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Japan "Twitter Killer" sentenced to death
- Thread starter Typhon
- Start date
Fucking hell, It always takes a thread like this to remind me how many people in this forum are ok with death penalties.
It's scary how popular that sentiment is.
It's scary how popular that sentiment is.
The standard for murdering people is not "how useful are they to society"
That's the same dumb argument. If Hitler was alive would you not do the same thing Hitler did to Hitler?
It's murder no matter who does it. It's a very easy to define line that shouldn't be crossed by anyone.
Depends. In some "justice systems" it's possible for the sentence to be carried out only one day after sentencing.
Not that that would make it any more suitable for a modern civilisation.
After doing some minor research, it appears that you both are correct.
Serious question: How does that work? I've always heard that used in the arguments against the death penalty, but I never understood exactly why it would cost more than keeping another person alive for a multitude of years.
People love performative justice rather than real justice. They want to feel good rather than doing what is best for society.
^ Wanting revenge is completely natural, does not mean it is the right thing and it should never be up to those close to the situation.
Maybe it would, but there are several objections to that.
There's precedent for people being cleared of all charges after being on death row for longer than two years. Considering factors like institutional racism in justice systems, we shouldn't be in a rush to kill prisoners. It would be highly irresponsible to evaluate the potential merits of the death penalty in a vacuum, where we imagine that wrongful convictions don't occur, or new information that justifies a reduced sentence never comes to light.
A common response to this point is "Why not just execute people who were convicted of horrific crimes beyond reasonable doubt?" Well, that description should apply to every single person on death row. And yet, as we know, innocent people have been destroyed by the system regardless. We just plain can't count on human beings exercising correct moral judgment flawlessly, 100% of the time. We can't discount the possibility of corruption, bias, or other factors contributing to wrongful or excessive sentencing.
Another objection is, to consider money as a factor in the preservation or dignity of human lives -- even those of violent criminals -- is a morally repugnant facet of a broken system. Prisons should never be for-profit. Prisons should focus exclusively on rehabilitation under humane conditions.
This is such a crucial point. It's utterly horrifying how eager society is to treat criminals as fundamentally evil subhumans, when so many of them are victims of their circumstances. It's such a grotesque failure in empathy and basic reasoning.
Crimes don't just happen. How can people be held responsible for their own actions if their actions resulted from abuse, neglect, mental illness, or other powerful factors? But many, many people are just plain unwilling to follow this chain of reasoning, because it leads to uncomfortable questions about free will, and our traditional assumptions about responsibility.
Edit: Jesus, apologies for the triple post. Mobile is a nightmare sometimes. I could have sworn there were replies below my earlier posts.
Why do you guys always bring up "innocent people who have been executed" in threads like this to argue against the death penalty.
This man is not innocent. People obviously don't want innocent people executed at the hands of the government.
There's no "ifs", he did it. Let people say he deserves to die and move on. Your moral compasses don't need go haywire in every death penalty thread of a confirmed guilty serial killer. They sure as hell don't go off as much when it's a dead politician or rich person you don't like either.
This man is not innocent. People obviously don't want innocent people executed at the hands of the government.
There's no "ifs", he did it. Let people say he deserves to die and move on. Your moral compasses don't need go haywire in every death penalty thread of a confirmed guilty serial killer. They sure as hell don't go off as much when it's a dead politician or rich person you don't like either.
because it's still a valid argument? agreeing to kill someone who did it makes it open to the risk you'l kill someone innocent later on!
And even then, what makes you so sure he did it? His confession? Guess what, japan has a tons of false confessions! What about the DNA you will tell me... well what if he was set-up? How can you know for sure?
I mean yeah he probably did it, but even the slightest doubt justice can get something wrong is enough argument to ban death penalty
(i'll just add again than i'm against death penality as a moral issue, being guilty or innocent has nothing to do with it in my case)
How guilty a person is is nowhere near the top of the list of reasons on why the death penalty should never be used.
I can't stand all the rehabilitation arguments in this thread. The worst scum don't deserve to be rehabilitated while there victims are 6 feet under. Why is there so much empathy for scum who I would argue aren't even human anymore. Makes me sick to my stomach. Life in prison for these murderers will never be justice.
I think everyone deserves to have the chance at rehabilitation and I have empathy for all people, as hard as it is to have. I understand why people feel the way you do.
You're looking for revenge, not justice. Lives have been saved by rehabilitated criminals. Criminals can go on to make important contributions to society if they're motivated by getting a second chance.
The desire to punish a criminal by ending their existence doesn't outweigh everything we know about rehabilitation.
Death Penalty is morally wrong, and I always found it really hard to argue against that.
An other issue slightly related that I find much more interesting to talk about is redemption.
I believe that it is possible for any criminal, no matter the crime, to better themselves given enough help and enough time. (And thus to become "useful" for society again). But I've never been able to defend that position much. It's a moral belief that I have. And discussion about it is usually extremely interesting.
An other issue slightly related that I find much more interesting to talk about is redemption.
I believe that it is possible for any criminal, no matter the crime, to better themselves given enough help and enough time. (And thus to become "useful" for society again). But I've never been able to defend that position much. It's a moral belief that I have. And discussion about it is usually extremely interesting.
He certainly does.
That doesn't mean it should be done though. A person's life should hold value to us as a society regardless of their actions.
You believe everyone should have a chance at rehabilitation. What about child molesters? Should they be given a chance to be rehabilitated and rejoin society?
do you have empathy for child molesters? Genuinely curious.
The state shouldn't have the right to execute its citizens.
Even if they do contribute to society, my point is they don't deserve a second chance. There victims don't get a second chance at life, so neither should them.
You're fine with killing a person... all because you read an article online?
Yes. I believe that they should be given a chance to be rehabilitated and rejoin society if they can without hurting anyone else. Now, I'm not saying they can be rehabilitated but they should have the chance to be. I believe that more should be done to prevent these kinds of disgusting crimes from happening by getting them help before they commit an act.
My empathy comes from two things. One, that I believe every human life has inherent value that cannot be taken away. Two, people who commit crimes, in general, are usually victims themselves. None of these two things absolves them of their acts however.
he is a danger to society and should be removed to avoid causing further harms.
I can respect that opinion even if I disagree. I strongly believe the heinous crimes these monsters commit should not be rewarded with a second chance through rehabilitation. I think we're we differ is I don't see them as human anymore, while you still do.
Removal doesn't have to mean death.
I completely understand why you and others feel like that.
Sweeping it under the rug is exactly what it is and as you are saying it's important to recognize that criminals are also victims. All the fucked up things that precede a person becoming a criminal: their socio economic history, domestic violence and abuse, mental illness - these are areas where society is supposed to step in and help before things go bad.
When you support the death penalty and horrible treatment of criminals, and then justify that by telling yourself that these criminals are evil, what you really are doing is absolving society of its responsibility for creating these criminals in the first place. Using words like "evil" is just a convenient way of never having to think about it. It's denial, sticking your head in the sand, sweeping it under the rug. Criminals don't just pop into existence. On a macro scale crime is predictable: when an area is stuck by poverty, crime rises. When a person suffers abuse they are much more likely to become violent. Crime is a manifestation of the failings of society not the failings of individuals. It's sad to see that even on a progressive place like era, when dealing with crime so many revert to their old testament "personal responsibility" morals.
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I'd add that there's mounting evidence that serial killers have brain abnormalities and that in conjunction with childhood trauma or abuse could be critical in creating their persona.
Maybe advances in medicine in the future could lead to a breakthrough in understanding and rehabilitation.
There's a tonne of reasons not to execute people that haven't even been touched on in this thread where as the only reason to do it is it feels right or fair which isn't a reason that you'd use to justify anything normally.
Innocent until proven guilty needs to mean something. You can't really go around imprisoning everyone that may have committed a crime and a big problem with the justice system in most countries is they often do just that, and for petty crimes too.
Eye for an eye? That might feel right and emotionally satisfying, but it serves no purpose beyond revenge. We don't torture people on behalf of murder victims' families, even if that would give the families satisfaction. And civilized societies don't hurt criminals for the sake of punishment. We shouldn't kill them either. It's all different degrees of inhumane.
BTW, personally, I'm totally sympathetic to people who want brutal criminals dead. Stories about torture and murder make my blood boil. I carry a deep well of personal rage and resentment toward the overwhelming injustice in this world. I have no problem fantasizing about sadists having to relive their victims' pain and death.
And yet I have to recognize that those feelings don't have a place in a justice system, and the places my vengeful mind takes me aren't consistent with the values of any society I would want to live in. I wouldn't want the public to agree that you can decide someone isn't a person, and therefore it's OK to treat them worse than an animal. I don't care about the circumstances. It's an ugly thing by itself, but you couple that with the reality of general human shittiness and corruption, and it's a recipe for atrocious abuses down the road.
When an innocent person is murdered, that's a tragedy and an injustice. You can't fix it by committing another injustice. Executing a prisoner -- someone who is helpless by definition -- isn't just. Making them pay for their crime with confinement and compulsory self-improvement is better.
It's a choice between ensuring that no good comes out of a horrible situation, or creating the possibility to salvage something from a horrible situation by letting people and society benefit from a reformed criminal. Regardless of whether or not they deserve a second chance, some ex-cons have done a great deal of good and improved many lives.
It's a plain fact that the world is a better place thanks to rehabilitation. If you take away a criminal's life, you deny the rest of the world whatever positive effect they could have had on it. It's a statistical certainty that you eventually sacrifice worthy lives by prematurely ending less worthy ones.
People who can't be rehabilitated, and are so twisted that they feel no remorse for disgusting crimes, need treatment, not death. They can hardly be held responsible for their actions if they're severely antisocial or mentally ill.
One of the fundamental ideas that modern civilization is based on is the principle of universal human rights. We've collectively decided that humans have intrinsic dignity and are deserving of basic respect, no matter where they come from or what they do. If a right can be suspended or removed, it's not actually intrinisic at all. So human rights apply to everyone or no one, unless we want to rethink an essential tenet of modern laws and morals. (This isn't to say we shouldn't strive for even better principles that lead to fairer outcomes in more circumstances!)
When you empower a government to decide that someone is no longer human in order to do inhuman things to them, you open the door to having your own rights revoked. It's happened in every dictatorship in history. It's happening to immigrant children and their parents in the US right now.
Yes, it would be a wild stretch to compare the plight of immigrants to criminals on death row, but it's not about the people, it's about whether or not authorities can strip someone of their humanity. Because if it's possible in even one kind of circumstance, then abuse is inevitable. We know that some people, once they have authority, abuse their power to harm others. And we know that bigotry and cruelty depend on dehumanizing people. So that's probably not a practice anybody should indulge in, no matter how good their reasons.
Prisoners are already removed from society. The death penalty executes confined people who pose no threat to people outside the prison walls -- with exceptions that are so rare they can be discounted in this discussion.
Great post. You make a very important point.
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I think it's mainly cost of various legal appeals prisoners can use. Act of killing itself is inexpensive. I mean they hang people in Japan, rope can't be that expensive.
You can't separate the fact this man is absolutely guilty with the fact that as long as the death penalty exists, innocent people will die due to it.
No matter how much you might want to.
I understand your sentiment but also...there are people like Ted Bundy out there. Nothing happened to him in his childhood to make him a monster, he simply was one. He didn't have some sort of psychotic break at an early age or suffer from head trauma. He just felt the need to murder women. Calling all criminals "victims" is an odd stance to take, while you aren't wrong that some criminals truly are victims...a person keeping the human heads of the people he murdered maybe isn't one.
Per Wikipedia:
You seem to be taking at face value Bundy's own account that nothing out of the ordinary happened during his childhood, when the truth is very different.
There's absolutely nothing "genuine" about this post.
Ted Bundy - Wikipedia
I think if a serious criminal with the right help and guidance could have had a non-criminal life, then they are a victim. You'd have to prove they were beyond the reach of help to convince me otherwise.
This thread is a perfect example why criminal justice reform is so hard.
Always focusing on edge cases instead of looking at things systemically. Not to mention that most in prison are their for non-violent crimes and bullshit crimes (drugs).
Always focusing on edge cases instead of looking at things systemically. Not to mention that most in prison are their for non-violent crimes and bullshit crimes (drugs).
I don't know if that's necessarily true about Bundy. He just didn't remember his trauma. Anyone watch "Crazy, not Insane"(I haven't)? Think that's the crux of the argument, it happened when he was 3.
Picking out 1 serial killer where it might not be true doesn't really make for a good argument anyway. There's other things that might contribute , didn't he have a benign brain tumor?
Fully agreed. As to why Era seems to be so divided about this when it's otherwise pretty consistently leftist... I don't think it's that much of a mystery. Empathy and rationality are exercised far less often than the average Era poster would like to think; it's easy to be a leftist when the allies are the disenfranchised, and the enemy are greedy corporations. It's a lot harder to empathize with rapists and murderers, and to tell victims and their families "your feelings that this person should be dead are not enough".
But the thing is... is it truly empathy, if it's effortless? Is it really testing your empathy in any way to post in a message board in support of minorities versus bigots? What's the effort you're really making here? How progressive and commited to empathy Era members truly are, when Cyberpunk 2077 is still massively popular and played despite its transphobic issues, and when next-gen consoles are still bought day one, even knowing they're manufactured through slave labor?
Agreed. Not because criminals don't deserve it, but because I don't think any government should have that power.
It was a genuine question. The guy I was quoting believes everyone deserves rehabilitation including child molesters which I disagree with.
That makes even less sense since I'd imagine that the majority of sex offenders and child abusers don't receive life sentences. Surely the outcomes--reducing recidivism and protecting children--are more important.
I think even more then it's easy to have empathy for minorities in a lot of cases here it's more like "it's easy to have empathy for people facing similar problems to yourself". A lot of people here are part of those minority groups so it's basically having empathy for yourself and your family/friends in those case
