Page 10 - Tookie Williams & the death penalty

07-01.-2006, 02:41 AM

#136

stevebaby

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by limerickman

There probably isn't a solution Steve but I think we're both on the same side of this issue ie capital punishment is wrong.

I can well understand the reasons for victims wanting to exact revenge.
The most heinous of crimes are committed.
But if the penalty of capital punishment is on the books, I have no doubt that
some poor innocent bugger will be tried convicted and executed.

The law and the legal system must be seen to be beyond any reproach.
That is a very high standard.

We are indeed,Lim.In the first place it is just plain barbaric.I just started reading the biography of one of england's hangmen,james berry.I can't finish it,it's just horrendous,and I don't want it in my house where my kids might see it.I'm no shrinking violet,I've pulled bodies out of the water,I've witnessed autopsies and I've seen a lot of shit that I would much rather forget but the thought of anyone cold bloodedly killing another person,whether sanctioned by the state or as a crime just totally defeats me.What totally chills me are the rabid bastards who just want to see someone else die.When it comes to the crunch none of them can do it themselves despite their protestations.
Until such time that there is universal concensus that a perfect legal system exists then there can be no justification fot it.All of the proponents of the death penalty disappear when the miscarriages of justice are exposed.
I really don't understand why they are the way they are,why they need a scapegoat,but I do know that there is something deeply wrong with anyone who wants to see another person die,for whatever reason.
I can give plenty of reasons how this whole issue has touched me but I have already done so before privatelyand I'm not about to discuss it publicly.Suffice to say,I have a better knowledge than most people on this thread,about this subject.

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07-01.-2006, 04:48 AM

#137

jhuskey

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by limerickman

You were suggesting that prostitution ought to be legalised earlier.

I haven't thought about it too much JH : I think prostitution is a terrible thing.
The women are exploited and they're subjected to terrible treatment by pimps
and the like.

I think that if the profit (for pimps) element was removed it would be a good thing.

Pimps aside,I guess I mentioned it since it is often refered to as a victimless crime and yet we dwell on it as much as illegal drugs or crimes that I consider much worse.
Prostiutes are looked upon by some as a threat to the decent element of society as much as a child molester.
At least you generally have two willing individuals involved.

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07-01.-2006, 12:21 PM

#138

stevebaby

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by jhuskey

Marriage has been described as legalised prostitution and there is a lot of truth in that description.Perhaps prostitution has been vilified in western cultures because it gives women more power than they have previously historically had.
Pimps are a different story.Legalisation greatly lessens their influence and the prostitute-client relationship becomes a contract between two individuals and really noone elses business.

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08-01.-2006, 06:21 AM

#139

jhuskey

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevebaby

More power? Hell, I still breath when and where I want. Yes, I still retain that right and fell quite independent because of it.
You know the old saying. "Women have half the money and all of the".... well you know the rest.

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09-01.-2006, 07:52 AM

#140

cyberlegend1994

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dondare

The death penalty is a deterent....

I have heard this statement many times and find it strictly an opinion - there is no solid evidence to suggest that capital punishment is actually a deterrent - has anyone actually seen crime rates drop in states that have it? I'm glad my state doesn't have it - in fact, the governor and some members of the legislature tried to get it reinstated this past year but failed.... I personally think that people who have this "eye for an eye" opinion on it take that opinion way too far. The last time someone was executed in MA was in 1947.

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09-01.-2006, 08:14 AM

#141

wolfix

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by cyberlegend1994

The last time someone was executed in MA was in 1947.

Anyone who has voted for Kennedy and is from MA reallly shouldn't discuss the immorality of capitol punishment. I believe it was shown in your state that killing someone is unjust unless you are a Kennedy.

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09-01.-2006, 12:37 PM

#142

cyberlegend1994

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by wolfix

For the record, I never once voted for that drunken SOB.....

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09-01.-2006, 06:52 PM	#143
Hypnospin Registered User Join Date: Apr 2005 Location: ex of santa cruz, california, usa Posts: 798	Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty it is right enough for those in positions of financially based power, prestige and celebrity to benefit by being above the law all too often, a system of privelege rather than justice all too often... [QUOTE=limerickman] In fact citing OJ re-enforces the case that the "system" can be and is wrong. QUOTE] Last edited by Hypnospin : 09-01.-2006 at 06:58 PM.

10-01.-2006, 04:09 AM

#144

Chance3290

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Posts: 619

Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by wolfix

Well said. HHRUMPHH!! HHRUMPHH!!

But calling prostitution a victimless crime is not looking at the whole picture. In recent years the US has seen a major increase in the importation of women from Central and South America, Asia and Eastern Europe. These women are being told there are coming to the US for better jobs and lives. Once here they are forced, using various nasty means, into a life of prostitution.
Slavery is still alive and kicking on every continent.
The average 'crack ho' on the street is not selling herself because she wants to, she doing it to make money to apply to her habit.
Add to this the courts cost for those who are arrested. Cost of medical bills the person or state must pay for workers and 'clients' that catch...whatever. And the cost to families after Daddy has to tell Mommy about his visit to the doctor and the court.

That being said, I will say that during my time as a young man in the Army, I visited Amsterdam and enjoyed myself very much. Wonderful scenery, and I hear the city was pretty too.
There's a reason its called the world's oldest profession.

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11-01.-2006, 04:14 AM

#145

tcklyde

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by limerickman

I've got to agree with you - no matter how heineous the crime (and there have been some pretty despicable murderers like In Huntley), I do not agree with capital punishment.

Two wrongs do not make a right.

I agree here. I do not support capital punishment in any case.

But I have no remorse for Tookie. I read the his briefs and I don't doubt that he is guilty. He has, like many criminals, spent a lifetime lying and manipulating compasionate people to support him.

I believe that no state should be in the business of killing people. But I also don't think anyone should feel sorry for murders. Tookie should have spent the rest of life in jail. California shouldn't have killed him but he shouldn't have killed his victims.

I don't care much about Tookie. He can rot in hell, for all I care. But there is a more importnat principle, a principle that has nothing to do with scum like Tookie, and that's good government. Good government recognizes that the power of the state must be limited. It recognizes that the state must be an example of restraint and judgment, not a venegful god.

Principle is the backbone of the anti-death penalty movement, not people. If you want to stop the death penalty, argure against the death penalty, don't argue not to execute an individual person. No one with any heart wants to save a scum like Tookie, but everyone who cares about civil liberties wants our countries to respect rights. We have to save some shit to have real freedom. I'll buy that tradeoff.

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12-01.-2006, 04:22 AM	#146
Chance3290 Registered User Join Date: Oct 2004 Posts: 619	Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty For those who think that life in prison, a California prison, is a fitting sentence for murder, please meet Clarence Ray Allen. Sentenced to life in prison for the 1974 murder of his son's girlfriend, Mr Allen ordered, from his jail cell, the murder of eight witnesses to his first murder. Two of these victims were teenagers who had no knowledge of any murders, they were just in the wrong place at the right time. Mr, Allen, now blind, deaf, and confined to a wheelchair, is scheduled to leave this mortal coil on January 17. __________________ Please, don't MOO at the cows. It only confuses them.

12-01.-2006, 07:38 AM

#147

EoinC

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by Chance3290

For those who think that life in prison, a California prison, is a fitting sentence for murder, please meet Clarence Ray Allen.
Sentenced to life in prison for the 1974 murder of his son's girlfriend, Mr Allen ordered, from his jail cell, the murder of eight witnesses to his first murder. Two of these victims were teenagers who had no knowledge of any murders, they were just in the wrong place at the right time.
Mr, Allen, now blind, deaf, and confined to a wheelchair, is scheduled to leave this mortal coil on January 17.

I'm not quite sure how the pathetic security properties of your prison's is meant to be a reason for having capital punishment. If prison living conditions are too good, and liberties too great, change them. You don't have to kill people just because your prisons are comfortable. If Clarence was able to do as you state, then you need to address the security issues of your prison system.
Executing people because your prison system is not doing what it was meant to do doesn't quite make it to the 10 best reasons for retaining / reinstating capital punishment.

12-01.-2006, 07:53 AM

#148

Chance3290

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by EoinC

I'm all for locking them up and not letting them see the light of day for the rest of their lives. But those who fight against capital punishment also fight for inmates rights. This man killed a girl, no question. But because he has 'rights' in prison he was able to communicate to others and have innocent people killed.
Change prison conditions?

Make life miserable for the inmates?

Are you insane? We have celebrity supported-billionaire funded organizations that do nothing but champion the rights of the down-trodden in prison.
Again I'll say it, if you make prison life miserable, they won't want to come back. Going to prison, even for life is not a deterent for people who live as good a life, or better, than they lived on the street.

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12-01.-2006, 08:14 AM	#149
jhuskey Registered User Join Date: Oct 2003 Location: Great Smoky Mountains, TN USA Posts: 6,570	Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty Does anyone have a problem with making prisoner work for a living during their incarceration and using their payed wages to go toward their keep plus repaying the victims or their families? After all we are talikng about re-paying a debt to society,aren't we? __________________ Sobriety is over rated!

12-01.-2006, 09:12 AM

#150

limerickman

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Re: Tookie Williams & the death penalty

Quote:

Originally Posted by jhuskey

Does anyone have a problem with making prisoner work for a living during their incarceration and using their payed wages to go toward their keep plus repaying the victims or their families?
After all we are talikng about re-paying a debt to society,aren't we?

The penal system here (and I am sure it was the same in Britain) up until the 1960's was very very strict.
Free association was restricted, food quantities were weighed and measured to ensure that prisoners only got the minimum amount of food required to stay alive, prisoners had no access to education, prisoners had very very limited visiting time per week (30 mins per week).

Reform of the penal laws was carried out because it was deemed that a civilised society ought to help the most deprived people.
Prison is deprivation and thus prisoners up to the 1960's were deemed to be probably the most deprived of all.

What is the purpose of prison?
Is it retribution? Or is it rehabilitation?
I suggest that ot ought to be both : it should be a penalty for a crime but it must also offer a chance for people to change their circumstances.

The debt to society?
I do think that society dumps it's problems in it's prisons.
Many people who end up in prison are there because society didn't give a shit
about them in the first place.
I quote the govenor of Mountjoy Prison in Dublin John Lonergan who said
"I am left with the problems that irish society fails to address. A lot of the people incarcerated here, are here because they have been excluded from normal things like a job, an education, hope.
That's what I have - I have people for whom hope is gone".

Maybe if society took more care of it's people, you might find crime levels
falling.

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morelike hypocrisy.

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