EPTTroy Davis, death penalty in the United States - Page 5
| Forum Index > General Forum |
|
durza
United States667 Posts
| ||
|
Feartheguru
Canada1334 Posts
On September 22 2011 11:36 wesbare wrote: I believe anti-death penalty arguments do not place a high enough value on human life. I would only advocate the death penalty for someone who is clearly, beyond a shadow of doubt, guilty of murder. I am a Christian. I believe God created man in His image, making human life unique from the rest of creation. Human life is sacred, and both Biblical and Western values speak to this (i.e. Locke's "life, liberty, and property"). There are good Bible-based arguments for circumstances which call for the death penalty. There are also Bible-based arguments against the death penalty; I believe those latter arguments poorly formed. I believe anything less than the death penalty for unmistakable cases of murder does not uphold the value of the life that was unjustly taken by the murderous act. Proper government via a social contract with the people is designed to uphold the rights of the people. Using Locke again, the government must dutifully protect the natural rights (i.e. life, liberty, property, pursuit of happiness) of its people, and the people must act reasonably toward their government, obeying its laws and paying their taxes. Protecting the rights of the people means treating their rights, namely their right to life, with the rightful worth and value those rights deserve. Put more succinctly, here is my mostly secular argument for the likely agnostic audience of this forum: A man's life is valuable/precious. If you murder a man, that is to intentionally take a man's life without just cause (e.g. not out of self-defense), then you forfeit your right to your own life. As for the problem of convicting an innocent man of murder... I agree. It's a very troublesome problem. I am thankful it happens in very small percentage of cases, but I am, like the rest of you, bothered that it happens at all. No justice system is perfect in its judgements, and I can't imagine a solution to the inevitable fallibility of the Court in some instances. And Christians have the mettle to argue that atheists are the ones who are the hypocrites? | ||
|
Naio
27 Posts
On September 22 2011 12:36 acker wrote: If Cole publishes an "if I did it" book in the next year like Casey Anthony and Simpson, I'm going to break something. Please tell me that you are not a citizen of the United States. If you are, please tell me that you cannot vote and do not plan on reproducing. Great contribution, chap! What are you suggesting, a powerless state that will not try people for fear of indicting an innocent person? You realize that you, as a member of the USA, gives the courts an enormous amount of power and potential control over your life, right? Your residence is an agreement that you will follow what the State says... | ||
|
jupidar
United States229 Posts
On September 22 2011 12:00 ShadowDrgn wrote: This isn't a failure of the judicial process whatsoever. Davis had his day in court and has been given numerous stays and appeals, and he's ultimately lost every single one of them. He was also convicted of shooting another man that same night, and the bullet casings matched the ones at the cop murder - that's a lot more than zero physical evidence. As for witness recanting, it happens often. My uncle is a criminal lawyer in Georgia and has had to deal with it before. Over the years, people's memories get fuzzy, they feel responsible for sentencing a man to death/prison, and they're pressured by the family of the convicted to change their stories. The fact that the witnesses didn't recant until right before his first execution date is very telling. I don't like the death penalty, but that doesn't make Troy Davis innocent either. Eye witness testimony is not very reliable to begin with. | ||
|
Telcontar
United Kingdom16710 Posts
| ||
|
Release
United States4397 Posts
On September 22 2011 12:50 Feartheguru wrote: And Christians have the mettle to argue that atheists are the ones who are the hypocrites? Plz no religious debate: no God, no Christian, no Atheist. I think that Georgia will have to proceed with caution. If they end up killing an innocent man, i doubt their legal system will have any merit anymore. | ||
|
Deleted User 183001
2939 Posts
I'm going to take a wild guess and say he's a minority, most likely black since there's been many cases historically (famous and not), where blacks are convicted of stuff they didn't do. I will now check the news article. EDIT: What do you know. He's black. No surprise he's in this pickle when the evidence is bad, probably completely fabricated for all we know. gg legal system. | ||
|
Naio
27 Posts
[B]On September 22 2011 12:54 Telcontar wrote: It's the problem when the defense and prosecution's cases are based upon convincing their non-professional, inexperienced peers. | ||
TanGeng
Sanya12364 Posts
On September 22 2011 12:35 Naio wrote: Then honestly, neither should they have the power to convict and ruin people's lives. Mistakes will always be made, people will always intentionally do wrong. We are not a benign species, and as such some sacrifices should be made and some control should be given up to the State to attempt to make the best, safest life for the majority (I do realize that every country really doesn't give two shits about fully assisting the people with their needs, but that's for another post). Until that day that we as a species think of the whole rather than as an individual, we absolutely must allow the state to make those types of decisions, despite the fact that there is a margin of error (and lets be honest, it is a rather acceptable margin for error). On this point, society should be designing a system that provides incentives to minimise prosecutor misconduct and miscarriages of justice. That the US largely affords immunity from prosecutor misconduct to prosecutors removes the negative consequences of convicting innocents and de-incentivises efforts to ascertain the innocence of the accused on the part of prosecutors. That the US largely immunises the government and judges from liability of wrongful convictions also removes incentives to pursue of truth in the courts. The legal effective immunity of liability of judges does a great disservice to the pursuit justice and tilts the playing field inordinately towards both convictions and wrongful convictions. | ||
|
OpTicalRH
147 Posts
I do not want to be spending a single penny to feed and sleep those rapists and murders. Let them put to death, do you think you can stand when one of your family members was raped or killed while the criminal is still breathing and bragging about his "achievement"? | ||
|
DoubleReed
United States4130 Posts
On September 22 2011 11:36 wesbare wrote: I believe anti-death penalty arguments do not place a high enough value on human life. I would only advocate the death penalty for someone who is clearly, beyond a shadow of doubt, guilty of murder. I am a Christian. I believe God created man in His image, making human life unique from the rest of creation. Human life is sacred, and both Biblical and Western values speak to this (i.e. Locke's "life, liberty, and property"). There are good Bible-based arguments for circumstances which call for the death penalty. There are also Bible-based arguments against the death penalty; I believe those latter arguments poorly formed. I believe anything less than the death penalty for unmistakable cases of murder does not uphold the value of the life that was unjustly taken by the murderous act. Proper government via a social contract with the people is designed to uphold the rights of the people. Using Locke again, the government must dutifully protect the natural rights (i.e. life, liberty, property, pursuit of happiness) of its people, and the people must act reasonably toward their government, obeying its laws and paying their taxes. Protecting the rights of the people means treating their rights, namely their right to life, with the rightful worth and value those rights deserve. Put more succinctly, here is my mostly secular argument for the likely agnostic audience of this forum: A man's life is valuable/precious. If you murder a man, that is to intentionally take a man's life without just cause (e.g. not out of self-defense), then you forfeit your right to your own life. As for the problem of convicting an innocent man of murder... I agree. It's a very troublesome problem. I am thankful it happens in very small percentage of cases, but I am, like the rest of you, bothered that it happens at all. No justice system is perfect in its judgements, and I can't imagine a solution to the inevitable fallibility of the Court in some instances. This doesn't make any sense. It's okay when society kills somebody, but not when people do? Remember, they'll be in jail for life, they cannot kill anyone else. It doesn't matter to the public one way or the other whether or not we kill or jail them for life. You are killing somebody only for the reason that society says they should die. At the very least, you should admit that it's morally ambiguous. May I remind you that the proper execution described in the Bible is stoning someone. And when we hear about middle eastern countries stoning people, we consider them barbaric. | ||
|
Caelyn0101
103 Posts
On September 22 2011 10:50 Haemonculus wrote: It's less about the death penalty in general, and more that we're likely about to execute an innocent man. It's possible he is guilty, but there was never any physical evidence, and he was convicted based on eye witness accounts, whom I believe have *all* since recanted their testimony. This argument holds no value at all, you could use the same logic to say that people shouldnt drive becasue innocent children could be run down in an accident, You can't say that the death penalty is a bad idea and a broken system because they MIGHT make a mistake. Like anything mistakes can happen and the consequences can be fatal, but that's no reason in my opinion to say that its a bad system. | ||
|
Diamond
United States10796 Posts
On September 22 2011 13:05 OpTicalRH wrote: I'm not talking about Troy Davis' case here. I do not want to be spending a single penny to feed and sleep those rapists and murders. Let them put to death, do you think you can stand when one of your family members was raped or killed while the criminal is still breathing and bragging about his "achievement"? There then comes up the issue that often times it costs more to kill someone then life in jail: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/03/27/just-cost-death-penalty-killer-state-budgets/ | ||
|
MilesTeg
France1271 Posts
On September 22 2011 12:35 Naio wrote: Then honestly, neither should they have the power to convict and ruin people's lives. Mistakes will always be made, people will always intentionally do wrong. We are not a benign species, and as such some sacrifices should be made and some control should be given up to the State to attempt to make the best, safest life for the majority (I do realize that every country really doesn't give two shits about fully assisting the people with their needs, but that's for another post). Until that day that we as a species think of the whole rather than as an individual, we absolutely must allow the state to make those types of decisions, despite the fact that there is a margin of error (and lets be honest, it is a rather acceptable margin for error). The difference is that it's somewhat harder to correct your mistake after you killed someone. I actually like your choice of words, "we absolutely must". Do you think it's absolutely necessary to kill people who do wrong? Don't you think the threat of imprisonnement is enough? Most civilized countries don't have the death penalty anymore, and as far as I can tell it's not complete chaos. There really is no reason to have the death penalty in the first place. All it does is create tensions and unnecessary violence. | ||
|
Zealotdriver
United States1557 Posts
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/22/us/final-pleas-and-vigils-in-troy-davis-execution.html | ||
|
Termit
Sweden3466 Posts
| ||
|
BlueBird.
United States3889 Posts
On September 22 2011 13:05 OpTicalRH wrote: I'm not talking about Troy Davis' case here. I do not want to be spending a single penny to feed and sleep those rapists and murders. Let them put to death, do you think you can stand when one of your family members was raped or killed while the criminal is still breathing and bragging about his "achievement"? Except the only way to not spend a single penny is to not pay taxes. It costs way more $ to kill them, there have been a couple posts about this in this very thread. If I witnessed a family member being raped or killed, and I had the chance, i would probably kill the guy/woman right there, emotions and everything would probably make anyone do things they would regret later. If you gave me a year or so to cool off, then yes, i can say I'd rather have them sit in prison than be put to death. I am 100% against the death penalty, in all cases. I mean, let's be honest, there are people that are in jail cause they got caught with weed a few too many times, that's whats costing you $. The entire system is dumb, my step dad's good friend from his youth got put away for life for the three strike rule. Did he do some really stupid stuff? Of course, does he deserve to go to prison for life.. Don't think so. I don't know this guy btw. From what I can gather, Troy was probably guilty, he never was able to win anything in court, and they generally know what their doing if he lost all of those appeals, and the jury convicted him. I don't really think I care enough to look into all the details, but by no means should this guy have died today. | ||
|
keiraknightlee
United States301 Posts
Black man gets hammered by the full extent of the law, while the white damsel in distress is let free... That's America for you... | ||
|
Terranist
United States2496 Posts
On September 22 2011 13:17 keiraknightlee wrote: It's actually really simple. Troy Davis was executed even on weak evidence, while Casey Anthony was let off the hook despite strong evidence... Black man gets hammered by the full extent of the law, while the white damsel in distress is let free... That's America for you... he had prior felonies and 7 of the 12 jury members were black. | ||
|
DannyJ
United States5110 Posts
On September 22 2011 13:17 keiraknightlee wrote: It's actually really simple. Troy Davis was executed even on weak evidence, while Casey Anthony was let off the hook despite strong evidence... Black man gets hammered by the full extent of the law, while the white damsel in distress is let free... That's America for you... Wait... Everyone in America was calling for the head of that "damsel in distress". There was no clear evidence she was a murderer, and she was let free by jurors. Something that maybe should have happened in this case. | ||
| ||
