MovieChat Forums > The Last Hangman (2006) Discussion > Death penalty doesn't make moral sense !

Death penalty doesn't make moral sense !

posted 12 years ago by JustMammal
15 replies | jump to latest

If someone is innocent and we execute him, then we execute an innocent person.

If someone is guilty but genuinely remorseful now, then we execute a reformed man.

If someone is guilty but incapable to be genuinely remorseful because he is a psychopath, then we execute someone who is incapable to care about the wrongness of his crime. He may have intellectually known that killing is wrong, but psychopaths emotionally did not feel it was so.

Imagine yourself in shoes of a psychopath - you are told that if you step on an ant it's wrong and you'll be sentenced to death, but you don't feel "wrong" stepping and killing ants. And in the impulse of a moment decided to squash a few. Then the society hangs you for that and you just don't feel why you'd ever deserve that.

Now substitute ants with people for a psychopath and see why, while they have to be removed from the rest of the society when they commit crime, they cannot be put be morally put to death.

[–] LCella9370 11 years ago

And your purpose for posting your worldview on a film discussion board rather than one created to discuss life philosophies is . . . ?

[–] fgeorgio 11 years ago

I'd like to see your opinion on the matter after somebody close to you is murdered.Until then,you are just offering cheap philosophies.

[–] JustMammal 11 years ago

Well I may very well would want to kill the bastard. Victim's family want to kill for lesser crimes than murder, like rape. That's not the point.

The point is for society to act not like a vengeful victim, but in a detached, reasonable way.

[–] fgeorgio 11 years ago

And it is reasonable to keep a violent and dangerous criminal,who has no intention of correcting himself alive?At a massive expense to society?The justice system doesnt exist only to correct and rehabilitate people but also to punish.Some offenses deemed heinous must be punished with the life of the person who did it.

[–] JustMammal 11 years ago

Well punishing someone for acting his vile nature and/or upbringing is like punishing a rabid dog for being rabid. Yet we don't "punish" rabid dogs, we exterminate them. Do you want us to start exterminating certain people too ?

I just finishing reading a biography of Richard Kuklinski (aka the Iceman) and this sick SOB, for money and per "customer" request", kidnap people, and devise some devilish way of slowly torturing them: like dismembering them, skinning them alive, disemboweling, and then feeding them alive to rats and sharks. Often recording his deeds for the client.

It gave me nausea just to read it ! He did this dozens of times over many decades. Yet upon apprehension he was given a life sentence. I felt if anyone deserves death penalty, this monster sure does, yet they made three HBO documentaries about him, and showed how good family man he is, and caring about children.

So how can we ever put to death people who just "merely" shoot someone after a burglary, while giving life to people who torture to death in a horrific way and do that on numerous occasions ?

[–] fgeorgio 11 years ago

That is a question to reform the justice system of the US.In many European countries,like the UK of the time this film is about,had a mandatory death sentence for premediated or aggravated murder.

[–] JustMammal 11 years ago

I just don't think we can mandate something irreversible like death penalty. We just had a case when a death row inmate that was previously within hours of being executed was proved innocent and let free.

As society we can't put someone to death even if there's a remote chance someone is innocent. It's should not just be "beyond reasonable doubt" but beyond "any" doubt. And since in this messy world nothing could be 100% certain, we can't impose death penalty due to its ireversability and the risk of miscarriage of justice among other arguments.

[–] fgeorgio 11 years ago

Someone could be found innocent after serving 30 years of a life sentence.Could you give him his time back?

[–] JustMammal 11 years ago

You could pay him for time served, some states give something like $50,000 per year served. Not ideal, but better than just saying oops

[–] highpriestess32 10 years ago

Nobody that is a mortal has the right to play God in my opinion.

YES incarceration is expensive so my answer to all that like to play the vigilante is to bring back the chain gangs. If murder is so abhorent then we can't justify executing someone. It makes no moral sense. I am 100% on your jury  

"Has anyone seen my wife?" - Columbo

[–] cmp_gr 10 years ago

It makes no moral sense

And does it make more moral sense exposing the safety and life of innocent people in danger, should such a criminal break out, something which you cannot exclude? I would like to see you writing the same things after having been raped by such a bastard.

[–] 10 years ago

[deleted]

[–] cmp_gr 10 years ago

Sorry to read that, but you still do not express but your opinion, without replying to my question.

[–] gary_overman 9 years ago

Nobody that is a mortal has the right to play God in my opinion.

YES incarceration is expensive so my answer to all that like to play the vigilante is to bring back the chain gangs. If murder is so abhorent then we can't justify executing someone. It makes no moral sense. I am 100% on your jury

Just want to point out that taken to its' logical extreme, your position would preclude the government using force against anyone or there even being a criminal justice system.

Is kidnapping (holding some against their will in an unlawful manner) wrong? What is imprisonment? Can it not be called legal kidnapping? How does this make any more moral sense? How about fining someone? Is this not legal theft?

Logically if we take your position to its' extreme, how is it any more moral to fine or imprison someone than it is to put them to death?

There are some valid arguments against the death penalty, and even though I support the death penalty, I recognize this. But the argument that you put forth here boils down to nothing more than moral equivalency.

[–] cmp_gr 10 years ago

Many of these violent and dangerous criminals are either given a mercy and are set free, or they break out. Most of the time they kill, rape or whatever again. Why should we protect the life of such a dangerous criminal, endangering safety and life of innocent people?

The PO is repeating like a parrot the known cheap philosophies of the persons, who never had any loss.