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Forum nameOkay Activist Archives
Topic subjectRE: Death Penalty?
Topic URLhttp://board.okayplayer.com/okp.php?az=show_topic&forum=22&topic_id=18935&mesg_id=19008
19008, RE: Death Penalty?
Posted by guest, Mon Feb-05-01 10:38 AM
American society generally hesitates to admit that our justice system is largely based on retribution. Despite claims of rehabilitation of criminals or deterrence of crime, something like the death penalty can only be described as retribution. It is unfortunate that in so many cases the death penalty serves as retribution merely for being poor and black. Really, what is death row but a warehouse for poor people? In my opinon no problem has ever been solved by attacking only the symptoms and not the cause. You can't keep killing people who commit crimes (if they are even actually guilty) without trying institute changes that will prevent people from committing crimes in the first place. Even aside from the philosophical question of whether we are justified in taking another life, the death penalty just doesn't make sense. We will never stop violent crime, or "protect the American public" by using the death penalty.
Stop the forces that cause once innocent children to grow up into murderers and thieves, and we will find the death penalty unnecessary. I'm not saying that's an easy task, but that's the direction America should be looking in, not building more prisons.