is not how Western society is supposed to roll.
I feel like a broken record but very few capital crimes convicts are first-time offenders. Likely the accused crime is not unique. While there is a small chance that the accused is not guilty of the particular crime in question or has a smaller role in it than would warrant the death penalty, the chances are the typical capital convict is a "one man crime wave." While we have a responsibility to allow an accused to show reasonable doubt, we also have a responsibility to enforce the rule of law.
Surveys vary with the exact percentage of people who oppose the death penalty... typically the number cited in the US is around 60% support its existence.
Yet I find it hard to believe that 40% of Americans oppose the state killing Osama Bin Laden. I'm guessing that number is probably closer to 10%. That would mean the vast majority of people who "oppose" the death penalty really only oppose it unless the crime is really, really bad, right?
If you don't think the state has the right to take away a human life for any reason, then why the absence of outrage from those who oppose the death penalty on Bin Laden's "murder"?
I oppose the death penalty because "thou shall not kill". I don't need to believe in god or even be religious, but the 10 commandments are a good way to live. If you put someone away forever without possibility of parole, they can't hurt others anymore. The only time I think killing is okay is if it is to prevent someone in the middle of a murder. That is saving others at the time of a crime.
So, I am part of the 40%. I don't really care what others think about it as I am my own person. Evil people can just be locked up.
It says thou shall not MURDER.
The old testament had no problem at all with killing.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jbgusa
That is the Jewish read of the Ten Commandments.
While the concept of a death penalty is recorded as an accepted practice in "the old testament" (the holy book known to Jews as the Tanakh), the Talmud advises that the death penalty should be used sparingly. It has been stated in the Talmud that any Jewish court that handed down a sentence of execution at least once within a period of seven years was "a destructive tribunal." Rabbi Elazar ben Azarya (who lived in the 1st century C.E.) went even further to say that a court was destructive if it handed down a sentence of execution once in seventy years. (Source: Mishnah Makkot 1:10).
Yep and I am certainly not Jewish, although the reformed Jews are very similar to a lot of mainstream christians.
Thou shall not kill is what I was taught and stick to it.
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