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This year we can end the death penalty in California

paulgraham.com

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Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#151

Post by labster »

xiaoma wrote: post #104
jernfrost wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is bad, but you can compensate an wrongfully jailed person afterwards. But I think it is a fair point, which is why I am also against harsh prison conditions. I think prison should mainly be about rehabilitation and shielding society from the danger of the person. If prison mainly means losing freedom, you aren't necessarily ruined mentally when you get out.

> That is bad, but you can compensate an wrongfully jailed person afterwards. How do you compensate someone for being imprisoned (and likely raped) from the age of 28 to 45? In many cases, the death penalty is more humane.

If rape is likely in prison, as you suggest, how is our current prison system not a form of torture?

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#152

Post by danieltillett »

There is one good reason to keep the status quo (death penalty without any actual deaths) which is that anyone given a death sentence gets their case extensively reviewed and appealed by excellent lawyers working pro bono. The people who get life get no help at all.

I have read of prisioners being upset when given a life sentence as they know that no one will help them appeal their conviction. If you are innocent you want to be given a death sentence since you will have so many more people helping you get your conviction overturned.

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#153

Post by wolfgke »

mikeash wrote: post #15
justinzollars wrote: post #10

The death penalty never made sense to me. We teach our kids its wrong to kill by killing? I'd rather the person spend their life in jail to think about what they have done.

I'm against the death penalty, but I don't think that argument holds up very well. We say it's wrong to kidnap people and hold them against their will, but we put people in prison as punishment. We say it's wrong to steal, but we use fines as punishment. Pretty much by definition, any effective punishment has to be something that's wrong to do to people in general.

> We say it's wrong to kidnap people and hold them against their will, but we put people in prison as punishment.

This is rather an arguments against prisons to me.

> We say it's wrong to steal, but we use fines as punishment.

Objectivists would indeed argue this is an argument against taxes.

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#154

Post by exolymph »

noobermin wrote: post #73
silencio wrote: post #6

Don't forget to explicitly vote no on 66 if you are voting yes on 62. If both of them pass, the one with more 'yes' votes will supersede the other.

States should not allow two propositions that contradict each other to be put up for vote simultaneously. They are generally confusing and almost always favor the status quo at the expense of most citizens who don't have time to understand the nuances of each prop/issue/initiative/ammendment.

California's whole proposition system is stupid in general.

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#155

Post by tedunangst »

jacquesm wrote: post #140
tptacek wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not arguing against persuasive essays. Persuasive essays are great. I'm saying that this isn't a persuasive essay. It's a political bulletin. I agree with its politics, but not with its place on the HN front page.

Even if the essay isn't persuasive the discussion could be. I also think that your flag-marshalling is in pretty poor taste, flagging it yourself for whatever reasons you have is fine but to call on others to do so as well is really not good.

Isn't that exactly what the article is doing, calling on others to vote the same way?

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#156

Post by tropo »

jernfrost wrote: post #78
murtnowski wrote: post #7

California already removed the death penalty in 1972 then later reinstated it. This resulted in killers like Charles Mason being relieved from execution and denying many victim's family member from obtaining a measure of justice they wanted. Since being reinstated only 13 people have been executed. And none in the past 10 years. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capital_punishment_in_Californ...

Why can't people speak in honest terms? What you mean isn't justice, but revenge. Killing a killer will not undo the damage they have done. It will not bring a life back. If people require revenge for emotionally healing then that is because society has promoted this as justice. I've never heard of victims desiring death for killers in my home country, but we are not so big on revenge and don't. The American justice…

This justice-revenge distinction you are making is merely tone. Factually, they are one and the same.

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#157

Post by Koshkin »

rm_-rf_slash wrote: post #23

Execution is cathartic but hardly effective. Clearly it does not deter murderers as they believe they will either get away with it or they simply don't care as long as they satisfy their need to kill. The wrong people can be executed and unlike a prison sentence, there's no going back. Appeals can last for decades and waste enormous amounts of time and money. End the death penalty. It's just not worth it.

> hardly effective

Of course it is effective. If only because it reliably and permanently removes the dangerous person from the society.

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#158

Post by jacquesm »

tedunangst wrote: post #155
jacquesm wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if the essay isn't persuasive the discussion could be. I also think that your flag-marshalling is in pretty poor taste, flagging it yourself for whatever reasons you have is fine but to call on others to do so as well is really not good.

Isn't that exactly what the article is doing, calling on others to vote the same way?

No, it isn't. Flags are counted asymmetrically compared to votes. But if you want to be clever about it go ahead, personally I think it is against what HN is about, if we're going to have flag brigading we might as well have vote brigading. See also: digg.

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#159

Post by paulddraper »

jacquesm wrote: post #107
paulddraper wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's no undo button for imprisonment. Your life was taken, and no one can give it back. It's a difference of degree only, not kind.

I think that viewpoint was already covered elsewhere in this thread.

I think this whole thread has already been covered elsewhere.

Re: This year we can end the death penalty in California

#160

Post by jacquesm »

Taek wrote: post #150
lawpoop wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wow, this seems extremely naive. (Honestly I'm feeling like I got trolled.) You don't know of anybody who has never been imprisoned who is managing to live their life without interacting with any of the things you've mentioned? If not, I would recommend enlarging your circle of contact.

When you come back to society and try to make friends, everyone is going to be utilizing technology to shape their interactions. Uber makes new types of socializing reasonable. (bars and parties farther away). Phones change how people schedule events. Chips in credit cards change how you spend your money. This isn't trolling. If you don't know how to use modern tech, it's going to be harder to socialize, especially i…

It wouldn't take more than a few weeks to learn how to use those newfangled bits of tech. In fact, a very large portion of the world gets along just fine without them.

There are far worse consequences to being jailed for 10 years or more than not to be able to use a cell phone or the latest social media fad.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutional_syndrome

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