Changing Moralities...

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Bigga

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I thought I'd ask this question based in reality.

What type of DOMESTIC crime is "too much" and deserves a 'solution' that ends things once and for all?

I don't quite know what to think in the following situation.

Members of a Chinese Crime Family Sentenced...

I don't know if it's hard line or overboard, but either way, I'm not sure I'd feel that bad if there was unrefuted proof and it was here? I can't believe I'm questioning my own morality and thinking like that but, in a way, to free society of extremely heinous bad people can't be a bad thing...

Can it...?
 
Bigga said:
I thought I'd ask this question based in reality.

What type of DOMESTIC crime is "too much" and deserves a 'solution' that ends things once and for all?

I don't quite know what to think in the following situation.

Members of a Chinese Crime Family Sentenced...

I don't know if it's hard line or overboard, but either way, I'm not sure I'd feel that bad if there was unrefuted proof and it was here? I can't believe I'm questioning my own morality and thinking like that but, in a way, to free society of extremely heinous bad people can't be a bad thing...

Can it...?
Click to expand...
Most people are much the same, some fall in with a bad crowd and do bad things - enough of them to be killed by the state as a deterrent?
 
Mad Eyed Screamer said:
It’s a cheap solution to over crowded prisons.
Maybe have a new reality type show.
“I’m a prisoner, get me out of here”
Where the jailbirds have to perform tasks and the public get to vote them out - and to a death sentence. The winner gets to stay behind bars!
Click to expand...

Norris from the nonce wing only has to answer this question to win the competition and secure his release.

"Who was lead singer of the Glitter band?"
 
Mad Eyed Screamer said:
It’s a cheap solution to over crowded prisons.
Maybe have a new reality type show.
“I’m a prisoner, get me out of here”
Where the jailbirds have to perform tasks and the public get to vote them out - and to a death sentence. The winner gets to stay behind bars!
Click to expand...

Yes, an arbitrary point, but wrong perspective.

I'm wondering what crime is enough to say 'enough' and, therefore acceptable(if it ever is), to remove some from society for the safety of others?

Rehabilitation is one thing, but if life-taking destructive people cannot/ will not rehabilitate, then what?

I'm Old School Left, the Chinese Gov took a stand and I'm not mad at it.
 
I'm With Stupid said:
Opposition to the death penalty has never been about whether some crimes deserve it or not. It's always been about miscarriages of justice.
Click to expand...
Miscarriages yes but also the moral question: does one human ever have the right to judicially kill another?
 
Bigga said:
Yes, an arbitrary point, but wrong perspective.

I'm wondering what crime is enough to say 'enough' and, therefore acceptable(if it ever is), to remove some from society for the safety of others?

Rehabilitation is one thing, but if life-taking destructive people cannot/ will not rehabilitate, then what?

I'm Old School Left, the Chinese Gov took a stand and I'm not mad at it.
Click to expand...
You have to look at the nature of punishment and what it's designed to achieve. I was working at the Ministry of Justice in 2010, when the coalition government took power. Ken Clarke was the new Justice Secretary and he did a 'town hall' which I went to. I was stood with the Assistant General Secretary of the Prison Officers Association and we had an interesting chat about this.

He was adamant that short sentences (6 months or less) were useless as they didn't give prison staff enough time to work on reforming offenders. If you were someone who had fallen into trouble by accident, then even a short prison sentence was more than likely enough in itself to put you off offending again. But if you were a more criminal element, it just made you worse as you learnt lots of bad things in that time, but not many good ones.

We agreed that justice should serve 3 main purposes-
  • Punishment for misdeeds by depriving someone of their liberty for a time
  • Protection of the public
  • Giving the opportunity for reformation and rehabilitation
The question then becomes what is the appropriate punishment for the crime, and we have a system of sentencing guidelines for that. These are the principles our justice system is based on.

Justice systems like China's, and many other countries, tend to be more performative rather than rules based. They decide to crack down on something then do it heavily for a while, to make a statement. Or maybe this gang didn't grease the right palms, or fell out with someone who had better political protection.

I've just read Bill Browder's Freezing Order, about his battles with the Russian government, who ripped off hundreds of millions of dollars from the investment fund he set up and murdered, or attempted to murder, anyone who tried to expose them. They used their justice system to protect the guilty and even used Interpol to pursue vendettas against people like Browder. That's not justice.
 
Prestwich_Blue said:
You have to look at the nature of punishment and what it's designed to achieve. I was working at the Ministry of Justice in 2010, when the coalition government took power. Ken Clarke was the new Justice Secretary and he did a 'town hall' which I went to. I was stood with the Assistant General Secretary of the Prison Officers Association and we had an interesting chat about this.

He was adamant that short sentences (6 months or less) were useless as they didn't give prison staff enough time to work on reforming offenders. If you were someone who had fallen into trouble by accident, then even a short prison sentence was more than likely enough in itself to put you off offending again. But if you were a more criminal element, it just made you worse as you learnt lots of bad things in that time, but not many good ones.

We agreed that justice should serve 3 main purposes-
  • Punishment for misdeeds by depriving someone of their liberty for a time
  • Protection of the public
  • Giving the opportunity for reformation and rehabilitation
The question then becomes what is the appropriate punishment for the crime, and we have a system of sentencing guidelines for that. These are the principles our justice system is based on.

Justice systems like China's, and many other countries, tend to be more performative rather than rules based. They decide to crack down on something then do it heavily for a while, to make a statement. Or maybe this gang didn't grease the right palms, or fell out with someone who had better political protection.

I've just read Bill Browder's Freezing Order, about his battles with the Russian government, who ripped off hundreds of millions of dollars from the investment fund he set up and murdered, or attempted to murder, anyone who tried to expose them. They used their justice system to protect the guilty and even used Interpol to pursue vendettas against people like Browder. That's not justice.
Click to expand...

Interesting post.

Let me make it closer to home; the M.E.N. bomber, if he had done it before and there was a chance he'd do it again and execution was on the table, would you disagree with him being deleted from society?
 
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