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stui magpie
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005 Location: In flagrante delicto
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All the guys I've known who did time, did rehabilitate.
Probably a dodgy sample because I don't hang around with guys who are crooks. _________________ Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005 Location: somewhere
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stui magpie wrote: | All the guys I've known who did time, did rehabilitate.
Probably a dodgy sample because I don't hang around with guys who are crooks. |
You missed the other part of my rant
What kind of crime did they rehabilitate from?
And did they do anything to make it up to whoever was their victim? _________________ You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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stui magpie
Prepare for the worst, hope for the best.
Joined: 03 May 2005 Location: In flagrante delicto
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AFAIK petty shit, I don't make it a habit to drill people about their lives. Usually when people tell me voluntarily (which happens too often) I've forgotten it 5 minutes later.
I only retain stuff I'm interested in, which is probably why I've always been shitful with peoples names. _________________ Every dead body on Mt Everest was once a highly motivated person, so maybe just calm the **** down. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003 Location: Andromeda
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think positive wrote: | And yet you still haven't answered the question, who is going to pay for it all? |
Taxpayers, naturally.
Sounds pretty disgusting to me. If anyone can demonstrate that this kind of humiliation and brutality have a positive long-term rehabilitative effect, then I'm willing to listen; but this just sounds like mini-fascists enjoying a power trip.
Let's go in the opposite direction entirely. Giving prisoners freedom and dignity is not only more humane, it actually seems to work:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/29/magazine/the-radical-humaneness-of-norways-halden-prison.html?_r=0
And here's the dark(er) side of your Tent City:
http://www.phoenixnewtimes.com/news/dead-end-6438519 _________________ All watched over by machines of loving grace
Last edited by David on Fri Oct 30, 2015 9:04 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005 Location: somewhere
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stui magpie wrote: | AFAIK petty shit, I don't make it a habit to drill people about their lives. Usually when people tell me voluntarily (which happens too often) I've forgotten it 5 minutes later.
I only retain stuff I'm interested in, which is probably why I've always been shitful with peoples names. |
That's an Ozzie thang! Why you all call each other mate or cobber! _________________ You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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Jezza
2023 PREMIERS!
Joined: 06 Sep 2010 Location: Ponsford End
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think positive wrote: | David wrote: | One of the difficult but essential things we need to reconcile in our minds is that people like this - and Anders Breivik, and Adrian Bayley, and even Adolf Hitler - are human beings, complex human beings like you and me with emotions and hopes and dreams, not monsters or extraterrestrials.
I know it seems weird for me to say this as an atheist, but I sometimes wish that our society would remember some of its own Christian cultural background, and the fundamental belief that all people are loved by God, and all are capable of redemption and forgiveness. That's not so much an argument for or against capital punishment as an argument for humanity and empathy. It's a beautiful doctrine, and it saddens me that our society no longer seems to have any time for it (if it ever did). Our society has become one of hatred, and judgement, and of kicking the weak while they're down. How we treat criminals is actually a hugely significant part of that.
I am not saying that we should feel less empathy for victims and their families. It is essential that we can put ourselves in their shoes. But if you profess to care so much about children, remember that this alleged rapist/murderer was once a child too who needed love and compassion. We can help children to grow up with empathy by providing a positive example in the way we treat and talk about others. |
And jezza as for the it's no deterrent, it sure is to the bastard with the lead in his black heart, or the electric shock zapping his body! |
I'm talking about deterrence in the sense of future offenders who may commit similar crimes to the person who has been recently executed via capital punishment.
Here are some good articles that might be of interest to you raising the arguments of deterrence from both sides in support or against the death penalty.
http://deathpenaltycurriculum.org/student/c/about/arguments/argument1a.htm
http://deathpenaltycurriculum.org/student/c/about/arguments/argument1b.htm _________________ | 1902 | 1903 | 1910 | 1917 | 1919 | 1927 | 1928 | 1929 | 1930 | 1935 | 1936 | 1953 | 1958 | 1990 | 2010 | 2023 | |
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Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007 Location: Between London and Melbourne
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David wrote: | Mugwump, I'm sure you wouldn't be protesting against the assertion that certain laws regarding capital or corporal punishment in Saudi Arabia are barbaric. If I'm right, then you clearly don't really believe that lawlessness is a necessary condition for barbarity.
The only other way in which you draw the line is 'uncivilised' and 'unreasonably harsh' – which are, just like 'barbarity', subjective value judgements. We're pretty much on the same page; you just have a different standard as to what you consider 'uncivilised'/'barbaric'/'unreasonable'.
I grant you that there could be conceivable arguments for the death penalty, so perhaps I was overstating that a little. But I don't think either of the ones you provide are particularly strong. Personally, I don't find the idea of assigning monetary value to human life particularly savoury – if you're going to go down that path then I think you need to apply it to all people, not just criminals. Basic Western human rights statutes have no place for the idea that a criminal (or certain kind of criminal) ceases to be human, after all.
Beyond that, you hypothesise that certain acts might warrant extermination. To that, I'd just ask one question: why? Why isn't permanent removal from society sufficient? I think that's the question that lies at the heart of my opposition to the death penalty. |
"Unreasonably harsh" is not a merely subjective value judgement, in the context of our society. It includes, at minimum, the idea of proportionality and fairness. It is not at all unreasonable or disproportionate or unfair to contemplate executing, say, Anders Breivik or Julian Knight, given their acts against innocent people.
I thought I answered your "why" question : because CP expresses society's highest level of repugnance for certain crimes and accords with many (most?) people's idea of fairness and equity of punishment ; and because it is better to spend money on things other than lifetime incarceration.
The trouble with it, for me, is that the evil of executing an innocent is disproportionate to any benefit gained by the execution of 100 guilty, when incarceration is an alternative. But I don't think it is barbaric in itself, if it is proportionate, preordained as a consequence of certain crimes, and fairly tried. I think that definition of barbarism becomes a bit circular - "it's barbaric because I do not like it ; and I do not like it because it is..." etc _________________ Two more flags before I die!
Last edited by Mugwump on Sat Oct 31, 2015 9:26 am; edited 1 time in total |
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think positive
Side By Side
Joined: 30 Jun 2005 Location: somewhere
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Because we have an endless supply of money and don't know what to do with it?
So many more worthy ways to spend it _________________ You cant fix stupid, turns out you cant quarantine it either! |
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HAL
Please don't shout at me - I can't help it.
Joined: 17 Mar 2003
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There exists anyone can demonstrate that this kind of humiliation and brutality. |
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Wokko
Come and take it.
Joined: 04 Oct 2005
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I've done a bit of research on this and Norway with its 'hotel like' prisons (compared to USA for example) has one of the lowest recidivism rates in the world. Now there are significant demographic differences, so I'd be more interested in say Sweden's statistics over the last 5 years but the evidence at hand seems to be against super harsh treatment of criminals.
I'd say however that the willful murder of a child nullifies someone's right to a social contract that includes rehabilitation and reintegration. Throw those £$%$ers in a hole for all I care (metaphorically speaking). Treat them with the barest semblance of humanity (3x3 cell, bed, toilet, books) and throw away the key. |
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Mugwump
Joined: 28 Jul 2007 Location: Between London and Melbourne
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^ Broadly agree, Wokko, but why restrain this to child murder ? What makes the murder of a 20 year-old or a 50 year-old substantially less damaging ?
I think we have become creepingly lenient on the matter of murder. It is the ultimate act of negation, depriving the victim and their family of every hope. 15 years followed by a residual lifetime of sunsets and autumns and football games etc for the perpetrator seems to me disproportionately low unless there were serious mitigating factors. I could do with fewer prison sentences for minor violence if we were to look again at 25 year minimum terms for murder.
On the subject of prisons, yes, for most crimes, good prison conditions are probably conducive to rehab, which is a proper goal. _________________ Two more flags before I die! |
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Skids
Quitting drinking will be one of the best choices you make in your life.
Joined: 11 Sep 2007 Location: Joined 3/6/02 . Member #175
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Have you read the book "Ä time to kill"
I enjoyed every word. _________________ Don't count the days, make the days count. |
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Skids
Quitting drinking will be one of the best choices you make in your life.
Joined: 11 Sep 2007 Location: Joined 3/6/02 . Member #175
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Mugwump wrote: |
I think we have become creepingly lenient on the matter of murder. It is the ultimate act of negation, depriving the victim and their family of every hope. 15 years followed by a residual lifetime of sunsets and autumns and football games etc for the perpetrator seems to me disproportionately low unless there were serious mitigating factors. I could do with fewer prison sentences for minor violence if we were to look again at 25 year minimum terms for murder.
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BAM _________________ Don't count the days, make the days count. |
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David
I dare you to try
Joined: 27 Jul 2003 Location: Andromeda
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Doc63
Joined: 06 May 2004 Location: Newport
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We can (and have) debated the death penalty until the cows come home, it aint coming back - ever. I'm a supporter of it in certain circumstances, but I know it will never happen again, and i'm not sure I trust our politicians to get it right anyway.
So, really, we should be discussing whatever the maximum penalty for this crime is, and should this scum get it or not. _________________ I hold a cup of wisdom, but there is nothing within. |
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