The death penalty, should it be used more?

[The Prosperous Peoples]

But how? How do we rehabilitate everyone? What about those who would act as if they've rehabilitated just so they could get another crack at killing someone?

Ask Norway and Sweden. They've done an absolutely fantastic job of it.

You act like this has never been tried, or isn't actually successful.

I'm not saying it hasn't. I'm saying different cultures have different people, and thus different solutions.
I'm too lazy to look it up, so if you could explain in text HOW you would do it, that would be appreciated.

[Alvecia]

Ask Norway and Sweden. They've done an absolutely fantastic job of it.

You act like this has never been tried, or isn't actually successful.

I'm not saying it hasn't. I'm saying different cultures have different people, and thus different solutions.
I'm too lazy to look it up, so if you could explain in text HOW you would do it, that would be appreciated.

Just like to point out that not having a plan doesn't make the idea any less valid.

[Prussia-Steinbach]

You legitimately see criminals as subhuman?

I am saying, that someone may commit such things to even loss their human rights, since they lost their humanity.

Was Ted Bundy a human being?

I think he was not anymore.

That is false. He was a human being, one with severe mental problems.

No one should ever lose their most basic of human rights if it is at all possible to ensure them.

[European Socialist Republic]

Slave labor is "labor that is coerced and inadequately rewarded." I'm fairly sure that qualifies.

But how is that immoral? We give them hard work, like normal citizens would receive, and they get to eat, have shelter, drink, and have other activities to do after work. How is that immoral?

Yeah! We take Africans from their backwards continent, bring them to our civilization where we teach them our superior ways, give them some work to do and in return they get food and shelter. What's wrong with that?

[Talvezout]

Preferably not.

[Prussia-Steinbach]

Ask Norway and Sweden. They've done an absolutely fantastic job of it.

You act like this has never been tried, or isn't actually successful.

I'm not saying it hasn't. I'm saying different cultures have different people, and thus different solutions.
I'm too lazy to look it up, so if you could explain in text HOW you would do it, that would be appreciated.

Here are some articles on it.

http://www.theatlantic.com/internationa ... or/279949/
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013 ... ike-people
http://www.businessinsider.com/why-norw ... ul-2014-12

[European Socialist Republic]

Slave labor is "labor that is coerced and inadequately rewarded." I'm fairly sure that qualifies.

By that logic, you should ban all prisons, because imprisonment is against Universal Declaration of Human Rights

What? Name me the article in the UDHR where it says that.

[HMS Vanguard]

The death penalty should be applied in response to patterns in behaviour rather than individual crimes of extreme severity. Someone who murders a particular person for a particular reason, after decades of law abiding behaviour, could in principle be reintegrated into society. Someone who has been committing thefts and low level violence for the past ten years almost certainly cannot, and is simply a waste of the state's resources, a permanent dependant either as a prisoner or a free parasite.

I am not saying that death should be applied on a strict "three strikes and you're out" basis, but in terms of real crimes against the person or property of a private person going about his own business in peace, no one needs more than five strikes.

What if instead of that, we simply gave them exponential amounts of time in prison, to a point where they will be doing hard labor after many repeated crimes? That way, we place those who clearly refuse to accept rehabilitation in their place, while those who do can continue to live happily.

Rehabilitation is a chimera. People who can be rehabilitated don't need to be, those who do, can't be helped. Constant surveillance and threats can create changes in behaviour, but you cannot change a person's personality.. Some crimes were carried out for particular reasons, in defiance of the known penalties and moral prohibitions that the perpetrator would ordinarily agree with. People who commit such crimes can probably be released with few consequences. Of course they must still serve the normal sentence, since otherwise there would be a lot more such people, but no more than that.

The fact is that these sorts of crimes are rare. Most crimes against persons were not committed with great forethought and moral rationalisation, like in murder mystery books. They were committed in the spur of the moment because the perpetrator simply doesn't value others' rights whenever they conflict with his own desires. Keeping such people around is neither necessary nor desirable.

As for your proposal of keeping them as slaves, slave labour ain't worth what it used to be. Prison is a big loss maker, and always has been, which is why pre-industrial societies used fine, corporal punishment, or execution for almost all crimes, prison being reserved for elites.

[Ifreann]

What if instead of that, we simply gave them exponential amounts of time in prison, to a point where they will be doing hard labor after many repeated crimes? That way, we place those who clearly refuse to accept rehabilitation in their place, while those who do can continue to live happily.

Rehabilitation is a chimera. People who can be rehabilitated don't need to be, those who do, can't be helped.

Chimera?

[Socialist Czechia]

By that logic, you should ban all prisons, because imprisonment is against Universal Declaration of Human Rights

What? Name me the article in the UDHR where it says that.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Today, you can call literally everything to be 'cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment'.
Like no TV in a cell

[Washington Resistance Army]

What? Name me the article in the UDHR where it says that.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Today, you can call literally everything to be 'cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment'.
Like no TV in a cell

My time in lockup certainly felt degrading, and it's not because I didn't have a TV.

[European Socialist Republic]

What? Name me the article in the UDHR where it says that.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Today, you can call literally everything to be 'cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment'.
Like no TV in a cell

Right. Well, if you have no better argument to make than that...

[Alvecia]

What? Name me the article in the UDHR where it says that.

Article 5.

No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

Today, you can call literally everything to be 'cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment'.
Like no TV in a cell

I don't know that anyone would consider no TV in a cell to be any of those things. Perhaps you should stop presuming such extreme views.

[European Socialist Republic]

Today, you can call literally everything to be 'cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment'.
Like no TV in a cell

My time in lockup certainly felt degrading, and it's not because I didn't have a TV.

It's because they let you laze around instead of giving you hard work!

[Conscentia]

[...]but you cannot change a person's personality[...]

That's a load of rubbish. A lot of people experience changes in the personality as they age. Experience shapes personality. Drugs and brain surgery can also alter one's personality.

[Washington Resistance Army]

My time in lockup certainly felt degrading, and it's not because I didn't have a TV.

It's because they let you laze around instead of giving you hard work!

I'll admit I did sleep a lot, even if those pillows were horrid and hurt your neck. Not much else to do when you're by yourself in a cell for 21 or so hours a day.

[Prussia-Steinbach]

My time in lockup certainly felt degrading, and it's not because I didn't have a TV.

It's because they let you laze around instead of giving you hard work!

I know on the days I didn't get backhanded, spit on, or otherwise demeaned by guards, I felt like there really wasn't any point in me being there.

[Kauthar]

Even if you believe in "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth", the death penalty costs tax payers much more than a life sentence and there is no evidence to suggest it helps lower crime. It also makes the US stand out unfavorably compared to its allies. In my opinion, the only justified use of capital punishment is when a crime against humanity has been committed.

I suggest you put a poll up, OP.

Most inmates would rather have the death penalty than a life sentence.

[Prussia-Steinbach]

Most inmates would rather have the death penalty than a life sentence.

Source.

[HMS Vanguard]

[...]but you cannot change a person's personality[...]

That's a load of rubbish. A lot of people experience changes in the personality as they age. Experience shapes personality. Drugs and brain surgery can also alter one's personality.

I cannot accelerate aging; perhaps you can.

I do not want the state to have the power to drug or lobotomise people. It could spread much too far. Execution has some level of revulsion attached that limits its use only to those who really pushed it.

[European Socialist Republic]

Even if you believe in "an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth", the death penalty costs tax payers much more than a life sentence and there is no evidence to suggest it helps lower crime. It also makes the US stand out unfavorably compared to its allies. In my opinion, the only justified use of capital punishment is when a crime against humanity has been committed.

I suggest you put a poll up, OP.

Most inmates would rather have the death penalty than a life sentence.

Does that actually matter?

[Zakuvia]

I think it's time for a hypothetical before this turns into a flammenwerfer-grade thread.

You are a judge presiding over the homicide trial of a man of indistinct ethnicity or race. Supposing you're not a self-hating whatever you are, just insert your own. The man found his wife and the victim in flagrante delecto and, in a rage, gunned the man down. After he was booked, he was as calm and presentable as he ever could be. Until that point he was a model citizen with maybe a parking ticket to his name. He has not been determined mentally ill by an impartial diagnostician and it seems by all accounts that this man will not present a danger to the community if he were to be released.

What's his verdict?

[Roski]

Hard labour in exchange for a shorter sentence and/or currency to use in the prison? Optional?

[The Prosperous Peoples]

I'm not saying it hasn't. I'm saying different cultures have different people, and thus different solutions.
I'm too lazy to look it up, so if you could explain in text HOW you would do it, that would be appreciated.

Here are some articles on it.

http://www.theatlantic.com/internationa ... or/279949/
http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013 ... ike-people
http://www.businessinsider.com/why-norw ... ul-2014-12

Looking at some of these articles, I can see where you're coming from. (TIP TO EVERYONE: Don't result to insults. Just tell what you want to do. Like this.)
I noticed in the second article that the prisoners farmed their own food and were given lives similar to society. I like this. It blends hard labor with rehabilitation. Perhaps the best solution would be to establish a large town for prisoners to rebuild lives, and those who want to leave may choose to do so (after they serve their sentence) or they may choose to stay. I'll admit, it would definitely work, but some conditions would have to remain slightly worse than society, that way they have motivation to go back. But overall, I do agree with that idea.

Congrats on retaining your humanity by not stooping to insulting.

[Roski]

I think it's time for a hypothetical before this turns into a flammenwerfer-grade thread.

You are a judge presiding over the homicide trial of a man of indistinct ethnicity or race. Supposing you're not a self-hating whatever you are, just insert your own. The man found his wife and the victim in flagrante delecto and, in a rage, gunned the man down. After he was booked, he was as calm and presentable as he ever could be. Until that point he was a model citizen with maybe a parking ticket to his name. He has not been determined mentally ill by an impartial diagnostician and it seems by all accounts that this man will not present a danger to the community if he were to be released.

What's his verdict?

A singular murder? He should not have less than twenty years, but I don't think he's quite justified getting shot.