All rise. The Sandbox Court, is now in session, the Honorable Judge Parudoks presiding. Members of the Jury, your duty today will be to determine whether the Death Penalty should be abolished. The defendant, Death himself, believes himself to be just when it comes to the punishing of criminals. This court case will last from May 14th to May 20th
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I really don't want to keep answering here because I'm not supposed to be a part of the debate (We can talk about it in PMs). I can't change it anyway after the topics been made. It was the best thing I could think of for a "Something vs Something" name.
firstly, you cannot simultaneously use an argument for an ideal prison system against the death penalty and deny an ideal application for the death penalty. you can't have your cake and eat it too, either both are to be presumed flawed or neither are
secondly, even if you grouped violent criminals with other violent criminals does a violent criminal still deserve what befalls them at the hands of another violent criminal? again, you can't prevent this without confinement
The debate is over whether or not the Death Penalty should be abolished, and many/all of the people in the prosecution believe it should be abolished because it is not just (i.e. morally righteous). So death is trying to prove that he is indeed a part of justice. The Death Penalty is the one on trial right now.
there's no such thing as figurative hypocrisy please no "literal" hyperbole
you can say the entire concept of justice and punishment is also hypocrisy. someone commits a slight against society, society slights them back. this is justice, but you would call it hypocrisy
justice doesn't actually have a consistent definition (making it an invalid argument), but for fun I'll analyze Lady Justice the most famous symbol of the concept
Lady Justice has three symbols of justice: a sword, a scale, and a blindfold. Everyone knows what the blindfold means. The sword is punishment; righteous indignation. The scale is equality. Some people might think that means "equality under the law," but they're wrong, that's what the blindfold represents. The scale represents equality between the weight of the crime and the weight of the punishment. It's balance; what you would call "an eye for an eye."
This is where having appropriate prison facilities comes into play. Certainly I would make an argument as to how the prison facilities should be segregated, primarily ensuring that those who do commit non-violent offences are not placed beside any violent offenders, but that is more due to my belief that rehabilitation would be more likely in this case. Prison guards are there to ensure the safety of the public, but also to ensure the safety of those in prison. It is not unreasonable to expect that prisoners do not pose threats to one another given the supervision and the conditions in which they live. Maximum security prisons (or wings within prisons, I'd imagine this would differ from prison to prison) should allow for human interaction without allowing murderers to be placed beside those who committed lesser crimes, but still ensuring the safety of all.
The reason for which I am putting the word justice in quotation marks, is because it has been proven that many of the people who have been executed by means of capital punishment were later exonerated or proven innocent. I refuse to see it as a means of delivering any sort of justice if there is no absolute evidence. You can say "none of those "i can't imagine this being a coincidence" shawshank court shenanigans" but this is a reality that occurs more often than any are really willing to admit.
Additionally this is by nature hypocritical. To say "no you cannot kill, that is wrong, we will punish you by killing you" is literally hypocritical. Putting someone in prison is taking away their livelihood as you put it, I would argue that this in a way ends their life as they knew it. Ultimately ending their life is unnecessary.
Additionally, if the crime of killing is morally reprehensible in nature, I would argue that killing someone in the name of justice falls into the same bracket. I'll acknowledge here though, that it depends on the logic as to why the death penalty is being enacted. If it is being enacted as a means of retribution, then the above argument stands clear. If it is being enacted to ensure the safety of society, then prison is the better option.
Sidenote - isn't Kitt meant to be against the death penalty?
but should we accept criminals posing a threat to each other? i don't think someone serving time for a nonviolent offense should face a death sentence to a madman in the next cell
there's no way to prevent this if inmates are allowed to interact, and if they aren't then they're confined
you have to explain why it's morally reprehensible, you can't just say it is
you're telling a half truth: on the one hand, it's "retribution" (that is what justice is), on the other hand it's preventative: to permanently put a stop to a killer. again, you can't explain away the hypocrisy without dismissing the entire concept of justice, as justice is by its very design a scale. you put it in quotations again as if to say justice means something else, implying you put the weight of your argument in justice meaning something else. what does justice mean?
The financial burden of carrying out the death penalty does not lie purely within its' enactment. It lies within the criminal case. For the death penalty to be enacted, most criminal justice systems demand at minimum extended trials and expert witnesses. These costs are an extreme burden on the system, and are ultimately more expensive than it would be to have a criminal serve life without the possibility of parole.
Additionally, solitary confinement is not the only way to ensure that we have no more casualties. I believe that with appropriate prison facilities, those who are sentenced of committing these crimes should be able to live their lives in prison. This is not torture, this is an acceptable consequence for the crime they have committed. The prison system is there to ensure that criminals pose no threat to society. This should be our means to prevent further deaths, absolute punishment is not necessary.
this is how our criminal justice system actually works
people often misapply the term "eye for an eye" to "steal and i'll cut your hand off," but those things are obviously not equal. if you steal, you either pay a fine (greater than what was stolen) or we lock you up, effectively robbing you of your livelihood. if you're in jail for sexual assault, you'll basically get it back and then some. people shy from that expression, but it's undeniably accurate
edit: this is also not a valid argument, besides not explaining why an "eye for an eye" approach would be bad and besides the false equivalency between a violent and peaceful death
disclaimer: anything can be misused, so I'll argue for the concept of the death penalty and not the current application as any concept can be dismissed on the basis of wrongful application
in the case of a premeditated murder with absolute evidence (none of those "i can't imagine this being a coincidence" shawshank court shenanigans), a person has not only proven themselves to be a threat to human life but has already acted on it. besides absolute justice in the case of a crime beyond measuring (as human life cannot be prescribed value, unlike goods), the death penalty is also a means to prevent further deaths
the alternative is solitary confinement as the only way to ensure no more casualties, but that is torture, and I don't believe torture is justice. often, people sentenced to solitary will wish for death, and i think it's more humane to save them the sanity with merciful death
as for the method, inert gas asphyxiation. unbelievably simple, cheap, and painless. all you need is nitrogen and the body will confuse it for oxygen while suffocating, but the person won't feel any pain or panic. it's basically like going to sleep
Adopting an "eye for an eye" approach has no place within our criminal justice system.
Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, the death penalty is an archaic and morally reprehensible way of permanently enacting "justice". There are many reasons as to why the death penalty should be abolished, and I am certain they will be brought to light over the coming days, however I will focus at this time on just a few.
I am going to preface my argument here by saying that I am Australian, and the death penalty here was abolished in 1973. So my arguments are not based on personal experience or involvement, but rather my own beliefs as to why this is an unacceptable method of delivering justice.
The entire concept behind the death penalty is that of retribution. An Eye for an Eye. Essentially, an individual has committed a crime which is by nature, so morally reprehensible that the only acceptable punishment should be death. There is much hypocrisy within this argument. How is it that we can condemn with such ferocity the original crime, whilst turning a blind eye when the same crime is committed, purely because it has the name "justice".
There is no substantial evidence to suggest that the prospect of the death penalty is a deterrent for criminals. There is, however substantial evidence to suggest that many people who have been executed due to their 'crimes' were later proven to be guilty, or exonerated. There is also evidence indicating that the death penalty causes a higher financial burden on the state than a life sentence would. Finally, there is evidence suggesting that the enactment of the death penalty is reliant more on the race/socio-economic status of the victim and of the criminal than it is on the crime itself.
Is this not enough to suggest that the system as a whole is flawed, and that the enactment of the death penalty as a means of delivering justice is morally and logically wrong?
Death vs Justice
