Why we should enforce the death penalty

[Happy Monkey]

Originally posted by Troubleshooter
I would feel sorry for them, but to expect 100% efficiency from anything the size of the state is to be deluded. And to believe that the state should not punish people at all because it might punish someone who is innocent is also wrong.

Punish? Correct. Kill? I don't think so. If there is a chance someone is innocent, they should not be executed. While someone is alive, there is always the chance that they could be exonerated. Once they're dead, it's too late.

This links in with the idea of revenge as being compatible with justice, or "treating the victims well". If the wishes of the victims are given high priority in law enforcement/trial/sentencing, the system is easily corruptible. Victims are less capable of being impartial, and are likely to latch on to whoever is first tried for the crime, and resist any evidence to the contrary. I have seen several death penalty cases being overturned, where the victims are interviewed, and they are angry that old wounds are being reopened. Revenge, being exceedingly emotional, can be satisfied as long as somebody pays.

I see in may debates "you'd feel different if your child were murdered". That may be correct, and that is the reason that certain jurors are excluded from certain trials. One of the fundamental concepts of the modern Western judicial system is that justice, not revenge, is to be served.