Question about killing another human

[hey_moe]

Yeah you read it right. Are our laws to laxed in this area because just about every time I turn the News on or open the local paper all I see it killings. It almost like the ones who do the killings have more rights than the victim. If the laws where to change what do you think would stop or slow down the shooting or killing of another human being. BTW, let's not turn this into a political thread cus you know what will happen..lol...Mike

[stiz]

If the laws where to change what do you think would stop or slow down the shooting or killing of another human being.

No. It'll take more than a change in law, more a change in society.

[Terry]

Swift and certain punishment! I would recommend public hangings complete with audiance, media, and hot dog vendors. Most killings would stop in short order.

[rdaniell]

I agree with Terry about the "swift and certain punishment." Unfortunately, I'm not sure there has ever been "swift and certain punishment." Just read the chapter entitled: "The Tardiness of God's Punishment" found in Plutarch's Selective Lives and Essays.

RD

[lifejogger]

It is a lack of respect for self and others. A total breakdown of society.

[stiz]

Swift and certain punishment! I would recommend public hangings complete with audience, media, and hot dog vendors. Most killings would stop in short order.

Thats been tried, corporal punishment, Victorian prisons etc etc ... fact of the matter is, if someone wants to kill someone else, they will. I'm convinced the murder rates haven't gone up etc, its just that the media are reporting it more and less people are going "missing" .. or just being dumped in the river by thugs quietly at night. Murders that would have happened at one end of the country would prolly not be reported by the media at the other end. These days its plastered over at least 10 papers and countless websites running the "story" for at least a week, with full character profiles of all those involved, or untill the next murder happens, in which case they do the same again. Rinse and repeat till the world is empty ... or the football starts and they plaster that all over the place.

Its gonna take a shift in attitude, social morals and gang/religious/racial mentality to lower murder rates and violence to any extent. Even then its still going to happen. 1 experiment would be to ban the press printing any storys releated to murder/theft etc for say a year, and see if joe public thinks the world is a safer place.

[Roadburner440]

Unfortunately Mike the only way to help this is by allowing people to stand their ground, and defend their "castle" with impunity. Now that being said such authority comes with a lot of responsibility that the vast majority of society lacks. As you say there seems to be those who have no issues just taking lives of others. You see this on both sides of the spectrum from criminals, and also the vigilantes using these "stand your ground laws" to their advantage in certaint instances (to be clear not talking about the Florida case, but other cases in the past that have already been settled). So as said above it is going to be a definite culture/societal change required.

I think the best thing you can do is get a concealed weapons permit, do the required training, and learn/respect the laws governing the use there of. I know a lot will disagree with me on this matter, but I lastly advise respect for human life and encourage this as last resort. While you only have seconds to determine what to do if you have the proper training and knowledge you can make the right one most of the time.

Lastly I am tired of the criminals having more rights than the real victims. Suing because they were injured while commiting crimes, or their family coming on the back end and suing for wrongful death. It truly is a shame, and the more you increase criminal rights you will see a vast uptick in crime. Especially when you start slapping people on the wrist, and it becomes more beneficial to do crime.

[SSI01]

This one will call for some deep thought. I figure the hydrocodone I took a few hours ago should be enough of a mental spur for a halfway intelligent answer - I think.

Part of the problem - hence the solution - lies in the cheapening in the value of human life that has occurred in our culture. This begins with our attitude toward a certain class of person who hasn't drawn a breath yet. Euthenasia for "useless" elderly was once practiced in the "civilized" West, and this is nothing more than a logical extension of the aforementioned attitude toward those on the other end of the age scale. Add in what young people are exposed to in many PlayStation games, with their speed and pace and "excitement," with no thought to the consequences for the driver of that vehicle you just forced off the road, or the person you just shot/blew up/burned/dissolved/etc etc etc. I remember when there was a series of complaints some years ago about the old WB and Hanna-Barbera cartoons being "too violent" for children, hence they were pulled. You can't see Wile E. Coyote get blown up or run off a cliff any more - only now we've substituted even wilder violence on a device that uses the TV as a medium to display even worse mayhem. Even in the old cartoons there was no blood, or body parts - the character just got a blasted look, their hair/ears all askew - but they came back after cleaning up. Now you can see the technicolor details. Just saw an ad this weekend about some little bitty thing with little bitty clothes, sucking on a lollipop, who slaughters zombies using all kinds of devices and methods. That's my point. Go to any game store or WM and look at the computer games or X-Box games section. Scary.

Another part lies in unevenly applied very severe penalties for the unlawful taking of human life. Extreme effort must be expended by governments to prove an individual took someone else's life without justification, to preclude an unjust conviction for homicide. However, once it is proven beyond any conceivable shadow of a doubt the penalty should be administered swiftly, and every state needs to have the same penalty. Of course they never will - but we're talking about an "ideal" world, aren't we?

Dad was part of a generation that sent many of its members to deal with ideologies and governments that had cheapened human life to a frightening degree. He detested what he had to do but became awesomely good at it because he knew it would bring what he was fighting to an end. Once it was over he wanted nothing more to do with it. He hated unnecessary violence; for example, if watching old WWI or WWII films and an airplane spun down or plunged to impact with the earth he never failed to state there was a man in that airplane. Look at the social mores of the time of his adolescence and you can see they were totally different from what they are now - much more liberal now, hence the subject of the mores is cheapened.

There was more religiosity when he was growing up - more people were "churched," and churches were strong and well-grounded - that helped, too. The churches uniformly had the same concept of the value of human life, and expected you as a member to conform to their values - rather than the exact opposite which it has devolved to now.

We've also isolated our young people from real death - from attendance at funerals even to how we refer to death - "passing" - "pass away" - "move on" - and any other synonym you care to use, instead of using the words "die" or "died." They just don't sense the terrible finality of death. Assigning a pettiness to death through how it's portrayed in popular film or video entertainment worsens the problem.

Public executions were tried in Britain back in the 1700s and 1800s but all they succeeded in doing was drawing a crowd of otherwise bored people.

Don't want to bend your ear any more, but this goes way beyond just a quickly-administered public penalty, however justly and richly deserved. My point is this sickness goes very deep into our younger people in this culture, and in many ways it's not their fault at all - it's ours.

[Terry]

Thats been tried, corporal punishment, Victorian prisons etc etc ... fact of the matter is, if someone wants to kill someone else, they will. I'm convinced the murder rates haven't gone up etc, its just that the media are reporting it more and less people are going "missing" .. or just being dumped in the river by thugs quietly at night. Murders that would have happened at one end of the country would prolly not be reported by the media at the other end. These days its plastered over at least 10 papers and countless websites running the "story" for at least a week, with full character profiles of all those involved, or untill the next murder happens, in which case they do the same again. Rinse and repeat till the world is empty ... or the football starts and they plaster that all over the place.

Its gonna take a shift in attitude, social morals and gang/religious/racial mentality to lower murder rates and violence to any extent. Even then its still going to happen. 1 experiment would be to ban the press printing any storys releated to murder/theft etc for say a year, and see if joe public thinks the world is a safer place.

We don't do that here!

Public hangings are meant to be more than a deterrent, they eliminate the problem through attrition!

[SSI01]

We don't do that here!

Public hangings are meant to be more than a deterrent, they eliminate the problem through attrition!

One thing's for absolutely certain - it may not deter someone else from committing an unjustifiable homicide, but it will sure administer a just penalty to the person who did. In addition, it keeps this person from serving a "life" sentence - in many jurisdictions, actually 20 or so years, frequently with TO for good behavior or for being "rehabilitated" - and then coming out of the prison to kill again. This actually happened to a rather well-known Fox Channel program host who was once a state governor and provided a pardon to a prisoner who had either already killed someone or displayed a propensity for extreme violence to another human being - who upon pardoning and release promptly killed a LEO. This is the second-worst type of homicide because it was perpetrated against someone who represents the protective powers of society toward its members. Someone who kills a LEO, who is armed and stands between the criminal element and innocent members of society, obviously won't stop at killing anyone else in society - hence the justification for administering the most severe penalty to someone who is clearly and meticulously convicted of this offense.

[arfyhun]

OPTIONS: There are four;

(In Gt. Britain we only have options three and four).


1. Hanging, or any other way for permanent removal from the gene-pool.

2. Prison for LIFE.

3. Prison for 'life', (here ~7-8 years), (or in the case of drunk drivers with no licence or insurance, around 9-18 months).

4. If the court finds them guilty, they get told not to do it again & are set free immediately.


RESPONSES TO OPTIONS:

1: Could convict the wrong man or woman, as has happened in the past.

2: In popular society, permanent incarceration is cruelty and surely against their 'ooman rights'.

3: I am not aware of the latest statistics here, but around ten years ago killers who had served their 'time' and had been freed, went on to kill a further 62 people.

4: This is the only way forward in view of the imperfections of the above. Keeps the anti-death brigade happy; stops cruelty to human beings banged up to rot, (not to mention the money saved on the running of prisons) and if you are going to be murdered by a previous murderer it will happen sooner or later anyway.


I personally, would make the offender work to pay his way.


To support the family of the deceased.

To pay the police costs in finding him/her.

To pay the court costs.

To pay the cost of his/her prison stay, (food, water, clothing, toilet rolls, etc.). It's not a taxpayer-sponsered holiday camp.


I feel if this were applied, suddenly a fifth option would arise, a high suicide rate.

This would prove mathematically, in this instance, 1=5.

Q.E.D.

In the 1950's around three people were hanged a year for murder. If we were to re-introdce the death penalty now in Gt. Britain we would need a rainforest of trees just for the jibbets.

Graham.

[stiz]

We don't do that here!

I know, but it would be an intresting experiment. A few years ago the press ran a report on "happy slapping" attacks that were happening in a town, no one else had ever heard of it. Over the next few weeks it was happening everywhere.

If we were to re-introdce the death penalty now in Gt. Britain we would need a rainforest of trees just for the jibbets.

now now, we cant be cutting down trees, thats just non eco friendly. Lets be really eco friendly and just push em off the roof?

[T Square]

First let me say I am all for the ultimate penalty for the ultimate crime, and that justice should be swift. That being said it is just my opinion, this will not and does not work in our current justice system. Unfortunately we live in a society where justice is not blind, it sees dollar signs. Justice is largely based in our society on how much money you are willing to spend to purchase it. In a system where money or the lack there of decides how well you are represented, the rich will rarely "hang" and the poor will always "hang". Like it or not under our current system you can murder, lie, cheat, steal, rape, do illegal drugs, not pay taxes, and probably a lot more crimes I missed if you can aford it. Yes you may have to spend a little time in rehab or maybe even a year or two in jail, but nothing like the time some poor slob with a public defender will spend. If you disagree with this opinion look at the headlines and cases in the news in the last few months. There are two levels of justice in this country poor and wealthy, the poor are guilty and the wealthy purchase, deserve the benefit of doubt.
Unfortunitely our society seems to have forgotten that the statue that represents justice is blindfolded for a reason, we should change her to having two eye holes cut in the blindfold and the scales should be tipped to one side with a dollar sign sittng on it. Unless we demand unbiased fairness be returned to our justice system I am against the "Death Penalty" fix the system and I'll apply for the job of executioner and donate my earnings to charity.

[pfflyers]

I'm one of those that believes the media deserves a lot of blame for making us feel less safe today, by sensationalizing murder. If you look at real crime statistics, most of us are no more likely to be murdered today than we were 50 years ago. In a majority of cases murderer and victim knew each other prior, in fact they are often family members. Often the crime involves intoxication, where emotions, disputes, etc get out of control.

[arfyhun]

now now, we cant be cutting down trees, thats just non eco friendly. Lets be really eco friendly and just push em off the roof? [/QUOTE]

Come on stiz, how much wood would it take to build the roofs, (let alone the price of foundations, bricks, doorways, stairs, tea bars every five floors etc.) just to get the shyte up there.....

Graham.