Through ironically colourful colourblind eyes....

The death penalty. Forever a contriversial topic. For it or against it? There have been some recent posts on this topic on two blogs, and its got me thinking. I never really had a stance before. Join me in my following train of thoughts to figure out my stance.

So someone is convicted of a heinous crime and is sentenced to death. What does this solve?

From a practical sense, removal from society so the rest of us can live in peace. Ok, that works. But...is this the only way to remove someone from society? Im pretty sure more creative ways could be thought up. Life sentence, shipped to somewhere, away from the general populous made solely for convicts of heinous crimes (eg Alcatraz) dropped in the middle of the South American jungle or the Sahara desert and left to fend for themselves, etc etc. If strictly for removal from society, then I dont believe killing them is absolutely necessary.

From an emotional sense, for those who are relatives/close friends with the victim, one could totally understand the death penalty if only to ease their pain, to give a sense of closure. For them, merely removing them from society by any of the aforementioned methods may not be good enough. Its normal to wish death on the person that has taken someone near and dear away from you. So, in this sense, it would actually be the family/close friends that wish the death of the perpetrator, so technically a judge should not be the one to determine whether or not the criminal should die, it should be the family/close friends, since they were the ones affected, right? The jury finds him guilty, the judge on his/her discretion decides whether or not the crime qualifies as a possible death sentence, and asks the family/close friends if they wish it. Ok, I guess I can see with that.

From a moral/religious point of view....who has the right to take a life? Who decides whether or not any one individual has the authority to legally take the life of another individual? I dont know the bible that well, but the only times I see that one is allowed to take a life is in self defense, or if the Lord himself commands it. So fine, no one has the right to declare death on any individual. However one could argue that there are some people on this earth that do not deserve to live. Child molesters, serial killers, etc...people that contribute nothing good to society, people who seem to be born without a conscience, people who are beyond any help currently available...do these people deserve to live? If they cause nothing but pain and trouble then why are they alive?? Ok, so since theyre a nuisance kill them, get rid of them, even if we don’t understand why they exist in the first place. But aren’t there 100 million things we don’t understand about the world around us? We always say “the Lord works in mysterious ways”, how are we so sure the mere existence of these individuals is not another one of His mysterious ways? We don’t understand them so we kill them? Hmm….. But you’d think the Lord would’ve provided us with ways to deal with such people. Sticky. Assuming we don’t have the right to take anyone’s life, we waste resources on these people in whatever way we punish them. Im not talking about putting them in fully carpeted air conditioned buildings with gym etc. and calling it prison. That’s utter rubbish.

So whats my stance? It’s a difficult call, I wont lie. I would agree with a death sentence only on the grounds of the emotional sense, where the family/close friends were PROFOUNDLY affected by the sudden death of the victim, and THEY decide whether the criminal deserves to die, not an impartial judge and jury.

Or I would go the Moroccan route. You steal, they cut off your hand. You rape, they castrate you. Punishment seems fitting enough to me.