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The real reason to end the death penalty

paulgraham.com

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Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#131

Post by goldcd »

unyttigfjelltol wrote: post #124
goldcd wrote: post #86

The thing I find distasteful is the 'sanitization' of execution. I've got some ideas on how to spice it up: Brushing away of the wrongful executions as a price of justice. Hold a monthly lottery of the population, with the random 'winner' being executed. Out of a population of millions you wouldn't even notice, but would send a message to the world that you were OK with the cost. Secondly. Repercussions for those tha…

>Hold a monthly lottery of the population, ... The point you're making is that living in society each day is a ticket in lottery where we could be falsely accused of a crime, falsely convicted, and unjustly punished. That's horrific all around, a death penalty is a factor but not even the biggest. On the contrary, if we need a death penality to make someone like your audience care about that horror of punishing innoc…

I think my more concise post would be that "law and order" (unlike practically any other issue) is thought of by the majority as "something that happens to other people". It's not. They think it's fair. It's not.

Example in the UK is that we used to have "Legal Aid" - if you were accused of something (and were of modest means) the government would pay a modest amount for a laywer to represent you. Wasn't a cheap system in absolute terms, but as a proportion of government expenditure was tiny. Over the years successive governments of all sides have gutted the system - and media delights in planted stories like "Insurance companies scammed" and "Terrorist receives money". Basically, "We're giving money to criminals and we should stop."

Nobody considers the flip side - "Can you pay for a legal defence if the Police knock on your door tomorrow?"

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#132

Post by cies »

anoncake wrote: post #107
cies wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which civilized society? In which baby Bush "finishes off" what papa Bush started?

What kind of argument is this? You're already barbarians so might as well be consistent?

It's more like: I see a pattern.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#133

Post by hedberg10 »

Sebb767 wrote: post #110
hedberg10 wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can never 'match' the crime. Even if you go justicing around 'an eye for an eye' style, the perp will always have taken the initiative. You can never get that back. Everything you do is just a reaction. That is what makes crime so heinous. So your focus should be prevention at any cost first and foremost, then justice as prevention (= rehabilitation) as well. Murdering a murderer is pretty solid prevention though…

> You can never get that back. Everything you do is just a reaction. Yes, but you can try. I can see why the loved ones of a murdered person feel someone is 'getting away' when he is still alive. Killing them feels much more like payback. I don't that this does reasonably make sense, but I can understand where they are coming from.

> Killing them feels much more like payback

I'm sure many find that it didn't feel like it at all, because of my argumentation. Payback will always be incomplete. It can never be paid in full.

Even if you kill someone over and over again (some Sci-Fi comes to mind), the perp always took the first step and elevated his role in society unjustly.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#134

Post by elisbce »

wideareanetwork wrote: post #2

I think no other justification is needed to end the death penalty than “it’s inhuman and barbaric”. Even discussing other factors arguments and considerations dilutes the core point that’s it’s straight up wrong unethical and inhuman to murder others in the name of the law. Paul Graham has a valid point, but if you say “it’s wrong cause it’s inaccurate”, implies it’s right if it’s accurate. And it’s not... the death…

It's inhuman and barbaric to sentence criminals to death penalty (usually very quick less painful), and yet, the usually much worse criminal acts (cold-blood torturing, mass murdering, beheadings, etc.) that they ACTUALLY conducted on other completely innocent human beings are just not inhuman and barbaric and unethical enough for you to the point that you think it is not even worth discussing and a no-brainer to forgive. This is why the crimes are on the rise in this world, and justice is not being enforced by law due to the hypocritical "empathy" for the real criminals.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#135

Post by gher-shyu3i »

wideareanetwork wrote: post #2

I think no other justification is needed to end the death penalty than “it’s inhuman and barbaric”. Even discussing other factors arguments and considerations dilutes the core point that’s it’s straight up wrong unethical and inhuman to murder others in the name of the law. Paul Graham has a valid point, but if you say “it’s wrong cause it’s inaccurate”, implies it’s right if it’s accurate. And it’s not... the death…

It's not inhumane nor barbaric (appease to emotions fallacy). It has to be applied correctly however. When someone kills someone else on purpose and with determinism, they have forfeit their right to live. It's quite simple.

Of course, the application of the death penalty in the US is very wrong. Other cultures have solved this issue a long time ago.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#136

Post by pseudo0 »

_hl_ wrote: post #51
donatj wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think there is a somewhat reasonable argument that a punishment should mirror the crime, and any less than inhuman and barbaric to the inhuman and barbaric lacks actual justice? I’m not saying I agree, I don’t personally support the death sentence, but if you’re actually interested in changing peoples minds it’s good to know where they’re coming from, and why they may not find your argument compelling. I personally…

I'm not from the US, so my knowledge on the death penalty is quite limited. But I clicked on a link posted below listing executions in Texas, and I was shocked to see that the most recent execution was last year for a crime committed back in 1993 . Why?? You've already locked the guy up for almost three decades, what possible benefit is there to executing him now? I get that he ruined (well, ended) someones life, but…

It's the result of a decades-long lawfare campaign by anti-death penalty activists. The more protracted and expensive it is to carry out the death penalty, the easier it is to argue for abolishing it on the practical grounds of cost rather than convincing Americans of the ethical case. A rather messed up byproduct of this is cases like the one you highlight, where the convicted person is left on death row for decades as they make hail-mary appeals.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#137

Post by simonh »

wideareanetwork wrote: post #2

I think no other justification is needed to end the death penalty than “it’s inhuman and barbaric”. Even discussing other factors arguments and considerations dilutes the core point that’s it’s straight up wrong unethical and inhuman to murder others in the name of the law. Paul Graham has a valid point, but if you say “it’s wrong cause it’s inaccurate”, implies it’s right if it’s accurate. And it’s not... the death…

I think the state legitimately reserves for itself the right to resort to lethal force. National defence and effective policing can require violence when necessary.

The key issue for me is necessity. It is not necessary to execute criminals, even murderers. I do have sympathy for the view that murderers deserve death, maybe many of them do, but then you get into drawing lines between cases that deserve death and ones that don't. Is the evidence in this case good enough to kill, but this one the evidence is only good enough to incarcerate. It politicises the judicial and criminal justice system. So I oppose the death penalty not because it's barbaric or morally wrong per se, but because it introduces moral hazard that compromises the system.

We can see this in the US where prosecutors fight tooth and nail to preserve convictions and ensure convicts get executed largely in order to protect the system of executions from the embarrassment of death row inmates getting exonerated. Defending the system becomes more important than serving justice.

As a Brit I think politicisation is the thing that concerns me most about the US justice system. Elected prosecutors, elected judges, the politicisation of executions I described above. I don't know what it's like in other countries, but comparatively speaking all that just isn't a thing over here at all. Political debate on criminal justice is focused on laws and the administration of policing. That's really about it. It's not like we don't have miscarriages of justice, our system is far from perfect but it's mainly sees as being independent and professionalised.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#138

Post by gher-shyu3i »

piva00 wrote: post #111
hntroll666 wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> barbaric Sorry, but that's exactly the kind of world we live in. The world simply is barbaric no matter what we would prefer. When people mess up a little bit, we put them through a process that, despite its massive inadequacy, is intended to rehabilitate them so that they can return to society. The death penalty is for when someone commits a crime so severe that they cannot ever return to society. If you are not a…

With this type of argument you attack one of the central tenets of human rights where every human life, no matter what, is worth the same. The moment you define that there are certain crimes where a human life is not the same as other human lives, no matter the reason, you move away from this core tenet. It's all a matter if you believe in that core piece of universal human rights or not.

> one of the central tenets of human rights where every human life, no matter what, is worth the same.

You have to define who made up this right. Not everyone will agree. Most people will have boundaries on that no matter what all human lives are the same. Killing someone else on purpose breaks that boundary.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#139

Post by true_religion »

ehnto wrote: post #64
mettamage wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, from a persuasion point of view I agree. But from a "trying to understand another human" point of view, I'd recommend you to read the Wikipedia page on ethics [1]. My own education on the topic: a course in college (as a business student) and watching some of the Harvard lectures on ethics [0]. IMO ethics courses teaches people to gain a more fine-grained vocabulary on explaining their own positions and underst…

The trap you are both falling into is the thought that political discussions centre around trying to understand the other persons point of view. It is almost always the other way around, one person trying to persuade an unwilling party that they are wrong. So as the poster said, as right as you are, you would still lose the political argument if that was how you tried to argue for your view. You can be correct all da…

It’s all good and well to try and persuade someone, but like the GP sometimes I like to simply state my ideological viewpoint. The problem with narrowly arguing based on someone else’s ideals, is that any agreement isn’t a true meeting of the minds.

For example people, once tried to end the deal then penalty by talking about to pain involved in hanging. Proponents agreed and eventually came up with the electric chair, then lethal injection. No pain, no problem right?

If we talk about innocents killed, proponents will add stricter guidelines, and allow for more appeals, or even say that the crime must have been videotaped in front of a crowd of witnesses. We might end up with a death penalty that applies to the likes of Derek Chauvin alone, but it’ll still be a death penalty.

Re: The real reason to end the death penalty

#140

Post by true_religion »

hedberg10 wrote: post #133
Sebb767 wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can never get that back. Everything you do is just a reaction. Yes, but you can try. I can see why the loved ones of a murdered person feel someone is 'getting away' when he is still alive. Killing them feels much more like payback. I don't that this does reasonably make sense, but I can understand where they are coming from.

> Killing them feels much more like payback I'm sure many find that it didn't feel like it at all, because of my argumentation. Payback will always be incomplete. It can never be paid in full. Even if you kill someone over and over again (some Sci-Fi comes to mind), the perp always took the first step and elevated his role in society unjustly.

Lack of punishment can lead to more crime if people lose faith in the system. To take it to an extreme, if murder were punished with only a fine then victim families would just hire assassins to kill off a murderer if they feel the fine doesn’t suffice.
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