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**Trebbinsa** · 05-25-2006, 07:00 AM

You have this 'moral' standard that says 'it's wrong to kill someone' - and then... someone who commits murder... as punishment they are condemned to death? That doesn't make sense to me. If killing someone is wrong, then it's wrong whoever does it. To say otherwise is making like certain people have more of a right than otherwise to judge who should live and who should die, and I think that's very suspect indeed, to put it mildly.

I am undecided on the death penalty. I don't think the arguments above are particularly valid though. In our society, we are bound by the laws of the land and be will punished if we break them.

The state has plenty of powers that indivduals don't, and that we would find morally wrong if an indivdual did them, such as

locking people up
extracting money from them (taxes)
requiring them to perform certain duties (jury service etc)
taking children away from their parents

These are all powers the state has but would be morally wrong if we as indivudals excercised. So I don't think you can use this argument against capital punishment.

There may be other reasons, personally I think the burden of proof is a powerful argument given terminating someones life is pretty terminal and doesn't give us the chance to correct any micarriages of justice down the line.

Comes down to numbers at the end - I'd be happy to see 99.99% as a accurate conviction rate... then is 99.9% good enough? 99%? 95%? Hard to know where to draw the line.

05-25-2006, 07:00 AM	#20
Trebbinsa Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 457 Senior Member	You have this 'moral' standard that says 'it's wrong to kill someone' - and then... someone who commits murder... as punishment they are condemned to death? That doesn't make sense to me. If killing someone is wrong, then it's wrong whoever does it. To say otherwise is making like certain people have more of a right than otherwise to judge who should live and who should die, and I think that's very suspect indeed, to put it mildly. I am undecided on the death penalty. I don't think the arguments above are particularly valid though. In our society, we are bound by the laws of the land and be will punished if we break them. The state has plenty of powers that indivduals don't, and that we would find morally wrong if an indivdual did them, such as locking people up extracting money from them (taxes) requiring them to perform certain duties (jury service etc) taking children away from their parents These are all powers the state has but would be morally wrong if we as indivudals excercised. So I don't think you can use this argument against capital punishment. There may be other reasons, personally I think the burden of proof is a powerful argument given terminating someones life is pretty terminal and doesn't give us the chance to correct any micarriages of justice down the line. Comes down to numbers at the end - I'd be happy to see 99.99% as a accurate conviction rate... then is 99.9% good enough? 99%? 95%? Hard to know where to draw the line.
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