waiting for the hangman
By jb78000
@jb78000 (15139)
November 6, 2009 12:32pm CST
this is a tricky one to lay out without offending people. anyway two things first of all – this is not a discussion about whether the death penalty is right or wrong in itself and secondly is not a go at america (this should be clear but just in case...)
I have been involved with the human rights organisation amnesty international for about 10 years, generally just joining their letter writing campaigns. they only ask you to do this for countries other than your own (for in some cases very obvious reasons) and while most of them involved countries you would expect to have human rights abuses there were, and still are, a number about death row in the united states. there seem to be a fair number of miscarriages of justice that end up with someone who probably is not guilty ending up here, not to mention the whole thing of making someone wait decades knowing they will be executed at the end of it - which seems pretty nasty to me.
so if your country does have the death penalty do you think it is being implemented properly or is it leading to human rights abuses? [will reiterate that the question of whether the death penalty is right or wrong has been covered in other discussions]
2 people like this
2 responses
@sunny68 (1327)
• India
6 Nov 09
the gap between the final verdict and executing the verdict can be very huge especially in case of capital punishment. the thought of it can certainly be more tormenting than the act itself. here in India some cases are implemented immediately but there are also some cases which are dragged indefinitely. no offense but i don't consider this as an abuse. pronouncing such a verdict itself tells of the gravity of the crime, so the wait may as well be well deserved.
as regards innocent people being executed, there is always a possibility. but here the status of the country matters. for example if someone is executed in China or Iran...you may sense foul play. but if someone is executed in US or India...you can be assured that the lawyers must have made the best efforts to save the convict.
@sunny68 (1327)
• India
7 Nov 09
i did mention that there is always a possibility. perhaps more dastardly acts are those as in China where organs of such convicts are sold or as in Iran where convicted girls are physically abused before execution just because Islam forbids execution of 'unmarried' girls. these are the acts that really should be condemned.
@RawBill1 (8531)
• Gold Coast, Australia
8 Nov 09
We do not have the penalty here in Australia. I think it was stopped in the 1960's.
I do believe that making someone wait decades is cruel. The Bali Bombers in Indonesia did not have to wait that long and neither did Saddam Hussein.
