i need help in formulating an opinion.

Thorn Bird said:
i agree with every single thought here. i really do. i just can't think it's that cut and dry. it looks good on paper, sure, but there are sooo many factors. i believe people make mistakes. i believe a few will change. i believe in mental illnesses. i believe in denying people privileges such as cable and gyms. i believe you should be punished for a crime.
which leads me to this: why can i not believe in the death penalty, but i LOVE the idea of putting people like saddam in a tiny hole where he doesn't even have room to turn around in and show him a stream of video of his victims and their families for the REST OF HIS LIFE. hopefully that would drive him crazy or to a heart, either way. i'm okay with torturing someone while they are alive, but i don't believe in the death penalty. someone help me here, too.
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Torture would be taking pleasure out of another living creatures misery. My soul could not handle that, no matter what kind of animal the person is. End their life and leave the rest of their punishment up to God and the devil.
 
Pandora said:
Torture would be taking pleasure out of another living creatures misery. My soul could not handle that, no matter what kind of animal the person is. End their life and leave the rest of their punishment up to God and the devil.
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that's what's bothersome to me. i can handle the torment but not the death. i don't see ending someone's life in a two-part step. i don't think you can end the life and then hand it over to the one who judges. i think it's all in one swift step, leading me to think it's not our decision to end a life but it is our decision to punish/justify. i don't think ending a life is our call.
 
Thorn Bird said:
that's what's bothersome to me. i can handle the torment but not the death. i don't see ending someone's life in a two-part step. i don't think you can end the life and then hand it over to the one who judges. i think it's all in one swift step, leading me to think it's not our decision to end a life but it is our decision to punish/justify. i don't think ending a life is our call.
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I don't think it's our decision to punish/justify. It's our duity to socity to determine wither someone is a threat to others. If so they are then removed from the law abiding society and placed into a 'society' of their non-law abiding peers. Being responsible for torture isn't any different than killing them. It's worse imo, because you are taking pleasure in someones pain. At that point you become an animal like them. I prefer the more cut and dry method of removing them from society all together. Have you ever seen anyone be tortured? Even just the fake stuff on tv and the movies.... :barf:
 
Pandora said:
I don't think it's our decision to punish/justify. It's our duity to socity to determine wither someone is a threat to others. If so they are then removed from the law abiding society and placed into a 'society' of their non-law abiding peers. Being responsible for torture isn't any different than killing them. It's worse imo, because you are taking pleasure in someones pain. At that point you become an animal like them. I prefer the more cut and dry method of removing them from society all together. Have you ever seen anyone be tortured? Even just the fake stuff on tv and the movies.... :barf:
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yeah, i totally agree. stuff like that really freaks me out, and i've only seen about two tortures. i don't think i can handle any serious stuff. i guess i'm not talking about torturing physically AT ALL. let me clarify. i guess i don't mean torture, really. i'd just hope that putting saddam in a hole and making him watch family videos would be torture for him. probably not. i guess i mean mental "torture," in where the guilty would be forced to reflect on what they did and why it's wrong, and spend the rest of their lives with nothing but a lot of time to do such. to me, that's torture. to me, having all the time in the world to reflect on my regrets would be torture.

i'm glad you brought the torture thing up because i realized that's not what i really meant! :)
 
Thorn Bird said:
yeah, i totally agree. stuff like that really freaks me out, and i've only seen about two tortures. i don't think i can handle any serious stuff. i guess i'm not talking about torturing physically AT ALL. let me clarify. i guess i don't mean torture, really. i'd just hope that putting saddam in a hole and making him watch family videos would be torture for him. probably not. i guess i mean mental "torture," in where the guilty would be forced to reflect on what they did and why it's wrong, and spend the rest of their lives with nothing but a lot of time to do such. to me, that's torture. to me, having all the time in the world to reflect on my regrets would be torture.

i'm glad you brought the torture thing up because i realized that's not what i really meant! :)
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Forcing them to face their crimes would be ideal. But some wouldn't change, or they would just fake it to get another hearing. And to me, even giving them the chance to change wouldn't fit the crime. They didn't give their victims a chance before they killed them.
 
What makes me sick today is when the police catch a murder and lawyers get all the evidence thrown out. You have the guy, a knife covered in blood with his fingerprints on it, his clothes covered in blood but you can just let the guy walk because he has a good lawyer?! He did it! Punish him!
 
b_sinning said:
What makes me sick today is when the police catch a murder and lawyers get all the evidence thrown out. You have the guy, a knife covered in blood with his fingerprints on it, his clothes covered in blood but you can just let the guy walk because he has a good lawyer?! He did it! Punish him!
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That's both the good and bad thing about our country. Mostly good though. Evidence gets thrown out when procedure or rights are violated. Those procecures and rights are what safeguard the innocent. Many times the guilty go free because of them, but it's better to let them walk than to wrongly imprison an innocent man.

People tear their hair out over these sorts of things, but I'd rather that be the case than live in a country like China.
 
b_sinning said:
What makes me sick today is when the police catch a murder and lawyers get all the evidence thrown out. You have the guy, a knife covered in blood with his fingerprints on it, his clothes covered in blood but you can just let the guy walk because he has a good lawyer?! He did it! Punish him!
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This is a direct result of trying to make the system "fair." If the system just doled out punishment based upon crime, then you'd find that those in more desperate situations would be in even more trouble.

At this point, the question becomes one of why punish the criminal? Is it some sort of justice? If so, what is that? Justice is just something that we have created, right? How would you define it.

This goes hard against saying that someone doesn't deserve life after they have taken someone else's. Who is to say they deserved it in the first place. Who is to say I deserve my life? What about yours?
 
taeric said:
This is a direct result of trying to make the system "fair." If the system just doled out punishment based upon crime, then you'd find that those in more desperate situations would be in even more trouble.

At this point, the question becomes one of why punish the criminal? Is it some sort of justice? If so, what is that? Justice is just something that we have created, right? How would you define it.

This goes hard against saying that someone doesn't deserve life after they have taken someone else's. Who is to say they deserved it in the first place. Who is to say I deserve my life? What about yours?
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Sounds like the start of a good stoned conversation.
 
Thorn Bird said:
yeah, i totally agree. stuff like that really freaks me out, and i've only seen about two tortures. i don't think i can handle any serious stuff. i guess i'm not talking about torturing physically AT ALL. let me clarify. i guess i don't mean torture, really. i'd just hope that putting saddam in a hole and making him watch family videos would be torture for him. probably not. i guess i mean mental "torture," in where the guilty would be forced to reflect on what they did and why it's wrong, and spend the rest of their lives with nothing but a lot of time to do such. to me, that's torture. to me, having all the time in the world to reflect on my regrets would be torture.

i'm glad you brought the torture thing up because i realized that's not what i really meant! :)
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But the problem with these people is they feel no guilt, so it wouldn't affect them.
 
kiwi said:
But the problem with these people is they feel no guilt, so it wouldn't affect them.
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i agree to that a bit, but i don't think i can put all guilty under that umbrella. i think a few do come out realizing the wrong done.
 
Pandora said:
I've had some really :cool: conversations that way. Try discussing perspective and reality when you're stoned and hanging out on a dock of the bay. That's a life changing experience right thur.
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omg...been there, done that!!! i recommend the pier in fairhope, ala.
 
Pandora said:
A few. But if they were capable of that would they have killed in the first place?
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sure. guilt doesn't stop people from choosing wrong. there are feelings that overpower guilt or even regret. rage, jealousy, etc can win over in a heated moment. irrationality.
 
Thorn Bird said:
sure. guilt doesn't stop people from choosing wrong. there are feelings that overpower guilt or even regret. rage, jealousy, etc can win over in a heated moment. irrationality.
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Unless you've already got some mental problems I still don't see how that could make a difference. No matter how mad I think I could ever be, I don't think it's in me to kill anything. I don't even like killing spiders, and I REALLY HATE spiders. Ick!
 
Pandora said:
Unless you've already got some mental problems I still don't see how that could make a difference. No matter how mad I think I could ever be, I don't think it's in me to kill anything. I don't even like killing spiders, and I REALLY HATE spiders. Ick!
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i see your point, but i also think you are waaaay more gentle than the average person. i've been lost in a moment of rage TWICE where i lost sense of who i was and any sense of control. i can understand how things can happen in a moment of lost control. doesn't make them right but it doesn't make the person mentally ill or insane. i'm an extremely emotional person, and, granted, i've never done something in these extreme moments, but i do know what it's like to lose control of yourself.
 
and lemme say that if i was witness to something happening to my daughter, you BET i could kill. i wouldn't want to, but i'd want my daughter more.
 
That's why the law has manslaughter and different degrees of murder. To try to cope with the emotional state vs. normal state problem.

I'm not a strong beliver of our legal system at all but I do think that was one good thing it does have.
 
Thorn Bird said:
i see your point, but i also think you are waaaay more gentle than the average person. i've been lost in a moment of rage TWICE where i lost sense of who i was and any sense of control. i can understand how things can happen in a moment of lost control. doesn't make them right but it doesn't make the person mentally ill or insane. i'm an extremely emotional person, and, granted, i've never done something in these extreme moments, but i do know what it's like to lose control of yourself.
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Am I really more gentle than the average person? I always thought I was kinda average? I've NEVER lost control of myself tho, especially to the point where I could kill anyone. I'm too much of a control freak. If it ever came to that I'd prolly be more likely to off myself cuz I did loose it.
 
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