Posted on 02/14/2007 10:19:32 AM PST by jsmith1942
But the death penalty is supposed to be incentive not to kill in the first place, and people still murder. So "incentive" doesn't really amount to much, the way it appears to me. It still comes back to the question of whether the state should have the power to take lives.
Someone serving 5-10 for robbery and aggravated assault is incentivized not to kill prison guards.
Depends on the prison. Gangbangers typically don't care whether they stay or go once they're absorbed into prison culture where gangs thrive. Status is oftentimes more important that a parole hearing, and usually involves crimes against guards and other prisoners.
I am not referring to matters of opinion. I am referring to the fact that certain inmates will kill a guard if they have half a chance to do so.
Well now you're getting into predicting future crimes. If only "certain" murderers will kill prison guards, does that justify killing those that "probably won't"? How do we figure out which ones are "certain" to kill?
Comparing murderers who try to kill guards to Christians imprisoned for their faith is more than a little silly.
You've missed the point. It's not about comparing murderers to Christians. It's about handing the government a weapon that could one day used against you and me because, really, the only thing stopping governments from taking such measures IS public opinion. Why would it ever get to that point? Because we live in a culture of death. And if you can't see the eventual persecution of Roman Catholics in America who reject the culture of death and perversion, then you're not paying attention. If we champion death, it will one day be our own.
We're moving into Mumia Abu Jamal sympathizer territory in which all prisoners, by virtue of being prisoners, are unjustly incarcerated prisoners of conscience.
That's quite a leap. Who said anything about anyone being unjustly incarcerated? The question is whether human beings are unjustly put to death, not incarcerated. Life imprisonment without parole is hardly a declaration of innocence.
That's an amazing statement. Any examples?
bump.
Yes, didn't you see the part where he'd said he'd done something "terrible" that day?
I am talking about a population of criminals inside prisons, not about the general population.
It is impossible to measure with accuracy how much of a deterrent the death penalty is, since people will rarely answer a survey by saying: "I was planning to murder Joe Schmoe, but then I remebered the death penalty and thought better of it."
What you can measure with accuracy is the death penalty's main purpose: the elimination of recidivism among the executed. That's running at a 100% correlation.
How do we figure out which ones are "certain" to kill?
When they make the attempt they kind of send the message to us.
I'm not saying the deterrant arg is faulty by nature; I'm saying it can't be definitively settled by statistical swings. That data will figure into the argument, it's just not definitive by itself.
Obviously you are committed to your position on this, which is all well and good. But at the end of the day, you are contradicting both JP2 and B16's assertion that conditions necessitating the DP are virtually "non-existent". There must be some wisdom behind that statement. Shouldn't we try and discover what it is?
My feeling is that their default theoretical milieu was/is an environment very much like modern-day Italy or Germany, societies with very low murder rates - and murderers who generally are individuals who kill a family member for personal reasons, not 18 year old gangbangers showing out for their crew.
When 50-year old Hans snaps and kills his wife Kuenigunde because she refuses to prepare roellmops the way he likes them, the chances that he will kill someone else anytime soon are probably statistically insignificant and the need to execute him or his ilk is "non-existent."
The Crips and the Bloods are not part of Benedict XVI's mental furniture.
There must be some wisdom behind that statement. Shouldn't we try and discover what it is?
Of course there is wisdom there - the question is: how broad is that wisdom's application? Since it is an extremely general statement that studiously ignores particular cases, we have to see how practical this non-existence is when the rubber meets the road.
But the Church does not teach that one must accept her position on the DP to be fully in Communion. (Regardless of the positions of the Am Bishops) If and when that ever happens, I shall work on bringing myself into the fold.
I feel that the DP is rare already. Of course, once you bring in states that murder their own for political reasons, it becomes much less so. While we believe the world revolves around the US, perhaps the Pope had the whole world in mind.
I agree that reform is needed, but think the DP should remain in place. As far as deterrence, doesn't a person need to believe that something will in fact occur, and probably soon? If the likelihood of the DP is minimal, and that it wouldn't be carried out for like 20 years, why would the existence of it be a deterrent?
Well, yeah. The Church is arguing that the sanctity of life protects even the worst criminal as long as they are no longer a threat to society at large. That includes criminals in China, North Korea, and the United States. Though it's not an absolute condemnation, and we're not removed from communion with the Church, it's still our responsibilty, as the flock, to listen to what the Magisterium advises us, and if our consciences are not conformed, to make the effort to seek out understanding of their stance.
This has been an extremely difficult step to take, as I was very much pro-DP. However, I've found it quite liberating to at least begin to understand what is being taught. I don't have all the answers, but if we're not open to what the Church has explicitly declared, we're just spinning our wheels with our own opinions.
Catholics should never go to jail! /sarc.
I understand what you're saying, but if the Pope issues an encyclical, he's being guided by the Holy Spirit, whether or not he has the "mental furniture" to understand the gang wars in Long Beach. What's the theoretical millieu employed by the Holy Spirit?
At any rate, as Bill O'Reilly says, I'll let you have the last word. I don't want to beat a dead horse.
Or maybe you could look at it like this: the only reasonable impetus, therefore, is justice. Is justice a legitimate goal for us to try to achieve by public means? The question is not without difficulty but I would answer yes.
It is important to bear in mind that no work of man will be perfect and therefore perfect attainment of justice but whatever means is impossible. My feeling is though that American justice is very far from perfect. The guilty are freed and the innocent punished all too often. But also the punishments meted out to the guilty are not fitting either too severe or too lenient.
My theory of government is that we have it because we've learned in the long course of human history, and in some part by our evolutionary heritage, that we're better off with it than without. IOW it improves our lives. It's a short step from that view to my moral view of government that, in order to fulfill its role, it is obliged to try to make us better off always and never worse. Further I think that it is obliged to seek continually to improve.
Who should be responsible? I think the members of our justice system, lawers, judges, legislators, police, have the primary moral responsibility to continually refine and improve it. I think they're not fulfilling that responsibility.
He probably is - but not necessarily.
The First Vatican Council's defined doctrinal standard of infallibility does not apply as a blanket covering all phrases in all encyclicals.
And the Holy Ghost generally does not deal in "almosts" and conditionals like "practically nonexistent in current conditions."
Such phraseology inevitably leads to the conclusion that "practically" is not "totally" and that it becomes a prudential judgment.
Everyone needs to take into account this question: "Is it necessary to execute Criminal X?" and apply the reasoning of the encyclical - but there is no hard answer as to what constitutes necessity for every actor in every situation.
The Church teaches that we do have a right to kill in self-defense, but the Church cannot really decide ahead of time in each and every case whether the self-defender could have just wounded the attacker instead given the circumstances in a given particular incident.
A well-formed conscience has to take revealed principles of moral behavior as the basis and measure of one's actions, but must apply them prudentially in each case.
>>I just wonder if you'd have the same position if it were you who were innocent and strapped to the gurney.<<
No. I would not. That is why we do not let convicted felons decide the methods used for incenting them to avoid the crime.
It is between me and God then. And although my flesh would not rejoice, my spirit would.
It is evident that some thrive in that environment. Modern prisons are well designed. An older one perhaps would be harsh to live in--but today, where a prisoner is not forced to do any labor, can get free education and medical care,free meals and clothing--well, it beats being in the real world where you have to earn all those things.
If prison is so bad, why the high rate of recividism?
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