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Jury has reached verdict in Dzhokhar Tsarnaev trial - sentenced to death
- Thread starter ActStriker
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To what end though? Rehabilitate him? Dude will never ever get out so even if he comes to genuinely comes to realize "huh... that was a pretty shitty thing I did" he can just rot with guilt for decades? Which does what for society aside from millions of dollars to keep him there?
To punish him? Then what's the difference between killing him or cooping him up for life? Either one is ultimately a cruel thing to do to a person, whether we feel they deserve it or not.
I don't know where I fall on the death penalty but both options seem pretty terrible in the end.
save money.
Words, that's all they are, nothing more.
dave is ok
aztek is ok
He could have not apologized at all or said nothing. He could have used his only time to speak to rant and rave about radical Islam or decry America
All things considered, I think he handled the apology pretty well and I hope the victims families get some peace out of it.
OrlanisWorks
Banned
The killing of someone who has murdered an innocent =/= the killing of an innocent. That's not to say we should just go around killing people.
May the sucka rest in peace (whenever he gets executed some time among future decades). At least we know he isn't innocent. I still don't like it though.
The only issue that I have related to the death penalty is when there is a question as to guilt.
This does not have that issue.
He does not deserve to live and draw breath when his victims do not.
He does not deserve to be able to sit in jail and pray to his god, and read of his god.
He deserves to die, so that the ultimate justice will be when he starts to doubt, and when he dies he will do nothing but rot.
Bombing is a cowardly way to kill, it is random and sloppy. There is something completely disgusting about it to me.
Let him die.
This does not have that issue.
He does not deserve to live and draw breath when his victims do not.
He does not deserve to be able to sit in jail and pray to his god, and read of his god.
He deserves to die, so that the ultimate justice will be when he starts to doubt, and when he dies he will do nothing but rot.
Bombing is a cowardly way to kill, it is random and sloppy. There is something completely disgusting about it to me.
Let him die.
Is putting him in a tiny bleak room isolated from all human contact for the rest of his life somehow better? Would you mind explaining what you think should happen to him?
There are basically three options for him:
1. Painless death by lethal injection (what he probably wants)
2. Life in the ADX (what he probably deserves)
3. Life in prison in general population (where he'd probably be killed within months)
Nobody wants a guy like him to be "rehabilitated." He's not crazy. He knew exactly what he was doing, and it would not be just to provide him with a somewhat comfortable life after he stripped that away completely from four people, including a small child. What kind of consequence would that be? I don't like the death penalty because it's expensive and innocent people sometimes end up executed. But you really need to consider if the alternatives are any better from a moral standpoint. And if not, how would you make them better? And at that point does the punishment still fit the crime?
perfectchaos007
Member
I'm surprised pictures of the luxurious Swiss prison hotel haven't surfaced in this thread yet.
Morrigan Stark
Arrogant Smirk
And Japan. *shrugs*
I'm not in favour of the death penalty, but it's certainly not because I feel this guy deserves to live.
Come on, it's a ridiculous false equivalence and you know it. Might as well say we should punish people who put away people in prison, because "kidnapping is wrong".
Battersea Power Station
Member
This is dangerously close to trying to prosecute "thought-crime."
Those are not the only three options. That's a false argument. It happens to be the likely options given this countries terrible obsession with barbaric punishment and its all-out ridiculousness about building a legitimate rehabilitative prison system, but the real option would be fixing our prison system so it isn't a torturous nightmare of hell and making it like the vastly more successful rehabilitative prison system in the Norway.
This has wide reaching benefits for society, prisoners, prison guards and the recidivism rate, but apparently we are so hell bent on revenge that the only options available to us now are "torture a person in solitary", "give a person a hopeless sentence where there is no light for them" or "kill them in a barbaric practice that has killed thousands of innocents since its inception, which deters no crime and which serves no end but bloodlust."
I think he should be placed under a long-term sentence where rehabilitation is the continual, ongoing goal. The likelihood is he would never get out - like Breivik - but that he would be kept within a prison system that is inherently humane and works infinitely better than our own. But because of the revulsion we get at even treating criminals like human beings in this country, we're supposed to accept that these are the only options, because people refuse to look at all the data that says what actually works. Doesn't matter how many people in society are hurt because of this stupid fucking policy of nightmare prisons hell bent on keeping people in forever no matter the cost.
I don't think just spewing how great Norway is has any relevance to this. Is there system superior for the vast majority of cases? Yes. Prison should be about rehabilitation. But I believe you can do acts in this life that are so vile and disgusting that you lose the right to your life. Does Norway have a statistic as to how well their mass murderers are readjusting to society? With Breivik people keep saying he is never getting out but that goes against the very mantra of their rehabilitation belief. If Breivik is rehabilitated, he would have to be allowed to leave. Would Norway actually do that? Or are they going to keep him in prison regardless of whether or not he is "rehabilitated". There are certain people in this world who have violated society in such a way that it is easier, cheaper, and more humane to all those involved to just end their lives quickly.
This is a fundamental misunderstanding of the rehabilitative prison system. It does not mean there are no crimes for which logically you'd never get out. For example, even though Breivik has a 21 year sentence he will almost certainly keep getting his sentence extended until he dies.
But, Breivik lives within a rehabilitative prison system. The fact that he does not get out does not change remotely how much that actually means to the entire system. Because of the system where Breivik can have access to activities which treat him like a human being, he's infinitely less likely to commit a violent crime against a fellow inmate or prison guard for example. Prisoners within rehabilitative systems are less likely to desire to extend that criminal mindset to train other prisoners within that mindset; ergo, prisoners which can get out are statistically much, much less likely to recommit a crime and thus society at large is much safer as a result.
Breivik has activities which can keep his mind active, thus eliminating the normal torture cycle of American prisons. He is allowed privileges based on his behavior which include vast access to books and writing materials and television. He is allowed to socialize and allowed to expand his education in things like political science. He is therefore allowed to keep a semblance of his humanity while existing within an environment that is far safer for everyone involved, and provides a system which isn't simply training criminals to recommit crimes or become worse criminals.
Norway's system is better. For everyone. There is no statistical point that says there are any exceptions. Death penalty serves no end, except to allow us all to be happy our bloodlust was satisfied. It does not deter crime, it is not cheaper - because living in a death penalty society by definition means you must allow extensive appeals process to take place, else even more innocents would die - and we all know the statistics about the innocents caught up in the act.
If one believes in a rehabilitation system then the possibility exists for mass murderers to change and enter society again. If one is kept in prison forever despite evidence suggesting they may be able to function again in society, the system is being circumvented for an outlying scenario. You can't say that Breivik is not getting out. If he shows he has changed then keeping him in goes against the very foundation of the system. There is no reason why you can't have a rehabilitative system and the death penalty coexisting.
One of these day people will hopefully stop putting bombs next to children and murdering innocent people.
He is not getting out. It is not against the rehabilitative prison system to understand that, because a rehabilitative prison system is not solely about the end result. Your argument here is as a person ignoring the entire construct of the system and only looking at the starting line and finish line and believing he understands the whole race.
The reason a rehabilitative prison system works and is so much more beneficial to society is not just for the finish line possibility, it's for the entire way the prison system is structured. It is not torture. It is humane. Treating someone who has no likelihood of getting out humanely, like Tsarnaev or Breivik, does not somehow mean justice is not served. Society as a whole gets to benefit. Because when the entire system works this way, recidivism drops massively - meaning the entire system becomes much cheaper. Mass incarceration becomes a thing of the past. Society is safer because there are far less criminals recommitting crimes, violent or otherwise.
So keeping the death penalty around in this case serves naught but bloodlust. It won't be cheaper, and understandably so - being obsessed with keeping such a pathetic, barbaric practice around means that we must keep the legal structure in place which allows people to ride the legal system through its many waves, else even more innocents would die. In the legal system, there are not exceptions like "well in the case you're really really sure someone is guilty, you can skip a costly trial." There would not be an exception like "well in the case you're absolutely sure of their guilt, go directly to execution." The reality will always be we are all stuck with an obscenely expensive procedure that does not work and kills innocents so that a few people can lick the blood off their dicks when someone they hate is convicted of a crime.
I mean it's truly sad that there are Americans who still think this is a necessity. We are among the last developed nations IN THE ENTIRE PLANET to still do death penalty, and most of those other developed nations are vastly safer than ours. And many of them still have terrorist acts occasionally committed within them. We share our illustrious policy with China, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, making up a total of over 80% (edit: it's actually near 90% now!) of the world's execution by death.
Truly this policy is the policy of the enlightened.
Just because the US fucks up its executions and hands them out like candy doesn't mean it can never work. Law is an entirely human construct and as such, has faults and is not perfect by any means. Laws can be changed and reworked so that the death penalty isn't costly. The US legal system makes the death penalty costly. I truly believe that rehabilitation is wonderful for 99.9 percent of the population but a small amount of people do things that are not worthy of being treated the same as everyone else.
We're just going to have to disagree about how mass murderers, people who killed children ffs, should be punished for their crimes. You may feel that Breivik and Tsarnaev should have a relatively cozy life despite what they've done, and I fully respect Norwegians who feel that Breivik is getting the punishment that fits the crime. I'm not arguing against that system. It obviously works well. But IMO when you consciously go out on a killing spree or blow people up and strip away the humanity of people who did nothing wrong, you don't deserve to keep that which you took away from others. Just my opinion. The death penalty won't deter a mass murderer, but neither will a better prison system.
Please, explain to me how you would change the law so that we could make the death penalty cheap without making it massively less fair.
Piggus said:
Won't deter them in the absolute sense, but will indisputably make society safer for all, prison safer for prisoners and prison guards, and massively reduce recidivism rates meaning less innocents outside become victims of violent crimes where they might die.
But I guess those benefits just aren't worthy if we can torture or slaughter a human being we don't like.
I never said it would be easy, just that laws are not divine and can be re worked. It would take a lot of effort, just like retooling the US legal system to be more a kin to Norways. The main idea should be the death penalty used as a last resort, in America it currently isn't, it should only be an option for the most disturbing of cases.
Ok, but there must be a legal way to enshrine such a belief into the law. Because the goal here is not solely "use only in last resorts", it's also to make the system not ridiculously expensive, right, as well as more expedient? Since "easier, cheaper, more humane" is the goal, correct?
So what type of law could we write which would define which cases are apparently 'exceptions' to allow all legal appeals to be evaporated in order to keep costs down, while simultaneously allowing something vaguely resembling justice and fairness to keep sway? Do you have an idea? Because basically people say this, and there's usually never any ideas that follow... just a vague notion they want to keep the punishment, despite us being one of the sole remaining developed nation hold outs, despite all those other nations existing in a much safer environment despite not having it, despite there never being an actual argument as to how we will achieve this alternative vision of the death penalty.
And I think that's a pretty large omission from the debate.
ProfessorLobo
Banned
Good post.
Guillotine. Pretty cheap and 100% painless.
The type of device we use isn't the reason the death penalty is so expensive.
The method of execution is not the primary reason execution is as expensive as it is.
It's the fact that people on death row must be allowed to exhaust endless legal options, in order to have the best chance of preventing innocents from dying in the system. And it doesn't just hurt our individual wallets by tax payments. State budgets routinely are slammed dramatically with the costs of paying this system, meaning other services must be cut or reduced to compensate, including criminal prevention programs/policies/etc that actually work.
1
It was famously said that "every time a killer is sentenced to death, a school closes", which is simply a dramatic way of illustrating that the costs of keeping an ineffective system of brutal executions in place is literally decimating regions and budgets.
The argument is about whether you have an alternative way to keep the death penalty - despite the fact it makes no one safer, does not deter crime, and kills innocents - whilst making it cheaper and more efficient and retaining some semblance of justice and fairness.
People are keenly aware of their pain for up to fifteen seconds following a guillotine execution.
Wanting to murder a human so justice can be delivered or otherwise people would be outraged is exactly what I would call bloodlust. Some Middle Eastern countries decapitate, while USA kills with injections. An eye for an eye calms the nerves of the people, I'm sure. But it achieves nothing for our society in the long run. It is not productive, and it does not stop crime. And it paints an extremely shortsighted hand of justice rooted only firmly in basic instinct of revenge.
But the entire premise of rehabilitation for criminals depends on a more gray vs a Good vs Evil outlook on human beings. In my mind - there were reasons the terrorist killed so many innocents. He was not born like that - i think we can all agree with that. To find what caused him to be such a destructive and cruel human being, then recognize and uproot those factors from our society would help us progress. It also helps criminals and mentally destructive/brainwashed/ill individuals see the error of their ways and become more productive human beings - that is progress in my mind.
Breivik might one day live to regret what he did. He might even offer us insight on how to prevent cases like him from repeating in our society. That to me is more value than the reflexive need to put him to death.
smokeandmirrors
Banned
Except I never said it was as bad as murder at all. Don't put words in my mouth.
This is not about rehabilitation. This is about retribution. Retribution is absolutely a core aspect of the system. To deny this is to deny you are human.
King Cobra
Banned
I'm glad this scum is getting the death penalty, although making him live the rest o his life locked up in a tiny cell where he'll slowly be stripped of his humanity sounds like a better punishment to me. You lose your rights as a human when you do something as horrible as what he did.
entremet
Member
I agree with your points, but in terms of building consensus for serious change, can we not start with mass murderers first, though?
That's an awfully hard sell.
Let's focus on ending drug prohibition, which is vastly worse effects on society than killing mass murdering terrorist.
That's gonna be a hard pill to swallow even for most progressive voters in the US.
Heck we still have solitary confinement and no one wants to touch that. We have a lot of work to do and better resources and effort would be put in wider affecting reforms. Mass murderers are still relatively rare.
In terms of the DP, many more progressive states have already ended its use.
Baby steps.
Having an opinion about his motivation and truthfulness? I'm not prosecuting anyone. I simply think he's full of shit.
Sorry if my opinion is unfair to a confessed murderer.
DrForester
Kills Photobucket
http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/bo...-colorado-prison-way-death-row-report-n382061
He's apparently already been sent to Florence, but not ADX, just the nearby Federal Prison.
Texas hands death sentences out like candy. Not all states use the death penalty so often. I know my state, Colorado, has only had 4 people on death row since the 70s, and maybe a fifth, depending on how the Aurora Theater Shooting trial goes.
SolicitorPirate
Member
Before this, Judy Clarke had a perfect record of avoiding the death penalty for her clients, didn't she? The prosecutor must have really been something.
I'm actually of the opinion that one pretty important way to get rid of the behavior is to target its most stomach turning consequence of its change, and still articulate why it'd be better for all if that change was effected. Because I think most people would agree it's fucked up that innocents get caught up in the system, and most people might even eventually agree the costs aren't worth it and that the data clearly shows it does not deter crime... But these same people would likely inevitably fall back to the last bastion of that death penalty argument about the worst of the worst criminals deserving a special kind of punishment.
But, and this is to your other point, we don't need to focus on one thing over another. We don't need to focus on death penalty or solitary confinement; drug war or LGBT rights, etc etc. Each are vital elements causing real consequence in society, and I don't think those being effected by these serious problems can stand to wait for another person's progressive change. In other words, an innocent waiting to die on death row or a community struggling to keep their head above water whilst paying the costly fees related to death penalty cases need the help just as much as an lesbian couple wanting desperately to start a family but feeling like they can't go the full mile because their state doesn't afford them the dignity to get married.
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