155 replies to this topic

[Alias]

CJ, on 9 Feb 2011, 1:14, said:

Quote

same goes for racism as Tunisians are by far more tolerant than Europeans or Americans.

I don't see Australia in that sentence, I don't know anything about racism in your country so I don't use it as an example. And so should you, since you've never been in Tunisia, how can you judge our social model in that case?
You say Tunisia is not a civilized country, or at least not enough by your standards, while you know approximately nothing about our country, at least the examples I cite frequently are France and Italy, which I both know well to make some judgments on their social and political models.
And stop saying that death sentence is barbaric, mass murder and pedophilia are even more barbaric yet it doesn't seem to cause you any problem.

Finally, about dictatorship, what's the difference between a dictator and a president who enforces a law that 80% of the French citizens were opposed to, who raised his own pay by 200% as a first action when he was elected, and who's clearly threatening the media and leading attacks on French journalists? Different methods but same result.

I'm not saying Western political systems are perfect, far from it, but they're the best we have in this present moment. I myself am an anarcho-syndicalist but I also know that anarcho-syndicalism is impossible to implement on a large scale. In terms of 'development', the HDI is a good start. I may not know much about your country but the statisticians do. Both Sarkozy and Berlusconi are completely incompetent and anyone can tell you that, however it's also worth mentioning their position in the HDI list. They may be both Western democracies but they're definitely not the best example of a western democracy.

Mass murder and paedophilia cause myself a lot of grief. But the belief I personally condone the killing of another human being would cause me even more grief. The fundamental human right is the right to live.

[CJ]

Golan, on 8 Feb 2011, 15:17, said:

CJ, on 8 Feb 2011, 13:17, said:

Alias, on 8 Feb 2011, 9:25, said:

CJ, on 8 Feb 2011, 17:00, said:

@Mbob : I'm not speaking for myself but for my friend's family, and all I'm saying is that if there are some people who want revenge you can't really possibly tell them that they can't have it.

And there's some people who want to rape little children, by your logic you can't possibly tell them they can't have it.
If it's against the law, it's against the law. Whether the murder is comitted for the sake of murder or for 'revenge'. You can't be cherrypicking definitions.

That's why death penalty is needed, since it's a PART of the law and it represents a mean of getting revenge. An execution ordered by a court or a judge is not a murder for the law.

Then why restrict it to murder? Why restrict it to the death penalty? Shouldn't a rape victim be allowed to have the rapist raped in return, too? How do you take revenge for the scars inflicted to ones soul? When no one is left that could have any interest in revenge, is the penalty to be carried out still? If the idea is to take revenge, why have a bureaucrat and a professional decide and do the slaying? And isn't it still morally a murder?
An eye for an eye for an eye for an eye...

You have a point there.
In fact the most "fair" system here IMO would be to let the victims (or their family in case of murder) decide of the adequate punishment as long as the guilt is proven. That way those who feel that the death of the criminal's wouldn't change anything could just have him sent to prison

[Golan]

CJ, on 8 Feb 2011, 15:05, said:

You have a point there.
In fact the most "fair" system here IMO would be to let the victims (or their family in case of murder) decide of the adequate punishment as long as the guilt is proven. That way those who feel that the death of the criminal's wouldn't change anything could just have him sent to prison

Exactly. Gearing the law towards revenge means turning it into a grab bag of personal vendettas - which isn't the point of the law or a Rechtsstaat at all. So why keep a grab bag for a single crime? One where people aren't even allowed to grab anything?

Edited by Golan, 08 February 2011 - 15:11.

[Ghostrider]

The point of law is to offer a harmed party appropriate consolation. In the case of a murdered loved one, the ideal consolation would be to bring the loved one back, and the murderer would forfeit their right to be in society (note: not their right to live). Obviously we can't resurrect dead people, so the best we can do is take the murderer away.

And what difference does it make if the person is in jail for life or dead? Either way nobody will ever have to see them again, and the person will never have an impact on society. They might as well be dead, but it's more cost effective to keep them alive and imprisoned, not to mention more morally acceptable for the majority of people in the world.

[BeefJeRKy]

Guys, I appreciate how you avoided a flame war on the last page. Let's just keep it less personal alright?

Since I posted here, I may as well express my opinion. I am against the death penalty because it is completely irreversible. I don't believe in an afterlife, so I wouldn't like to pull the plug one someone even if he killed say my mother or brother or father or anybody. How much better would I be than the murderer in the first place? Human life is too precious to waste. Furthermore, if there is a chance that a mistake was made in convicting that person, it can be corrected. The death penalty is a serious issue that cannot be approached that easily.

[Slevered]

You guys should see the documentary "14 Days in May". It's a great documentary about the death penalty and death row. I shed a man tear at the end.

The number of innocent people taking the death penalty in the U.S. is 10% (that is only the ones they have found innocent after death so the number can only be higher).

Even cops here have said that they framed people to look guilty (specifically before the miranda law).

This is also not counting people proven innocent before death.

Edited by Slevered, 23 February 2011 - 19:56.