For those against the death penalty....

[Devastatin Dave]

Like I am, here is a story that really troubled me...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/latimests/20...cutionsinchina
I understand China is not exactly a very open society, even if many on a certain side of the political spectrum will try to convince you otherwise, but I cannot believe some of the offenses they are killing people for. I do not understand the death penalty in any society.
Now a reflection on the US's death penalty stance; I think its barbaric and a waste to have the death penalty. It cost too much to try the criminals and we could use these prisoners for something more than just wasting the courts time with appeal after appeal. Opinions?

[Don Corleone]

As sorry as the state of affairs over there is (execution for advocating Tibetan independence? ) I had to laugh when I read this one one:

with the state press touting executions as conducive to a "safe, joyful and happy new year."

Happy New Year!!!


I'm not trying to excuse the situation, but perhaps explain it a little better. You cannot look at the Chinese criminal justice system through Western eyes. We tend to focus on the individual, and where one individual's rights are violated, we all feel slighted. They take a much more community-minded approach to everything. Therefore, if one or two innocents get executed, but crime rates keep dropping, it's a price they are often willing to pay. I'm not saying that's right, I'm just pointing out that's the mentality you're dealing with over there.

As far as the US death penalty, I agree. I say bring back chain gangs, and have the money the men earn thrown into a victim's fund. I also think 'Life w/out the possibility of parole' should be just that, not 8 years and time served for good behavior. You murder a child, somebody who's incapacitated, a cop or multiple people and away you go, never to darken our doorsteps again. I was actually thinking about this up in Alaska. You could make a fortune running prisons up there, if only you could get that damn court ruling that says you have to put people in prison no more than 2 hours from where they live.

[The Stranger]

this will always be a issue with deathpenalty. most defenitly when the murder/crime whas so brutal that there are going to be heads rolling if nobody gets caught.

so there is always the possibility that you punish someone for someone elses deed...but when you get killed for it you can never make it up...not even a little bit

[BDC]

China is a grim play. No other way to subdue such a big and different empire. Not somewhere to annoy the powers-that-be.

[Geoffrey S]

Don Corleone's right on this one. China's got different priorities/standards when compared to Western nations, looking at it through Western eyes doesn't really allow one to understand the situation. Not that it excuses the death penalty in any way, but it does put it into some kind of social context. I still think the death penalty's no good, and would be better replaced by a total removal of freedom in the form of a strict prison sentence.

[KingOfTheIsles]

The Don is pretty much spot-on with this one. The death penalty is currently just as expensive as prison, and if you are in jail, it should be mandatory to make criminals earn some of the money back that is being spent on them.

[Aurelian]

Yeesh. I can't believe that we're letting our companies shift the world's industry to China. When you read things like that it just shows how horrible that country still is from a human rights perspective. It's like the Soviet Union with fewer nukes and a (sort of) free market system.

A couple of weeks ago, there was another horrifying article about the Chinese using the collagen from executed prisoners in commercial beauty products:

Claim: executed Chinese prisoners used for collagen

Creepy.

"Soylent Green is Chinese people! It's Chinese peeeeeopllllle!!!"

[Byzantine Prince]

As sorry as the state of affairs over there is (execution for advocating Tibetan independence? ) I had to laugh when I read this one one:



Happy New Year!!!


I'm not trying to excuse the situation, but perhaps explain it a little better. You cannot look at the Chinese criminal justice system through Western eyes. We tend to focus on the individual, and where one individual's rights are violated, we all feel slighted. They take a much more community-minded approach to everything. Therefore, if one or two innocents get executed, but crime rates keep dropping, it's a price they are often willing to pay. I'm not saying that's right, I'm just pointing out that's the mentality you're dealing with over there.

I disagree with the underlined. Seeing as my parents lived under communism I can say that from their experiences, executions were about as popular a solution as putting someone in jail for pretty much any crime. This was sometimes a good deal for some people who took advantage of their conditions and messed up bad.

Therefore I don't think it's the 'West' that is looking at it with the its eyes. It's the traditional justice system versus the aggressive post revolution justice system that has not evolved since the begginings of any communist country.

EDIT: @Azi: executions are more expensive due to legal fees. There is little legal costs in communism.

[Papewaio]

If it makes you feel better to think that the Chinese people are happy with injustice then I have some real estate to sell to you.

Simply see how many people are trying to get out of China as refugees or immigrants.

Or just read that article:

There's no justice in China," Nie Xuesheng said, alternately shouting and whimpering. "My son can't just die like this. This system is corrupt

Nor is it even the traditional system... look at Confucian values.

[Devastatin Dave]

If it makes you feel better to think that the Chinese people are happy with injustice then I have some real estate to sell to you.

.

I hope that wasn't addressed to me, because I would never think that.

[Steppe Merc]

Human rights groups, however, say China executes more people than the rest of the world's governments combined.

Wow. And I thought Texas was bad...

I find it quite good that the UN wants them to reform. But will they? Or can they even be made to, or just threatened? But the only ones who I think would be taken the least bit seriously would be the countries that those that do not have it, like Great Britian or... some other European country. Because America asking China to stop executing so many people would be quite silly.

And can the UN make a country have better trials? Make them use juries, and have the trial records open?

[Papewaio]

I hope that wasn't addressed to me, because I would never think that.

No, it was addressed to those who think that because someone is Asian that they have different feelings to others.

[Kaiser of Arabia]

Like I am, here is a story that really troubled me...
http://news.yahoo.com/s/latimests/20...cutionsinchina
I understand China is not exactly a very open society, even if many on a certain side of the political spectrum will try to convince you otherwise, but I cannot believe some of the offenses they are killing people for. I do not understand the death penalty in any society.
Now a reflection on the US's death penalty stance; I think its barbaric and a waste to have the death penalty. It cost too much to try the criminals and we could use these prisoners for something more than just wasting the courts time with appeal after appeal. Opinions?

Did someone hack Dave's account?

[Papewaio]

It is the residual glow of having all his warnings removed ... that or he now is a civilian...

[Kaiser of Arabia]

It is the residual glow of having all his warnings removed ... that or he now is a civilian...

Wow.

Warnings really do stuff to one's mind, huh?

[Devastatin Dave]

It is the residual glow of having all his warnings removed ... that or he now is a civilian...

LOL, not quite, I've always disagreed on the death penalty since I became a Christian some 10 years ago. Its not exactly the morality aspect of it, its mainly because it is extremely impracticle.

[Kaiser of Arabia]

LOL, not quite, I've always disagreed on the death penalty since I became a Christian some 10 years ago. Its not exactly the morality aspect of it, its mainly because it is extremely impracticle.

Reborn, I take it?

By the way, what's impracticle about a $.10 bullet?

[Don Corleone]

No, it was addressed to those who think that because someone is Asian that they have different feelings to others.

I didn't say that, and I certainly didn't mean that. What I said was that the Chinese tend to look at the community as more important than the individual. Go back and read what I actually wrote.

You're right, the modern Chinese government doesn't uphold Confucian ideals, and that is causing a LOT of tension. I don't know where things are going to go from here over there.

[Devastatin Dave]

Reborn, I take it?

By the way, what's impracticle about a $.10 bullet?

Except for its not done that way. With the constant appeals and all the housing and care given to a deathrow inmate, it costs more to execute them than it would to just simply put them in prison for the rest of their lives!!! Its a fact. So a life of hard labor is what I propose.

[Kaiser of Arabia]

Except for its not done that way. With the constant appeals and all the housing and care given to a deathrow inmate, it costs more to execute them than it would to just simply put them in prison for the rest of their lives!!! Its a fact. So a life of hard labor is what I propose.

We *could* get the government to make it a simple $0.10 bullet to the skull?

[Papewaio]

Kaiser have you ever got in trouble for something that you did not do?

Did you get punished?

[Kaiser of Arabia]

Kaiser have you ever got in trouble for something that you did not do?

Did you get punished?

I usually talk my way out of it.

That's why their should always be a fair and just trial. However, once found guilty, and given one chance to appeal, we should show no mercy to murderers and rapists.

[el_slapper]

I usually talk my way out of it.

That's why their should always be a fair and just trial. However, once found guilty, and given one chance to appeal, we should show no mercy to murderers and rapists.

Death penalty in France was abolished in 1981. The last 2 men risking death penalty were Christian Ranucci, for murder, & Patrick Henry, for double murder of children. Christian Ranucci was executed, Patrick Henry stayed in jail for 25 years. Christian Ranucci was innocent, Patrick Henry was arrested 6 months after getting free while smuggling cocaine through Spain.

It is easy to say today, Ranucci & Henry should have been swapped. But at those times, it was not. In fact, most elements known to this date were proving that Ranucci was guilty. He was not. In a system without death penalty, you can still free someone jailed by error(recently happened over there, a guy freed after 15 years as the real guilty was the serial killer Francis Heaulme). In a system with death penalty, once wrong, forever wrong.

Errare humanum est, used to say the Romans. it means that making mistakes is part of the essence of man. It is true for the criminal, which does an error(though we cannot afford him to get free for some time), it is true to for the judge & the policemen leading the inquiry. So you can be found guilty on false basis, because witnesses didn't say the truth, because proofs were overlooked, because a witness was not clear, because a proof was not found, or because policemen were lazy. The last one did happen in southern France for the infamous "Omar m'a tuer" affair, where the gardener was found guilty of murdering the righ heir that was her boss. After the "cour de cassation"(kind of supreme court) did confirm the prison for him, and only after, it appeared that policement had destroyed photos taken the day the murder was supposed to have happened..... Chirac did free Omar the gardener then, but it has not be possible to know whether he was guilty : proofs have been destroyed, & noone never told what was on the photos.

The problem of your reasoning is that you assume that fair & just trials do not make mistakes. They do, & rather often, seen the complexity of those affairs. And neither you or me would do better.

[Seamus Fermanagh]

We *could* get the government to make it a simple $0.10 bullet to the skull?

Hey, if you're really interested in that form of justice, You could move to Red China. They not only put it into practice, but they bill the deceased's family for the cost of the cartridge -- you gotta love tender communist efficiency.

Seamus