Yes. No. Yes. No. Maybe. Sometimes. Crap.
Dec. 13th, 2005 10:53 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jchrisobrienCall it the astrological influence of being a Libra cusp (concerned with balance), call it weighing both sides of the issues, or call it plain on wishy washy, but I have a profoundly hard time coming down on one side of the fence or the other for a lot of the big moral issues out there. The Tookie Williams execution is the latest example of this. If you don't know, just plug tookie williams in google and read about him yourself, you can make up your own mind as to whether he is repentant or not.
I was raised Roman Catholic, so I was taught that killing was wrong, be it during war, murder, execution, or abortion. Later I learned about exemptions during wartime, and taking a life while defending your self, and a thousand other shades of grey. I've seen the hypocrisy of people who are pro-choice but anti-death penalty, and those who say life is sacred unless you are a murderer. I hear the arguments on either side, and I sway to and for depending on the eloquence of the speaker or the precision of their logic.
It's more than frustrating, it's weak. Your beliefs define your character, and if you're beliefs change with the wind, what does that say about you? I believe that people are organic: they grow and change over time, and once your learn something that doesn't mean you are committed to that belief for the rest of your life. Change should occur after you wrestle with an issue, hold up your beliefs to a spotlight, kick the tires and see how they hold.
Buy the car because you like it, not because the salesman made you like it.
I am a vortex of thoughts and opinions. Murder is the worst thing you can do to someone. Forgivness is a sign of civilization. People have to take responsibility for their actions, and suffer the consequences if that applies. People can change. Some people never change. You can come from a horrible background and neighborhood and better yourself. You can come from a cultured, civilized background and be an amoral prick who justifies their vile behavior through philosophy or a thousand shades of grey. People will say anything to save their life. You can't force someone to change.
If it's inhumane to kill someone who has killed another, what do you do to them? How should they pay for their crime? How many years of your life should you sacrifice to pay for the years you took from another? Can you ever really pay for that crime, and if you can't, why bother incarcerating them in the first place? I am told there are plenty of studies that say that the death penalty is not a deterrent. By that token, people are going to kill or rape or steal regardless of what you do. What is our response to that?
These kind of question quickly spiral out of the micro view and into the macro. They become questions of culture, of society. People wouldn't steal if they weren't poor. Any society that grows has rules, and needs ways of punishing people who break those rules. All kinds of words on all sides of the argument again. Drowning in a sea of emotion and logic.
If I really buckle down and think about it, I can come up with answers that satify me. It's good when things happen that make you question your beliefs, and even better if you can be consistant about them in the end.
I was raised Roman Catholic, so I was taught that killing was wrong, be it during war, murder, execution, or abortion. Later I learned about exemptions during wartime, and taking a life while defending your self, and a thousand other shades of grey. I've seen the hypocrisy of people who are pro-choice but anti-death penalty, and those who say life is sacred unless you are a murderer. I hear the arguments on either side, and I sway to and for depending on the eloquence of the speaker or the precision of their logic.
It's more than frustrating, it's weak. Your beliefs define your character, and if you're beliefs change with the wind, what does that say about you? I believe that people are organic: they grow and change over time, and once your learn something that doesn't mean you are committed to that belief for the rest of your life. Change should occur after you wrestle with an issue, hold up your beliefs to a spotlight, kick the tires and see how they hold.
Buy the car because you like it, not because the salesman made you like it.
I am a vortex of thoughts and opinions. Murder is the worst thing you can do to someone. Forgivness is a sign of civilization. People have to take responsibility for their actions, and suffer the consequences if that applies. People can change. Some people never change. You can come from a horrible background and neighborhood and better yourself. You can come from a cultured, civilized background and be an amoral prick who justifies their vile behavior through philosophy or a thousand shades of grey. People will say anything to save their life. You can't force someone to change.
If it's inhumane to kill someone who has killed another, what do you do to them? How should they pay for their crime? How many years of your life should you sacrifice to pay for the years you took from another? Can you ever really pay for that crime, and if you can't, why bother incarcerating them in the first place? I am told there are plenty of studies that say that the death penalty is not a deterrent. By that token, people are going to kill or rape or steal regardless of what you do. What is our response to that?
These kind of question quickly spiral out of the micro view and into the macro. They become questions of culture, of society. People wouldn't steal if they weren't poor. Any society that grows has rules, and needs ways of punishing people who break those rules. All kinds of words on all sides of the argument again. Drowning in a sea of emotion and logic.
If I really buckle down and think about it, I can come up with answers that satify me. It's good when things happen that make you question your beliefs, and even better if you can be consistant about them in the end.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-13 06:16 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-12-13 09:17 pm (UTC)------------------------
I think people like this (serial killers) are really a minority, an extreme case. Most murders are crimes of passion/necessity. People aren't thinking straight. Either blinded by rage or convinced that they need to kill someone else to prevent them from talking about something the killer did, etc. This is one major factor in why most murderers get caught. When you're not thinking clearly, and you kill someone without a real (or good) plan, you make yourself easy to catch.
This is the major reason (to my understanding) why the death penalty isn't a deterrent. Most people aren't thinking about the consequences when they kill.
I honestly don't think that most murderers would kill again if they had the chance. Serial killers are an extreme case. Of course, we have to account for the extreme cases too. I personally believe life without parole has to be the most extreme punishment I can accept ethically. If you have the death penalty it is a statistical certainty that some innocent people will be killed by their own government for crimes they did not commit. Even though being falsely imprisoned for life is also a monumental injustice, at least you have a better chance of being proven innocent before the end. Of living to be vindicated and regain your freedom. When DNA evidence first started being widely used a substancial number of people who were on death row or already executed were demonstrated to have been innocent. Time and advancements in technology tend to improve the chances of justice eventually prevailing. Executing someone eliminates the possibility.
I'm another one of those anti-death penalty pro-choice people. I also see it as an undesirable but necessary option. Where to draw the line is always the biggest question for me. IMO, a potential human life is still not a human life. If you talk about "potential", you go back to blastocysts and even earlier, and I find that absurd. A collection of cells without thoughts or feeling cannot be valued equally to a full-term human. But again, where to draw the line? One of the key points of development that interests me is the beginning of electrical activity in the brain. This occurs partway through pregnancy, and would seem to indicate the beginnings of thought/feeling. Something I think is worthy of consideration.
no subject
Date: 2005-12-14 03:44 am (UTC)I still maintain that the death penalty is a deterrant to some, but not other people. People aren't necessarily rational when they kill, some feel justified, some just don't care what happens to them. It's enough that I would agree that the death penalty in itself isn't a deterrant to everyone (though it sure is to me!)
The idea situation would be a prison system that honestly worked on reahbilitating the inmates: providing them with access to knowledge and learning, addressing why they killed, and how they can overcome it. There would be a review board every X years (10 for example) to see if the person had honestly repented and wanted to better their life. There should be harsh penalties if the individual kills again. If a society values life highly, then you have to be willing to forgive people who kill, even if the kill again. At this point, our society is more concerned with vengence than justice.
Our society is not perfect, nor will it ever be. We can do the best we can. If people are still alive, there remains the chance that they could be proven innocnent.
That being said, if I saw someone kill another person, or knew they killed someone I loved, or was responsible for genocide, I don't know how I would react. Part of me strongly believes that if you take another life, you forfeit your own. I won't know the answer to that until I face it myself.
See, I don't know if it is a necessary option. Having an unwanted baby isn't the end of the world. My sister is proof of that. I agree that a collection of cells is not a human being. I also that know that eventually it will be. I know that it has not say in what happens to it. Part of me is OK with that. Part of me is horrified.
Now if we had the technology to grow embryos outside of the body, this could become a non-issue. Pregnant? Don't want to have the baby? We'll transplant it out of you and put it up for adoption! Plenty of people who want kids!
no subject
Date: 2005-12-14 03:40 pm (UTC)