The Death Penalty

Byrnzie wrote:

Thirty Bills Unpaid wrote:

About 30 years ago, we had a fellow stalk a family while they camped in one of our nearby parks. To make a long story short... he shot the adults, enslaved the two young daughters for a few days and had his way with them... then finished them off. I wonder if those pain-filled days for those girls equal the months leading to the guillotine for the murderous fiend, Camus? After the public learned of the heinous crime- I was a pre-teen then- we were outraged... and sad. It was not nice.

The RCMP spent a year solidifying their case- even though they knew who it was. They couldn't risk 'botching' the case in court for not crossing a 'tee'. After finally arresting and convicting, the man went to prison- we don't have the death penalty. But man do we need it. He needed death. He needed death because the remaining family members and community for that matter have been subjected to his parole hearings that are entertaining the notion of releasing this man. Shortly after he was sentenced, some loser married the guy while he was in prison. I guess there wasn't enough guys outside of prison? He changed his name and now wants a fresh start- a mulligan if you will. Rumour has it that he's close to achieving these ends. He insists he's a 'changed man'. There are some do-gooders that think he is a changed man. The survivors insisting he remains in prison have become somewhat of a nuisance for these do-gooders ("Just get over it already. Come on now. Geez, talk about vindictive. Holy crap!"). The majority of us see him for what he is. Some crimes are inexcusable. This one is one of them.

The survivors deserve better than to keep fighting to hold this monster in prison.

Your example points to a possible failing in this particular case - you haven't provided any details of the case so it's not possible for anyone reading this to check the facts. What your example doesn't do is justify state-sanctioned murder.

Thirty Bills Unpaid wrote:

I wonder if those pain-filled days for those girls equal the months leading to the guillotine for the murderous fiend, Camus?

Firstly, how do you know those girls were certain that they were going to be killed?
Secondly, how does being told of the exact date of your 'execution' months, or even years beforehand, compare to a situation lasting a couple of days in which survival - escape, or rescue - is still a possibility?

In fact, your example contains a lot of drama and very little substance. "Just get over it already. Come on now. Geez, talk about vindictive. Holy crap!"
We're supposed to just accept your word for it that after a heinous murder of an entire family, that some delusional 'do-gooders' have intervened and are on the brink of succeeding in having this 'monster' released into society? That's it. A simple case of some do-gooders siding with a rapist and murderer and dismissing the feelings of the victims relatives.
Sorry, but that all just sounds a bit too convenient for me.


And who are you to say that anyone 'needs death'? That's the sort of thing that Nazi concentration guards used to say to the Jews filing into the gas chambers.

'A nineteen year-old girl [during one selection process] asked the Auschwitz camp commander, Hossler, to excuse her. He replied, "You have lived long enough. Come, my child, come."
- 'The Destruction of The European Jews' - Raul Hilberg

Sigh. Byrnzie... I guess when I speak in Pearl Jam's Moving Train forum... I'd like to feel as if I'm speaking in the pub. You want something pasted in here to prove what I say is true. Here's a fairly recent local news link:

http://www.news1130.com/news/local/arti ... -september

You'll find much of what I expressed earlier is supported. You can dig around more if you like to try and 'poke some holes in what I have expressed'. Know this though... I have followed this case with interest since its origin. I also know people who had worked the case. I won't what I am talking about here. Give me some credit- I'd do the same for you.

I won't speak for very long here because I get the impression you are the type that likes to talk alot, but doesn't listen with quite the same level of enthusiasm. Regardless, your response to my post borders on offensive. No, in fact... it is offensive. To be precise, I don't appreciate the mockery of my words and the veiled comparison of myself (or my attitude) to a Nazi concentration camp guard.

I can get over your condescending, Oracle delivered response... but what really gets my blood boiling though is how you make so little of the two murdered girls' situation. How do I know the girls were certain they were going to get killed? Well, I guess I don't. They may have been to busy trying to place themselves in another dimension while repeatedly being raped; however, it's likely a safe bet they did think they were going to die given their parents and grandparents were murdered in front of them just prior to becoming captive.

Further, are you serious when you ask: how does being told of the exact date of your 'execution' months, or even years beforehand, compare to a situation lasting a couple of days in which survival - escape, or rescue - is still a possibility? Yeah. The girls were likely plotting their escape until their captor 'kicked it up a couple of notches'. You also seem to equate the plight of a convicted murderer awaiting his execution with the plight of two innocent girls. Don't you think one plight was brought upon through one's actions? Does this not make any difference to you when comparing the two situations?

You keep throwing Camus's name out there (a kind of comical intellectual name dropping of sorts). If you are getting your perspective from him and this is what he has you believing... find another guy.

Byrnzie wrote:

Thirty Bills Unpaid wrote:

I don't appreciate the mockery of my words and the veiled comparison of myself (or my attitude) to a Nazi concentration camp guard.

Why? Where's the difference in either remark with regards to adopting the position of arbiter of life and death? Where's the difference in assuming the role of the giver of the Supreme and final judgement?

Thirty Bills Unpaid wrote:

what really gets my blood boiling though is how you make so little of the two murdered girls' situation. How do I know the girls were certain they were going to get killed? Well, I guess I don't. They may have been to busy trying to place themselves in another dimension while repeatedly being raped; however, it's likely a safe bet they did think they were going to die given their parents and grandparents were murdered in front of them just prior to becoming captive.

You can twist my words all you like, but unfortunately for you they're still there at the top of this page for all to see. I didn't 'make so little of the two murdered girls' situation'. I posed a question: 'How do I know the girls were certain they were going to get killed?' A perfectly legitimate question, which you now admit yourself you have no answer to. Were their deaths pre-meditated and certain? I don't know, and neither do you. And it's also possible that the murderer didn't know either before he finally killed them.
And your initial post said nothing about the girls parents being murdered in front of them.

Thirty Bills Unpaid wrote:

You also seem to equate the plight of a convicted murderer awaiting his execution with the plight of two innocent girls. Don't you think one plight was brought upon through one's actions? Does this not make any difference to you when comparing the two situations?

The difference it makes to me is that I would support such a murderer spending the rest of his life behind bars. Murdering him in turn will serve no useful purpose whatsoever, and would not have the effect of bringing his victims back to life.

Thirty Bills Unpaid wrote:

You keep throwing Camus's name out there (a kind of comical intellectual name dropping of sorts).

I don't keep 'throwing his name out there'. I've been posting quotations from him that are relevant to the discussion at hand. And I really couldn't care less if that bothers you.

Thirty Bills Unpaid wrote:

If you are getting your perspective from him and this is what he has you believing... find another guy.

Why? Because you happen to support state-sanctioned murder, and he doesn't?

Here's some more quotes from Albert Camus' essay:

'Whoever has done me harm must suffer harm; whoever has put out my eye must lose an eye; and whoever has killed must die. This is an emotion, and a particularly violent one, not a principle. Retaliation is related to nature and instinct, not to law. Law, by definition, cannot obey the same rules as nature. If murder is in the nature of man, the law is not intended to imitate or reproduce that nature. It is intended to correct it. Now, retaliation does no more than ratify and confer the status of a law on a pure impulse of nature.'

'But, let me repeat, I do not believe, nonetheless, that there is no responsibility in this world and that we must give way to that modern tendency to absolve everything, victim and murderer, in the same confusion. Such purely sentimental confusion is made up of cowardice rather than of generosity and eventually justifies whatever is worst in this world....To any who feel, on the other hand, that hard labor is too mild a penalty, we can answer first that they lack imagination, and secondly, that privation of freedom seems to them a slight punishment only insofar as contemporary society has taught us to despise freedom.'

My drink is empty in the MT pub and I'm going home on this one, Byrnzie. You have offered nothing to make me change my mind on how I stand on this issue. It's not for a weak effort though- barring some new divine argument... the Dalai Lama couldn't either. In my opinion, the position you support is not noble or profound. It's warm, it's fuzzy, and it certainly appears 'enlightened'... but it doesn't address the severity or nature of the crime. It doesn't serve the needs of survivors or the victims. Whether right or wrong... I seem to be more concerned with this than you though after you suggested: Murdering him in turn will serve no useful purpose whatsoever, and would not have the effect of bringing his victims back to life.

I have suggested that the death penalty has very useful purposes. It places closure on an ugly event for grieving survivors and communities. I'm okay with the Ted Bundy case closing as it did. At the very least, if 'vengeance' serves to assist grieving people... then so be it. Hugh, who sides with you, stated he'd want the death of any bastard that harmed his daughter. He proceeded to say it would be wrong... but that's how he'd feel. Camus' last quote echoed the same sentiments citing instinctual behaviour and the need for law to preside over such common instincts. To that end, I say let survivors have this form of justice given such a brutal scenario ever sadly becoming a reality. Faced with a life of grief, if the death of some bastard such as the one in the case I provided gives any solace at all... then provide it.

People surviving horrific crimes such as these should not be burdened with the task of ensuring these types of criminals at least remain behind bars. 25 years after the crime I detailed, if you read the piece I provided you, 9,000 signatures on a petition were ascertained protesting the possibility of parole when DS became eligible in 2008. That same year, people were shocked to hear that a release was given to him so that he could spend the day with his wife. Lovely. People in 2012 needed to summon their efforts again to protest the possibility of him getting paroled.

I'm okay with you feeling the way you do, Byrnzie. It doesn't make me think any less of you... but we'll have to agree to disagree.

Byrnzie wrote:

Firstly, how do you know those girls were certain that they were going to be killed?
Secondly, how does being told of the exact date of your 'execution' months, or even years beforehand, compare to a situation lasting a couple of days in which survival - escape, or rescue - is still a possibility?

Really? This is what you are going with? That the murderer has to deal with such a painful experience of waiting to die and it's worse than what he did to the 2 kidnapped girls?

Wow, I get that you are 100% against the death penalty. I can respect that. But I cannot respect that post at all.

I'm still in favor of having a death penalty. I think it should be rare, but it should be an option. But in reality, while I do enjoy discussing it, it's not really a high priority issue with me. If the death penalty was outlawed, it's not likely to change my world. And if we do away with any chance of parole for certain crimes, it wouldn't be a terrible travesty.

Byrnzie wrote:

cincybearcat wrote:

Really? This is what you are going with? That the murderer has to deal with such a painful experience of waiting to die and it's worse than what he did to the 2 kidnapped girls?

Yeah, that's the only thing I've said in 18 pages of this thread. :roll:

Almost, mostly you just quote others. But you said it and you said it is part of your justification for you position.

After re-reading that comment you made, do you really believe that?

Byrnzie wrote:

cincybearcat wrote:

After re-reading that comment you made, do you really believe that?

Yeah, I do. I wouldn't have said it otherwise.

Well then I think you are batshit crazy on this topic.

Byrnzie wrote:

cincybearcat wrote:

Well then I think you are batshit crazy on this topic.

Sure. And Albert Camus is an idiot, right?

sorry Byrnzie. I am with you being against capital punishment. but claiming that being on death row is worse than being the victim of a crime? that's taking it too far.

you cannot justify that statement in my eyes.

I'm against the death penalty for the benefit of humanity, not because I feel bad for the accused.

Byrnzie wrote:

cincybearcat wrote:

Byrnzie wrote:

From Reflections on the Guillotine - Albert Camus:

'it adds to death a rule, a public premeditation known to the future victim, an organization, in short, which is in itself a source of moral sufferings more terrible than death. Hence there is no equivalence. Many laws consider a premeditated crime more serious than a crime of pure violence. But what then is capital punishment but the most premeditated of murders, to which no criminal's deed, however calculated it may be, can be compared?
For there to be equivalence, the death penalty would have to punish a criminal who had warned his victim of the date at which he would inflict a horrible death on him and who, from that moment onward, had confined him to his mercy for months. Such a monster is not encountered in private life.

I love that attempt at making the murderer some kind of a victim.

And obviously this idiot isn't aware of what some of these monsters have done. There are plenty of monsters like that in private life.

Such as?

Just about everyone that kidnaps someone and tells them "scream and I'll kill ya".

How about all the sleazy bastards running sex rings?

I don't think it's unusual for some of these monsters to constantly tell their victims that they are going to die. If you want I guess I could google them all for you.

Byrnzie wrote:

cincybearcat wrote:

Just about everyone that kidnaps someone and tells them "scream and I'll kill ya".

How about all the sleazy bastards running sex rings?

I don't think it's unusual for some of these monsters to constantly tell their victims that they are going to die. If you want I guess I could google them all for you.

Yeah, go on. Google them all for me. Name me all the murderers who have confined their victims for months, or for years, having told them the precise date of their execution.

What is the difference, days, months, years? Its the fear of knowing that some monster is going to kill you and it could happen at any moment.

I know you have many other reasons for being against the death penalty, and a lot of good points. But this angle is just awful and I'm surprised you are even trying to defend it. It just absurd.