Saudi Arabia to behead and crucify paedophile...

[SeanMacGabhann]

Steve why do you persist with this?

I will ask the question again. If the death penalty is so effective then why bit go for a walk after dark in neighborhoods in any large American city ?

[SteveT]

Possibly Sean, because their judicial system is more corrupt than ours?

[SeanMacGabhann]

so you want to introduce the death penalty and hand it over to a corrupt judiciary? No thanks

Could it be Steve, that the death penalty doesn't deter crime?

Could it be that if you were interested in reducing crime rates (instead of killing people) you could look for solid examples of democracies across the world without the death penalty?

[SteveT]

It's probably a generational thing Sean, I'm of the generation where people of my age think that the ne'erdowells should get there just deserts.

Ideally it should be seen to be done too.

If people behave like animals, they should be put down like animals, then they will no longer behave like animals.

[SeanMacGabhann]

It might be a generational thing but I'm more interested in what works

London was famous for it's public executions and it was a hell of a lot more dangerous back then (say Tudor or Elizabethan times)

[SteveT]

Perhaps we can make a better job of it in future Sean, I am forever optimistic.

[huncamunca]

Most crime is commited by people.

Execute all people - no exceptions -and crime will virtually disappear

[SeanMacGabhann]

well, quite, snunca

It reminds me of the great philosopher and rapper Fur Q

You gotta kill people so they respect you.. but you can't kill all of them.. because...

@ theChair - that IS on topic as it shows up the absurdity of capital punishment!

[silverfox]

Or the absurdity of rapper Fur Q's 'philosophy'

[SeanMacGabhann]

ok .. now I'm slightly worried that you really think that I think Fur Q is

a) a philosopher

b) a real character and not a satire by Chris Morris

The link between capital punishment and the the sketch is exemplified by huncamunca's comment - ie if you want a totally crime free world then it's possible but.... Of course hunca being hunca I can't be 100% sure he/she doesn't also genuinely believe that ;-)

[silverfox]

No, I wouldn't insult your intelligence by pretending I believed you seriously meant that line of argument.

Seriously, I think people have to accept the argument that Capital Punishment as a deterrent doesn't work and is absurd. However, as some posters above have mentioned, Capital Punishment as society's revenge isn't absurd. The idea that a society can find certain categories of crime so abhorrent that the punishment is death on the basis that the perpetrator has forfeited the right to live within that society and also that justice is seen to be done is not absurd.

Whether we regard such a position as right or wrong is of course open for debate. But it is not absurd.

(edited for typo)

[SimonM]

It might be a generational thing but I'm more interested in what works

Let's just be absolutely clear here about one thing. It most certainly is not a "generation thing" as SteveT suggests. I have always been against the death penalty: I find it wrong on every level. Enoch Powell, with whose views I have almost nothing in common, also opposed the death penalty and he was not only far older than I am even now but also far more right wing.