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Comment by kuschku | Hacker News Reader

It’s interesting that an opinion that is supported by the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, by the EU (which ended up banning companies from exporting supplies for death penalty to the US due to that), and by the International Court of Human Rights, is downvoted on HN.

It goes so far that countries in the ECHR can not extradite citizen to the US if they might face the death penalty, because the death penalty is something that, according to the European Council of Human Rights, no one, not even a criminal, deserves.

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I didn't downvote, will probably be downvoted, but as someone who is atheist/nihilist/suicidal, I don't understand the great value placed on human life. We slaughter animals, we put down dogs which bite, I see no reason not to put down humans who have malfunctioned. All while being generally left wing. I think suffering should be an active goal, but I don't believe execution is suffering. There's enough effort to focus on progressing those who do buy into constructivism; those who don't wish to participate should exile themselves from society rather than lash out in deconstructivism

This logic likely exists in a watered down form amongst the HN crowd more than Human Rights groups

> put down humans who have malfunctioned

What about the ones that have not, but are put down due to a malfunctioning justice system instead?

That's a flaw in the system.

My uncle was (by his word, and I've seen the police reports which are a contradictory mess) falsely convicted. He got life in prison and could face parole after 20+ years. He didn't get a chance at that because he suffered and died in prison of cancer.

Falsely being convicted and put to death is horrific, but we also have a very rigorous appeals process, which is why some of these guys don't die for a decade or more. You get falsely convicted and 20 years, you aren't going to get near the appeals and your life is just as ruined. Those 20 years inside your lonely cell might even be worse than just being put to death.

It's never struck me as a realistic argument against the death penalty because of wrongful convictions. You could exaggerate your stance and suggest that no jails should exist and in fact no justice should ever be served because there are innocents.

To just say no death penalty, lock em up for 30 years instead doesn't begin to solve the issue and perhaps even fails to recognize how horrific that sentence is.

Sure, wrongfully convicted to long-term sentences is bad. But it's at least partially reversible. It's also cheaper to convict somebody of life without parole, than the death sentence.

I personally think the extreme incarceration rate, the conditions in prison, the lack of measures aiming at reducing recidivism, the disproportional sentencing are bigger issues in the US than the death penalty. Not because the death penalty is OK in any way, purely because of the size of the effect.

> Falsely being convicted and put to death is horrific, but we also have a very rigorous appeals process, which is why some of these guys don't die for a decade or more.

There's plenty well documented cases where these appeals were done on an absolutely half-hearted basis, with very dodgy evidence.

> It's never struck me as a realistic argument against the death penalty because of wrongful convictions. You could exaggerate your stance and suggest that no jails should exist and in fact no justice should ever be served because there are innocents.

Reductio ad absurdum.

> That's a flaw in the system.

Not only that, is is a flaw that cannot be fixed. Period. There is no 100% reliable way to handle this without mistakes. And mistakes are not only irreversible, they cannot be made up for in any way. As such this particular system cannot be allowed to be used.

I understand and appreciate the consistency with which you value life. my proposed solution is to stop killing things. not "kill all things equally".

killing a dog because it bit a person is just another demonstration of how we overvalue human life. you should get mad about that- too.

And surprisingly I completely agree on this.

I don't even know honestly where to start.

1. "as someone who is atheist/nihilist/suicidal". Describing yourself as suicidal is not a great introduction, go and see a doctor. Self-termination is not a "normal" feeling.

2. "I see no reason not to put down humans who have malfunctioned" - See point 1. Also, non third-world countries should have a justice system which would aim to recover individuals instead of "putting them down" or "making them pay/suffer". You might be stuck during middle-age if you think otherwise.

3. "There's enough effort to focus on progressing those who do buy into constructivism; those who don't wish to participate should exile themselves from society rather than lash out in deconstructivism" - again I don't even know where to start. Like if life was not difficult. Such a superficial view on life.

"I don't honestly know where to even start"

maybe next time try starting with some empathy.

Empathy in what sense? Not taking someone who is "suicidal" in such a direct way?

your post is peppered with insensitivity and condescension. the kind of behavior that typically drives people to become antisocial in the first place.

I am not trying to be overly critical. I don't sense you are a bad person. maybe just uninitiated :).

the line between "direct" and "insensitive" becomes so much more clear only once you've experienced a similar depression.

It's weird because life is both overvalued and undervalued.

The same people who believe that the death penalty is barbaric (hey, we all die, that's the hard truth) get fixated more on the tragedy of the criminal on death row than the dozens of people they killed.

I do mean that literally. Monsters like John Wayne Gacy don't need to live any more. They have nothing to offer society but a sneering "kiss my ass" as they are put to death.

I think your position is perfectly coherent, but I don't think the opposing view is necessarily that weird, for two reasons.

The first is that this isn't zero-sum; there's no evidence I'm aware of that the death penalty reduces homicide. Killing a murderer isn't going to bring the victims back, anyone even mildly sceptical about the criminal justice system should be against irreversible punishments, and (speaking personally and emotionally for a moment) I think it does something bad to a society when "giving up on one of your citizens completely" becomes an option.

The second is the idea that a lot of the passion surrounding the death penalty is about signalling membership of a political tribe rather than about any of the individuals involved. This is the "I can tolerate anything except the outgroup" theory [1]: tribe A attacks/defends murderer M not because they hate/like M but to emphasis their difference from tribe B.

[1] http://slatestarcodex.com/2014/09/30/i-can-tolerate-anything...

You're right. Didn't mean that suggest that the other side is weird, just that society's back and forth is weird, your second point gets to that. Yet another controversial topic that gets at that friction is people's view on abortion and war. Some people will fervently protect an unborn child but see nothing wrong with carpet bombing fifty others. On the other hand some people are fervently anti-war but see nothing odd about someone having six abortions (slow down maybe?). So much of it does seem like political signaling.

You are right the deterrent argument is dumb and unsupported.

> it does something bad to a society when "giving up on one of your citizens completely" becomes an option

Human societies have been like this forever, though. Sometimes the protection of the society is more valuable than an individual's life. That stance can be taken too far, but I struggle to see what the point of keeping individuals like Dahmer, Gacy, Bundy around. We can give up on them. We give up quicker on lots of people in society, why not someone who is a mass murderer? They've got nothing to offer and they've given up their rights in taking the rights of and normalcy of hundreds of others.

Abortion is actually a different case, I think; that comes down to incompatible axioms. Two people can both believe 100% sincerely that killing people is wrong, but if one of them considers a foetus to be a person and the other doesn't, they aren't going to agree on abortion.

> We can give up on them. We give up quicker on lots of people in society, why not someone who is a mass murderer?

Yeah, I know. Ultimately I think my unease here is a kind of slippery-slope argument, and deserves to be taken with the same generous pinch of salt as any other slippery-slope argument.

I suspect that much of the opposition to capital (and corporal) punishment has to do with how strong and visceral a mental impression it makes on those witnessing or even thinking about it. Conversely, I'm sure we underestimate the soul-destroying misery of long-term incarceration, because it doesn't offend our sensibilities as much. Same goes for many of the other people we give up on, which goes back to your point.

In any case, thanks for the thoughtful replies. Being able to have a reasonable discussion on an emotive topic with someone holding different views is always a breath of fresh air.

If executing a murderer would somehow bring the victims back to life, then your value comparison might make sense. But it doesn't, so being opposed to the death penalty does not mean you don't care about the victims.

> on the tragedy of the criminal on death row than the dozens of people they killed.

Most people on death row didn't kill "dozens of people". It's a bad way to make an argument.

But people on death row do, and they do commit heinous crimes.

A Six Deuce Brim gang member, Adams was already serving life in prison for a Santa Barbara robbery-homicide when he was sentenced to death for killing three young men in South Los Angeles in 1994 in a gang-related shooting.

Aguayo was already in prison for the attempted murder of a woman when a DNA match linked him with the 1979 rape and killing of a pregnant woman.

Alcala is serial killer whose total victim count is unknown. He worked as a photographer and had been a “Dating Game” contestant. He was convicted three times for the 1979 kidnapping and murder of 12-year-old Robin Samsoe. The first two convictions were overturned. He also strangled to death four Los Angeles area women and in 2013 confessed to killing two women in New York during the 1970s. He was charged in September 2016 for an eighth murder in Wyoming.

Aldana was convicted of torture and murder for killing a 16-year-old runaway, who was living with him, after he believed she had become pregnant. He stabbed her more than 100 times.

Real people on death row with much smaller victim counts. Why do these people deserve to live?

Adams - killed three

Aguayo - killed one, tried to kill another

Alcala - unknown, eight known

Aldana - killed one

None of these are "a criminal with dozens of murders". When you said that, you were mocking the efforts of people trying to stop capital punishment. In truth, most people asking governors for stays of execution are not 'fixated on the tragedy of the criminal over the dozens they killed', because a) none of these criminals did that; and b) it's a false dichotomy to say that they're not concerned about the victims. Basically, you're strawmanning in order to make your point emotively rather than with reasoned arguments.

How do you miss the monthly-odd posts of Yet Another Prisoner Jailed For 20 Years Found Innocent here on HN? Again and again and again it's shown that the justice system can get it wrong. The death penalty doesn't reduce the crime rate, it's not cheaper, it consumes more legal resources, and it's philosophically unsound. The only thing the death penalty does do is slake a thirst for vindictiveness.

If you're atheist, well, there's no 'heaven' to make it up to an actually-innocent convict (and their still-living loved ones). There is nothing you can do to 'make it better', not even in a token manner.

If you're a nihilist, well, it's the more expensive, labour-intensive path, requiring more effort. If nothing really matters, then why go to the extra effort?

And if you're proposing we treat humans the same way we treat dogs, then you should be aware that the number of dogs we kill for 'malfunctioning' (biting) is a rounding error of all the dogs we intentionally kill. If we were to treat humans like dogs, then for each of us there'd be someone deciding whether or not a person was convenient to have around (not necessarily someone that we even knew existed). Then we'd either be given a lethal injection if the decider was nice, or be killed in a variety of increasingly unpleasant ways if the decider wasn't. We kill an awful lot of canines (and all common pets) just because we can't be bothered to keep them around, from abandoned pets to puppy farms to feral culls to just getting rid of a pet's unwanted litter. Given all that, it seems odd to make much of a fuss over a 'broken' animal.

Final thought:

> but I don't believe execution is suffering

The act itself is largely not, but the lead-up to it is.

Your own attitude towards life or criminals is not something worth considering when seriously pondering this question.

Society is a collection of individuals; everyone has different opinions and feelings on almost anything: at least when we discuss such sensible matters, we should rationalize our arguments, stripping any trace of subjectivity.

> I don't understand the great value placed on human life.

Coming to the case, you may not value your life very much, but we can't say the same for the criminal who is facing a death sentence. Personally, I don't feel empathy for some criminals who consciously perpetrated atrocious crimes; I literally fail to care for them. Nevertheless, I can objectively understand that in a civilized country any human must be granted some undeniable rights.

> I see no reason not to put down humans who have malfunctioned.

Humans do not malfunction. Humans err, whether deliberately or not. They must have the right to redeem themselves. And even if they refused to, putting them to death would still be a miserable solution: it wouldn't mitigate the crime, nor would provide justice -- and I mean justice, not revenge. Indeed, it would be itself a crime.

Edit: typos and form

Breivik spent hours on an island with a youth camp methodically killing children. I think that was the incident where a girl called her father on her cell while hiding and the last thing he got to hear was his crying daughter getting shot in the head at point blank range.

But on the plus side, Breivik is currently working on his Poly Sci degree should they ever let him back into society.

I don't think Breivik is by anyhow a good base line for analogies.

On the flip side, you have Louisiana seeking the death penalty for a man who rolled over on his child. Dale Cox is a monster.

http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/07/06/revenge-killing

What he did was absolutely horrible. However, killing him is not going to bring anyone back. Do you really think killing him is going to act as a deterrent to future mass murders? He committed his crime thinking he would die. Study after study shows that there is no deterrent effect from the death penalty.

So, what is the point of executing someone? The only thing it does is reduce our own humanity, it doesn't solve any problem.

There have been killers who have plead guilty to manslaughter to avoid the death penalty and spare victims from testifying in a trial.

not interesting at all really. just a proxy metric for the quality of users we've been onboarding.

> the death penalty is something that, according to the European Council of Human Rights, no one, not even a criminal, deserves.

Is that actually the opinion of the council? It's about whether they deserve it?

I am against the death penalty because I don't believe we can prevent political convictions of innocent people. But I do believe there are many criminals who deserve to die.

Heck I think there are nonviolent offenders who deserve to die.

> Is that actually the opinion of the council? It's about whether they deserve it?

It’s about whether a person deserves the right to live, and the European Council of Human Rights is of the opinion that the right to live can not be limited for any reason, it is inviolable. Everyone deserves the right to live.

I didn't downvote, but was tempted to because I thought the comment was out of context and likely to start a political flame war. Not because I disagreed.

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