Do you agree to the death penalty ? Politics and governments

I DO NOT !

To be honest, I agree with death penalty, but I prefer life imprisonment.

I heard of a terrible story which happened in brazil in 2007 and in which an adolescent killed a child just for money in a RPG.
He just had 3 years of jail and is now free... But I think it's not fair at all ... You just take only 3 years in prison for murder ??? This is not enough... I think this person deserves more years, even life imprisonment... Okay, he is a teenage, but he murdered. Being a teenager does not excuse someone's death. If he was an adult I think he even deserves death.
However, it depends on the policy of the country ... In Brazil or in the United States, I find that justice is not as fair as it should be...

For me, it's "when you remove me a tooth, I remove you a tooth".

Yes, i do!

It depends on the type of crime. Sometimes the crime is so great that the death penalty may even be low
but i don't like (( killing)) at all

It highly depends on the crime. I’m perfectly aware of the fact that it’s something inhuman, especially in 2021.
In fact, no modern country would ever approve something as brutal as that is.

Essentially, yes and no. I would allow it for murder.
I would execute the murderer with the same, exact way as he/she had previously killed the victim.
Apart from that, I’m usually against it.
I would inflict balanced penalties depending on what crime was committed. For example: I would confiscate all the goods from a person who committed a robbery or a theft depending on what was stolen.
I could never confiscate someone’s entire property if they “only” stole a smartphone or a bicycle.

The question you are asking is highly controversial and I am not sure if there is a final answer, one that considers all aspects playing a role, an answer that is ethically absolute and deeply right. Still, I personally agree with german law (similar to most european countries) here - no death penalty. The reason, however, is not that I would say there are no terrorists, murderers, rapists or other cruel criminals who deserve it. My main two reasons are the following:
Firstly, death penalty needs to be avoided due to a phenomenon called the slippery-slope argument. It means that, death penalty for criminals undeniably causes something worse, arbitrariness in that very case. Innocents being killed by accident, innocents being killed because someone pays for it - that would be murder. So in my opinion death Penalty crosses a line that should never be crossed as the right of life is an essential human right. The slightest danger to kill innocents needs to be avoided.
Secondly, the question about penalty in general arises. Is it ethically correct to punish someone with exactly the crime he committed, so to say to commit a crime in order to punish the same crime? That conveys, as I see it, that it is not wrong to kill in some cases which leads - again- to the slippery-slope argument.
So my answer is a no to death penalty.
I do, on the other hand, understand those who disagree with me. I suppose my opinion is strongly influenced by my actual state of life. I discussed that very topic once with my mom, who said that, if I was killed, she‘d want the murderer to be sentenced to death. At that point, I‘m asking myself if my answer would be the same if I was in a different place. Probably not. So, what else can I say?

If someone is serial murderer or is hurting childs... I don't see a problem to eliminate people like that. So the question is: do we want to keep them in jails, pay for them, and let them enjoy some kind of substitute in cells like smuggled photos for example, or we want to erase them from society?
Like Braivik, who have everything in jail, like in hotel. Video games and all. It's sick.

And of course, there will be always cases like someone punished wrongly, because justice is not perfect.

In my opinion... Sure. Let them stay in jails. Even if that's really terrible trash, like rapist. But make them work somehow, like in old US movies. Chain them with chains and let them work.

And we should work more on institutions responsible for justice, because it's horrible when someone innocent goes to jail.

Also, I don't understand what is sensible in death penality, as long, as in some countries criminalist can leave jail after only few years, and make another crime.

The death penalty in my opinion is and always will be a necessary evil as humans can be evil, humans if nothing else are opportunistic the moment death penalties are off the table as punishment there will be rise in murders as well as overcrowding in prisons.

As a Christian it pains me as our lord and savior was executed not for his sins but the many sins of humanity truth is there is human garbage in the world that commit crimes befitting of a death penalty i agree death penalty should be sparsely used but it must be used to keep our society together. Also I am in favor of victims families showing mercy as they are victims themselves I do not want to come off as a blood thirsty person but a person researches these topics and comes to educated conclusions.

“Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement.”
Gandalf

In France the death penalty was abolished 1981, it seems to me that two of the main arguments for the abolition of the death penalty were the following:

Can we take the risk of killing an innocent to punish a criminal?

Is a man entirely guilty? By killing a man for a crime you take away all possibilities of doing well in the future.

From a personal point of view, I think that justice should be used to reintegrate criminals into society so that they lead a normal life, rather than seeking to punish them ...

100% of criminals sentenced to death and executed will fail to return to normal life. ;P

“Many that live deserve death. And some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them? Then do not be too eager to deal out death in judgement.”
Gandalf

In France the death penalty was abolished 1981, it seems to me that two of the main arguments for the abolition of the death penalty were the following:

Can we take the risk of killing an innocent to punish a criminal?

Is a man entirely guilty? By killing a man for a crime you take away all possibilities of doing well in the future.

From a personal point of view, I think that justice should be used to reintegrate criminals into society so that they lead a normal life, rather than seeking to punish them ...

100% of criminals sentenced to death and executed will fail to return to normal life. ;P

Is there any necessity to keep alive a man known to be guilty and who will never go outside of his jail? Is it necessary both to pay for such punishment and to make someone living with no hope to go outside anymore?
Is it necessary to keep a man that could potentially radicalize and decrease the integration rate of other inmates?
Is it better to be kept in prison for 10, 20 years with all the risk that it involves (threats, rape, violence...) before being found innocent and told "oh, we're sorry, here 500 000€ for the disagreement"?

100% of the criminals who don't give a shit about reintegration and who aren't put to death are still a threat to society?

sorry double post (I don't see anything to delete it).

No problem. 🙂

A miscarriage of justice is always a terrible injustice is irreparable ... Being quiet at home, death seems more enviable to me than prison, but facing the guillotine, you and I would surely change your mind.

Regarding radicalization, recidivism and violence, it is a problem linked to the lack of resources and training in prisons. And to a system that aims to be punitive rather than "restorative".

In fact I think you have to choose the world in which you want to live. By executing criminals, they cost you less than trying to help them.

We may think that a person who commits a crime is bad, has no place in society and that he should be eliminated since honest citizens do not have to pay for his faults.

Or we can think that a person who commits crimes, has also done it for external reasons, that he can be help to be able to correct his mistakes by becoming a "good" person.

I also add:

1) What is criminal? The notion of what is criminal or not can change depending on the place or time, some things that may seem trivial to us may have been considered criminal.

2) The death penalty is a dangerous tool because it facilitates the elimination of political opponents by those in power.

A miscarriage of justice is always a terrible injustice is irreparable ... Being quiet at home, death seems more enviable to me than prison, but facing the guillotine, you and I would surely change your mind.

It is not simply staying in a cosy home, but staying in a prison with other inmates. Some prisoners wish to be sentenced to death.

Regarding radicalization, recidivism and violence, it is a problem linked to the lack of resources and training in prisons. And to a system that aims to be punitive rather than "restorative".

Is it? And admitting it is, wouldn't the ressources needed to such restorative prisons be exponentially growing with the size of a country?

In fact I think you have to choose the world in which you want to live. By executing criminals, they cost you less than trying to help them.

Death can be a form of help as well, both for a criminal and for a society. The benefit of a reintegration, however, is near zero for a society whereas it might eventually be for the inmate depending on its goals only.

We may think that a person who commits a crime is bad, has no place in society and that he should be eliminated since honest citizens do not have to pay for his faults.

Or we can think that a person who commits crimes, has also done it for external reasons, that he can be help to be able to correct his mistakes by becoming a "good" person.

That's reductive. You don't have to think that people are bad to get rid of them, neither to think others are honest to "preserve" them. An individual could be the nicest man on the Earth and wish for peace only, but if he does bring troubles to a society, then one could argue that all the man's wishes are nefast and that he should be punished for the simple reason than the actions are harming a current form of social peace.

Someone could also bring troubles to a society simply because he doesn't like the society or its members, eventually because he belongs to another society, or has values that are in contradiction with the society he lives in. In this case, there is no mistakes and no good person to become since that person is following his own agenda.

1) What is criminal? The notion of what is criminal or not can change depending on the place or time, some things that may seem trivial to us may have been considered criminal.

If it changes, then a core remains : Troubles to an established society is often considered to be offending at very least.

2) The death penalty is a dangerous tool because it facilitates the elimination of political opponents by those in power.

I think it's time for us to get rid of this old idea. It might have been true in the past, but we live in the 21th century, which happens to be a modern world. The war on information is much more powerful than simply killing a dude you disagree with and, as a French, you should see it everyday.

Thinking about it literally the death penalty is government sanctioned murder. Just because someone committed murder does not mean that is okay for a government to do it to them. Furthermore, to use the USA as an example, 4% of their death row inmates are innocent. It should be zero! If a government is going to kill someone they should at least be 100% sure they are guilty. Continuing to use the USA as an example, killing someone by death penalty is more expensive that keeping them in jail for life, especially with the system of lethal injection. On lethal injection, it is often a way for people to justify the death penalty as a quick and humane death, it is not. What some people don’t release is the injection is noth administered by trained medical doctors because doctors take an oath to never harm or kill a person. Due to this, the injection is sometimes administered wrong causing the death to last a long time. Another thing is that in the US they don’t use an actual anaesthesia so the person is simply paralysed and a bit dulled they can still feel the lethal injection, from those that have had failed executions and survived; it feels like fire through their veins. Lethal injection is considered the “humane” execution think of the methods other countries use! Finally, it doesn’t deter crime, when someone commits a crime they are not planning on getting caught, they’re planning on getting away with it. They aren’t thinking about the possible punishment. Just like mandatory minimums for drugs didn’t do anything, neither does the death penalty.

The death penalty in my opinion is and always will be a necessary evil as humans can be evil, humans if nothing else are opportunistic the moment death penalties are off the table as punishment there will be rise in murders as well as overcrowding in prisons.

I'd just like to say, I hope you don't see my age as a reason my opinion is invalid as majority of what I am going to say is just easily googled statistics.
So, I don't disagree that humans can be evil but the death penalty is in no way a necessary evil. Firstly, "the moment death penalties are off the table as punishment there will be rise in murders", this simply isn't true. People commit crimes with the intention of getting away with them, they are not thinking about getting caught, they are not thinking about the possible punishment. Statistics support this as well, in the USA the overall murder rate is on a downward trend and (as of 2018) the murder rate in death penalty states is 5.34, while in non-death penalty states it's 4.1, close but lower.
Here's the source for that: https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/facts-and-research/murder-rates/murder-rate-of-death-penalty-states-compared-to-non-death-penalty-states

As for overcrowding in prisons, the USA has about 2 million people incarcerated and in 2020, 17 people were executed. There's really not much to say here, there are already a huge amount of people in prison in the US, to me its seems like its already overcrowded and abolishing the death penalty isn't going to add to that very much.

As a Christian it pains me as our lord and savior was executed not for his sins but the many sins of humanity truth is there is human garbage in the world that commit crimes befitting of a death penalty i agree death penalty should be sparsely used but it must be used to keep our society together. Also I am in favor of victims families showing mercy as they are victims themselves I do not want to come off as a blood thirsty person but a person researches these topics and comes to educated conclusions.

I am not going to comment on the moral issue of whether certain crimes derserve death, but a government in our modern world should not have the ability to make a decision on that. Especially one like the US government that isn't even 100% sure that the people they are executing are guitly. 4% of death row inmates in the USA are innocent and in a matter of life and death that is too high.
"death penalty should be sparsely used but it must be used to keep our society together." I think I can disprove this by experience. As an Australian who lives in Australia (a country without the death penalty) our society has not collapsed. And, to go back to statistics, in 2018 Australia's homicide rate was 0.89 in every 100k people while the USA's was 4.97 in every 100k.
Australia homicide rate source: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/AUS/australia/murder-homicide-rate
USA homicide rate source: https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-states/murder-homicide-rate

I am glad we don’t have the death penalty in the UK anymore. It was stopped in the 1960’s thankfully. I don’t believe a civilised country needs to kill people for making mistakes, no matter how abhorrent they are. An eye for an eye leaves everyone blind.

yea i agree with the death penalty!

I think the death penalty is the best way to get rid of rapists, murderers and traitors

I am totally against the death penalty. Execution is killing too. I think that brutality should not be the answer in a modern democracy. "A killer must repay with his life" - A life in prison is no life. No social contacts, no privacy, no freedom whatsoever.