Capital Punishment: Yes or No?

[Alleviator]

As long as I'm not paying for their life standards, they should be kept alive in prison. But then you've got to realize that someone has to pay for the food these guys need, right? What if some of them are not willing to work in prison to pay for themselves? Who is going to keep these guys alive?


I say you give them two choices:


1) Work for the food you receive in prison (so that us normal folk don't have to pay for you).

or

2) Starve.


Seems to be a simple solution for me. They could be making the money both for themselves and the paychecks of the guards watching them, security system bills ect.

[Shadowdrake]

Hmm...Capital Punishment...the Death Penalty...

Used to be, when someone stole horses or cattle back in the nineteenth century, those found guilty were strung up from the nearest tree. This was a rancher's livelihood to see him through to the next year. The Old West was brutal to criminals because it was a brutal environment while the frontier was still vast and wild. Was it barbaric? Perhaps. Perhaps not. As we've passed into the twenty first century, our ideals of morals and beliefs in humanity have altered some, but at the core, we really want to make sure the proper punishment fits the crime committed.

In that respect, we are still primitive when it comes to dealing with our vilest of offenders. Yet we, as a society in America both embrace and reject the Death Penalty for whatever reasons that make us tick as human beings. Just remember, we are the products of our own society. As such, we tend to forget life is only as precious as an individual percieves it to be. Think how Saddam Hussein fell from power and ultimately met his fate at the end of a rope by the very people he spent years supressing (please don't get into a debate about Iraq...off topic ^_^).

Did he deserve to die this way? Personally, he got exactly what was coming to him. Besides, there was a political reason for executing him; his followers couldn't attempt to save him if he was still alive.

So how does this apply to "common" criminals who do the worst of things in the eyes of the public? We have shown ourselves to be as compassionate as we are unforgiving...so the debate on Capital Punishment will rage on probably until something better comes along (Like put them on a man-made island in the middle of the Pacific and leave them there, guarded by ships, aircraft, etc.). I don't know exactly how we, as a people can get beyond this particular arguement. There are reasons why we, as individuals, cling to our personal beliefs in general and that is what makes us unique.

Getting to the point, I am FOR Capital Punishment. The laws of a nation must be upheld for the reason of maintaining a safe place for citizens to live and work. The cost of letting the worst of our criminal offenders shouldn't be an issue. The crime, whatever it was (murder, for example) must be dealt with by a means of death to satisfy the demands of a family and community shattered by this most final of acts of violence. Yes, our court system is imperfect, with so many loopholes for criminals to fight their sentences. That is where the cost becomse so high. It's because of this due process a man can stay on death row for decades. Will it ever be worked out? Who knows?

Capital Punishment is another means humanity unable to go beyond our barbaric heritages. We are savages (some more so than others). There is a need for some people to see death done to those who would kill the weak, the innocent, and the helpless. I am one of those people. I do not say this with pride, nor with any tone of disgust with myself. I am what I am and I feel what I feel.

[Dawn.x]

I will have to agree. The fact of the matter is my tax dollars are paying to feed rapists and murders, and give them an education. I rather them go to a pulled out chair and a quick fall followed by a gag.

[Flambeaux]

Bullet to the head.

Just sayin...