Gryphon
Dr. Spots
Capital Punishment
Posted by Dr. Spots on July 12, 2009
Capital Punishment is not punishment. By the dictionary definition, it does count as punishment. A penalty is being inflicted on a person thus sentenced. But for practical reasons it doesn’t count. There is no distress or loss of facility from the removed function (life) after the punishment is carried out.
If a driver loses his/her license due to infractions of the traffic code(s) then after the license is removed is when the person suffers. And that is what we are talking about after all when we speak of “punishment.” Causing the sentenced person to suffer in some way.
Capital Punishment causes the sentenced person to suffer only in the anticipation of the punishment. The punishment itself hasn’t occurred and only in facing the possibility does the condemned suffer. Once the punishment is effected all thought about it is immediately relieved and you can even say that the sentenced person is BETTER OFF after the infliction of the punishment than before.
This is the ONLY punishment I can think of in which the punished person is actually better off after 
the punishment. O.K. Sure, they no longer have the privilege of living. But for whatever the crime the sentence of death was issued, what would be the alternative?
Life in prison? That, to me, is “punishment.” A person would be made to suffer through imprisonment for as long as the penal system could keep them alive.
Capital Punishment is retribution. It does not act as a deterrent. It is also morally wrong.
And it is not “punishment.”
doc
(It is accepted that a person cannot be punished for a crime after they are dead. You cannot try a dead person in court.
The act of carrying out a sentence of Capital Punishment carries this idea to the extreme. The sentence is not considered carried out until the person is dead, but they must be alive for it to be completed. “Execution ” of the sentence occurs at the EXACT instant of the condemned’s death–by definition.
Why do they prevent people condemned to death from committing suicide? Because suicide is not only an illegal act in and of itself but primarily because it deprives the state from performing the act.
How many more aburdities do you need before you are convinced that this is wrong?)
c.e.s.
nursemyra said
No one, including the State, has the right to take another’s life
Gryphon said
I would amend you statement only to say, ‘especially’ the state. If we cannot trust the state to be our role model on this, then who? The sad part of it is that they DO have the right. The right given by law. It makes the difference between “killing” and “murder.”
It is a legal right but not a moral one. How better to illustrate the difference between morality and legality?
A God Unto Ourselves « Gryphon’s Aerie said
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