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[Poltifar]

Sean, from what I understand, you are sort of proposing to 'exile' the criminals? That would be great if we had only a small amount of criminals. But considering how many criminals are being kept in prisons even today, and how many are free, I think there numbers would reach the millions. If they are exiled to the same place, they would eventually form a sort of society, maybe a sick, twisted, lawless society, considering the people who compose it, but still a society, one that may be able to gather enough resources and fight back. We would then have a new, evil society, parallel to our own, and both sides waging war on each other. Unless we send them to some place REALLY isolated, but nowhere on Earth would prevent them completely from comming back, and I think exiling people to Mars or somesuch is still a bit farfetched for now.

[Sean Mirrsen]

Even a million people, perched on an island with no technology beyond hand tools (if that), would hardly gather any noiceable amount of resources, specifically because they would be limited to what's beneath their feet, and I doubt the governments would be so neglecting to choose an island sitting on an iron ore layer. And monitoring would be required, of course, but realistically, what could possibly drive a closed community with limited resources into an open conflict against, essentially, the entire planet? A similar plan (though with the spacefaring applied) got borked in Status Civilization, but mostly because of degradation of society rather than the idea's unviability.

[Cthulhu]

I just looked it up, and McDoomhammer's right.  The death penalty costs more.  It costs North Carolina 2.16 million dollars more per execution.(. P. Cook, "The Costs of Processing Murder Cases in North Carolina," Duke University (May 1993).)  Also, what's the real difference between execution and life imprisonment?  How long ago was the Oklahoma City bombing?  Timothy McVay was executed what, two years ago?  Three?  You're adding the cost of a much bigger trial,(Two trials, one for guilt and one for punishment) twice as many lawyers, sequestering the jurors, all of the appeals, and the sheer length of the trials, to 20 or more years of imprisonment, assuming they get around to executing him.

[Eagleon]

Wow. Kagus you're advocating revenge through the legal system, and it's a separate debate about what that's for. Personally I don't think revenge has any part in justice. But at the same time you seem to be suggesting that the fact of a crime is irrelevant beside the mental state of the person that may or may not have done it. Basically, that a genetic predisposition to mental illness, or real mental illness, constitutes guilt.

There is no 'murderer disorder'. There aren't really any fixed disorders at all, except that psychologists love to classify things in neat groups. If you can point to a gene, or several genes, and show that every person that has those genes is a cold blooded killer, or a drunk driver, or jewish (sorry, had to throw that in there because it's about as ridiculous), I will eat my foot. If you know that this isn't the case, and I greatly hope you do, what gives you the right to say that, for instance, a person with severe schizophrenia coupled with  pyromania is guilty before ever having committed arson?

If mental illness can't account for crime (no really, it can't. there are always other factors, and it is always more complicated), then the only other thing left influencing behavior is the interplay between a person's environment and that person's mind/body. This is what I was talking about. I won't for a moment deny that these things are a problem, and that there should be some means of controlling it, but the moment you exclude these people from the grouping of 'human', you let go of the key variable.

The fact is, no serial killer emerged from a vacuum. Rapists were little babies at one point, and their feet were ticklish. They influenced people around them the same way they were influenced themselves. The term 'monster' implies some unknown, but for the most part, we can know these people, and it is irresponsible to refuse this opportunity in favor of culling them when they emerge. If they were robots programmed to destroy, doing that would end the problem forever, but the real issue is that the society you live in is where they came about.

Do you really think your kind of vengeful thinking is any different from what goes through a killer's mind when he decides to kill someone that 'wronged' him? The only real difference is that it's backed up by a large number of others. The argument that crime must be treated differently from other human behavior is really kind of missing the point - you can put anything into that slot, and vengeance will go on working the same way. Devoting resources to vengeance is time away from looking for what grew these people, and educating people about how to prevent the same conditions from happening again.

I wish I could talk more, but classes start soon. I hope you take what I say into consideration. I don't have much hope of that, but I kind of feel like I should try anyway.

[Cthulhu]

I think this use of "monster" and other words is like calling a baby a fetus.  You're just dehumanizing it to hide yourself from the fact that you're advocating the death of a human being.  

As for mental illness, have you heard of Scott Panetti?  He's in death row right now, he's been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia.  During his trial, he cross-examined himself, dressed in a cowboy suit, and attempted to subpoena Jesus Christ.  On March 28 of this year the US District Court For the Western District of Texas found him competent to be executed.  Can you honestly say that this man is mentally fit?  These people need help, not removal.  At the risk of invoking Godwin's Law, you know who else killed the mentally ill?  Hitler.

[Mel_Vixen]

For Godwin's law: Stalin was not much better.

Telepolis an web Newspaper from Germany has brought an article to this theme today. This article says that in the last 44 Years 126 (1063 were executed since 1976 ,3344 are on deathrow by now, 119 Deatrowers are not from the US)people on the deathrow hadnt done the Crimes they are on deathrow for.

This article had mentioned a Study that says that public prosecutors would give a death penalty to a Black guy for lesser crimes then to a White guy.

An linked article from newscientist says that there is an good chance to suffocate up to 10 Minutes by the poisons until the Victim is dead. That is clearly torture. Torture is against the Human rights and the "United Nations Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment" which is signed(1988) and ratificated (1994) by the US of A. Here you can look into this Convention.

[ June 11, 2008: Message edited by: Heph ]

[Duke 2.0]

A note about the torture: Arn't lethal injection convicts sedated as part of the lethal injection process? I'm sure torture doesn't apply to somebody going into a sleep they will never return from.

It's like saying medical operations are torture. The person doesn't care if their chest cavity is open and their liver is gone, as long as everything is fixed when they are awake and aware no harm is done.

[Mel_Vixen]

Yeah you are right Duke but in good bunch of cases the Sedatives dont work or arent used in the properway for example by using not enough sedatives or by setting the first needle with the sedatives in an muscle. Same for the heart stopping drugs. So at last you are suffocating to death by full mind.

[ June 11, 2008: Message edited by: Heph ]

[Cthulhu]

The person is anesthetized with sodium thiopental, which is an induction agent, not a full anesthetic, it's short-acting and if the person doesn't die in time, they wake up, paralyzed and unable to express the fact that they're in excruciating pain.  Also, it's not a physician doing it, it's someone with no training in anesthesia.

[Kagus]

Oddly enough, I don't feel all that bad about that.

And Sean...  Would you be referring to something like Australia?

[Cthulhu]

If you don't feel remorse for their death, what makes you different from someone who kills a person who they think has wronged them?

[Kagus]

Revenge is not the only motive for killing...  There are as many motives for a murderer as there are ways of killing someone.  Some kill for the power of taking someone's life away, some kill for the sport of it, some kill out of boredom.

If you murder someone for such a pointless reason, if you take someone's life away for utterly selfish motives, then no remorse should be felt for your passing.

There are crimes of passion, which are regretted.  Crimes of selfishness, which are not regretted.  And crimes of insanity, which are not even noticed.

There was a story going around the net for a while about a young woman who was brutally raped by two men.  Her grandmother tracked them down and shot their balls off with a magnum.  The world cheered for granny, because it is that kind of justice that people want to know is out there in the world.  The story is completely false, but before it was debunked there were a few people who were just a little bit happier that such measures were taken.

I don't think the story would've had the same impact if the grandmother had tracked them down and reported them to the police, where they would do community service for the next few decades.

And let's take a look at the ever-so-common vigilante story...  You see comically evil men performing all manner of devilry, and then the glorious hero kills them.  Does it have the same punch of "he had it coming" if the vigilante locks them up for a really really long time?

These are exactly what they appear to be, references to fiction.  Fiction does not define how the real world should work.  However, I am trying to point out that you still cry out for the death of evil in such cases, not its incarceration.  

A man who has killed hundreds by his own hand, and who has only just been captured...  He does not show remorse, does not show compassion, does not seem to feel in the least bit ashamed of his actions.  Medical treatment has failed in finding either a source or a cure for his obvious mental affliction.  What do you do with him?

[Jreengus]

Haha I saw this a little earlier came on here and saw this discussion.

Ok as for me i am glad somone finally caught the whole cost more to kill than to imprison. Another fact is that the number one cause of death on death row is naturalcauses. and of course the fact that roughly 1 in 10 people killed are proved innocent afterward. So what does this say about the death penalty that its costly kills innocent people and after all that money has been spent most of the time nature beats you too it. Sooo that seems like a stupid idea to me, still I suppose I am somewhat biased (I personally would kill someone if I knew I could never be caught, of course no-one could give me that garuntee and so I never would but I hope no-one is ever stupid enough to conscript me to fight against a cause I beleive in) My soloution is to imprison them permenantly (Unless proved innocent), give them a very small very basic cell, then give them some kind of manufacturing job if they fufill a quota they get slightly better stuff next week if they dont fufill their quota they go back to the crappy basic cell.

[Kagus]

Haha, I remember the first time I acquainted myself with a CS:S teamkiller.  It was a bot server, and he was the only other guy playing.

I eventually bored him into leaving the server.  I just kept running up right in his face until he killed me, whereupon I would forgive him using the TK punishment list.  I guess that wasn't what he was going for.

[Cthulhu]

You should've freaked out, just to humor him.