1. DEATH PENALTY - The first thing people always bring up to emotionally charge this debate is the family of the victims. I've never honestly given it much thought as an argument for the death penalty, and I'll get back to that. I want to start by saying that I used to believe in the death penalty because I felt it was in our best interest to kill these people. They killed someone, so in order to make sure that it doesn't happen again, we should kill them. However, that is not really a good way to look at it, to me. That would mean that anytime someone does something bad, we should kill them because it means they won't be able to do it again. I don't think too many people would agree with that method.
Another argument centers around religion, which I personally feel is valid. However, I don't care what you say that the bible says, I don't believe in "eye for an eye". We're smarter than that. I think "two wrongs don't make a right" usually holds up to be true. I don't know much about the bible, but when Jesus was hanging on the cross next to two thieves, he gave them salvation. He didn't go steal from them. On the same token, when someone robs a house, we don't go rob their house to punish them. We put them in prison so they won't do it anymore. So, from a religious standpoint, I look at things like forgiveness, mercy and "Thou shall not kill" to form my opinions on the death penalty. I don't feel I can tailor my religion to fit my political beliefs. I see no problem with doing things the other way around, though.
Even if you agree with me, for whatever reason, that "eye for an eye" is not the best way to approach capital punishment (or life for that matter), you could still say that in any case, the punishment should fit the crime. Any reasonable citizen can agree with this. If you commit a crime, you should pay for it in a fitting way. That's what justice is all about. You could argue with my main point from the first paragraph and say that prison is a perfectly fitting punishment for someone who robs a bank. There's no need to kill a bank robber. I would agree with that. You could then say that a fine is a fitting punishment for someone who parks in a handicap space. Of course, there's no need to kill this person. You could then say that killing a person is the best way to "punish" someone who killed another human being. This is where I have to stop and think. Now, before going any further, there are varying beliefs of who should get the death penalty. It depends on the circumstance: the number of instances, the severity, the motive, etc. of the crime(s). A death penalty advocate may feel criminal A and B but not C deserve the death penalty and a different advocate may feel criminal C was the only one to deserve the death penalty. So let's just cut to the chase and assume someone committed the worst possible crime, whatever that may be. If anything warrants the death penalty, then the worst possible crime definitely would be one of these things.
So, someone committed the worst possible crime. We need to punish this person (let's say "inflict justice" instead of punish because, as I said in the first paragraph, stopping someone from doing the crime again is another valid reason for capital punishment, and for imprisonment for that matter.) How do we inflict justice? One way would be to kill him. There are several reasons to believe this is the best way to inflict justice. Some feel we should put them in prison. I personally feel we should stick this person in prison for life with no parole. I simply can't find enough reasons why death is the best way to punish someone. Hell, some criminals prefer death over life in prison. And I really don't want to hear anything about the cost relationships between the death penalty and spending life in prison. First of all, I think money does not come into play when you are dealing with whether or not you should end a human's life. And, second, I feel that the cost of the death penalty could be as cheap as a single bullet, a gallon of gasoline and a match. I also don't want to hear anything about how some people get wrongfully accused and killed. Although this supports my stance, my goal in life is not to justify the stances I take and from which I refuse to budge. I prefer making my stances based on things I've learned. And one thing I've learned is that life is not fair. Just like there are people who wrongfully get the death penalty, there are people sitting in prison who do not belong. Who knows? This same person might prefer a wrongful death over a wrongful imprisonment. In short, while I've decided not to support the death penalty, I respect anyone looking at it from this overall view point, no matter what conclusion you draw.
I think we should remember that in all aspects of criminal justice, the overall goal should be to make sure the crime does not happen again, or at the very least happens less often. It doesn't matter if you feel you are punishing the criminal and teaching him and others not to commit this crime anymore, or if you feel keeping him behind bars or killing him keeps him from being around the public and committing more crimes. At the end of the day, it appalls me that human beings commit serious violent crimes. I hate that we need to debate things of this nature and have to spend countless time and money determining how to deal with it. My personal view point, though, is that I just don't feel comfortable supporting the killing of another man, no matter what he did. For those people that have lost loved ones and feel that the criminal should pay for it, I'm definitely on your side. Just because I don't think this person should die does not make me a "supporter" of him as a person. And, personally, I don't think it's right to throw the whole "I know more on this topic because (blank) happened to my family so, no, you can't argue with me because it will make you look insensitive" at someone. Terrible things happen to everyone's family at some point or another and, while it's completely understandable that this victim and/or his family would wish death upon the criminal, just because it happened to yours specifically does not mean you get to influence the justice system. So, telling me to think of a victim's family when deciding my death penalty stance really has no bearing. I've already taken that into account as a reason to punish this person in the first place.
{To extend on this point, I've always believed that justice should be carried out based on the intentions of the criminal. If a drunk driver crashes into a car and kills three people, he can get charged with manslaughter. I agree, driving drunk is horrible. I hate it. I don't do it. This is not the point at all. Whatever laws that are currently in place for drunk driving incidents should remain. However, I feel that a person who shoots another person in the head in cold blood should spend more time in prison than the drunk driver, no matter what. However, if the victim in this case managed to survive the shooting and fully recover, I'm almost certain the shooter would get out of jail in less time than the drunk driver, on average. I personally don't feel this is right. If I were to agree with the death penalty, I would feel that the shooter in this case should get the death penalty either way. The fact that the victim survived is irrelevant. The shooter's actions were exactly the same in both cases. I don't care if you murdered someone or attempted to murder someone. Just because you failed at your goal doesn't make you any less of a criminal. And the fact that the victim's family is less distraught when he survives also does not change the criminal's actions.}
2. GUN CONTROL - If someone breaks into my home again while I'm there, I am going to kill them.
This one is not that complicated to me. The same reasons you have for not letting me have a gun are the reasons I have one.
I don't want to hear that "street violence is up" is a reason I can't have a gun. It sickens me that people are so violent. I care about street violence. I wish there was none. But when you outlaw guns completely and a guy from these same "streets" I'm supposed to care about breaks into my house, guess who's going to be the person with no gun? Screw that. The fact that murder rates and violent crime rates are up just increases my chances of being a damn victim. I want a gun even more after reading these kinds of statistics.
I don't want to hear that my kid could find the gun and start playing with it, then accidentally shoot himself. If I had a kid, that kid would be the very thing I'm protecting with my gun. Gun accidents are horrible, but it wouldn't happen to me. And if it did, I would never be able to forgive myself for buying that gun or writing this paragraph. But I would also never be able to forgive myself if someone broke into my home and harmed my family and I didn't do shit about it because I didn't want to risk a freak accident. I'm sticking with the gun and taking my chances.
And if you feel like throwing my death penalty arguments back at me to say I'm being hypocritical, that's fine. When shit hits the fan, all bets are off. I'd be more than willing to go to jail if it means I get to stay alive. The point is, I want to be able to own a gun so that I can kill someone if they enter my home. If killing the person who enters my home makes me a bad person or a criminal after the fact, then I'm willing to live with that. At least I'll be living.
3. HEALTHCARE - If someone is sick, I want them to be able to go to the doctor if they need to. I also feel people would take advantage of it and it would not be fair to those who really need it or those of us who would be paying for it. But life is not fair so we can deal with that. The point is, if you are sick, I want you to be able to go to the doctor.
4. ABORTION - I hate abortion. I think it should be illegal. I think women can have all the freedoms of choice they want as long as it doesn't involve killing someone. And if you want to say that it's not killing someone because the kid isn't alive yet, then that's fine. I'm not going to get into the science of it with you, I will respect your opinion because determining when someone becomes "alive" is not my field of expertise. I will just rephrase what I said. I think women can have all the freedoms of choice they want as long as it doesn't involve aborting their babies. I'm comfortable saying that. If you feel that abortion should be legal, then I don't think you should go to jail. But there is no way I will ever agree with you.
5. IRAQ - I don't think we should have gone to Iraq. I kept trying to word this as to not sound cliche like I was denouncing the war but supporting the troops, but it never came out the way I really felt. The way I really feel is that we should not have gone to Iraq. It's that simple. That doesn't mean I didn't support our involvement when it began. It means we shouldn't have gone. It wasn't my job to make that call. Now that we are over there, we are in deep. We messed their stuff all up over there. When it comes down to it, since people from my country are over there, I hope they do all the killing and don't get killed. I wish it was neither but I'm going to pull for my side, which includes some of my best friends as well as some of my best interests. It's not in my best interest for my country to lose a war. And now that we're there and f'ed all this stuff up, we have to fix it. So we have to stay. And I know that includes killing people. So from this point forward, I have to support the war. If I sound like a hypocrite, that's fine. I can't help it, I treat life like a poker game. What I see is, I just tried to limp in first position with jack-ten offsuit. Someone raises in third position and I realize how shitty of a play I made. However, in life and poker you have to re-evaluate at all times. After three people call and the blinds fold, of course I want to fold. But I do the math and my 6-1 odds aren't looking so bad with jack-ten off. Even though my first decision was horrible, I make a decision to stick with the hand and call the raise. Sure, I end up completely missing the flop and lose 3 times the amount I would have if I would have bailed during the middle, but I have to be smart and realize it was my original intention to get involved in the hand that was so terrible, not the second decision to stick with it after I was pot-committed. If I was more educated on the topic (Iraq, not poker), I would expand. But I have no idea what was going on over there before we showed up. I feel like we should have gone over to Europe during WWII. What Hitler was doing was so terrible that it would be terrible in itself to stand by and let it happen. Killing NAZI's was a good idea and Germany is a decent country today. I don't know what to believe about Iraq before we showed up, and I have no idea what will become of it after we leave. But what I do know is that from this point forward,we will do what we have to do and there's no way I'm talking shit about it.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment