Death Penalty

[migrendel]

I think tying someone to a post outdoors and shooting them makes a spectacle out of something that could be performed in a semi-private venue with a more reliable method. Also, your idea of an appelate court gives very little time for both the petitioner and the respondent to formulate an argument. Christopher Michael, I am once again awestruck in horror at one of your ideas. While God was revealing to you that you'd be a conservative Democratic president, why didn't He tell you to lay off the whip and chains approach to criminal justice?

[migrendel]

That is precisely why you cannot be considered objective on this issue. You have a personal stake in the continuance of the death penalty, and this emotional factor obviously influences your opinion. I haven't suffered the pain of losing someone in a murder, so I can speak on this issue. While I realize retribution is on the mind of those left behind, I would advise them to consider its similarity to vengeance. Rather than swallowing themselves up in vengenace, they could always forgive and show mercy, for forgiveness and mercy are the highest attributes of the human soul.

[migrendel]

I must once again state my unequivocal objection to the use of capital punishment under all circumstances. We are simply too far into human history to continue to administer it and recognize the primacy of a universal sense of justice.

When a state condemns a person, they reject their worth, and do something even more heinous than ending a life. They demean it. Until the end of a person's days, they must live with the opprobium of social condemnation. Regardless of the enormity of a crime, any nation which has any pretensions of calling itself a civilization cannot do such a thing.

The arguments about how the death penalty is not blind as to its victim's race or class are well known, and need not be presented here. Yet I am compelled to contradict one thing that is often heard said: Capital punishment recognizes a family's need for closure. We all are befallen with certain tragic events in our lives. And anyone with a scrap of humanity left in them will provide sympathy to those who are afflicted by grief. However, we cannot extend this desire to provide aid and comfort to serve as a call to act as condottiere to oblige these people's most bloodthirsty wishes. For any person that claims that they are asking for closure and retribution, I would reply that they ask for vengeance, and perpetuate a cycle of violence in a fashion that can indeed be described as evil.

Perhaps the most compelling arguments are the simplest. When all is said and done, how can the state reconcile itself as being nothing more than a murderer itself? How can it answer that cry for help that is violent crime by responding with the ultimate scorn conceivable? In any nation which sets kindness and mercy as ideals to which the government endeavors, the government cannot do either of those things and be consistent with its precepts. No longer should we attempt to fine-tune the machinery of death and expect to see something that is fair. While I may not live to see society recognize the dignity and worth of all its citizens, I believe that history is on my side, and someday this abomination shall be righted.