I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore
POSTED BY: JCKnife
UPDATED: Thursday, August 17, 2023 17:53
VIEWED: 13532
PAGE 7 of 12
Geezer,
here are your words, in full:
Quote:
...and just (to answer the "all lives equal" question - not to me. For example, the life of an armed housebreaker is not worth as much to me as my wife's life, or mine. I would not risk our lives by giving that person the chance to take them, even if it meant killing them. People who decide to violate the social contract in major ways forfeit major portions of their value (as "value" means right to live).
Is an Adolf Hitler worth as much as a Mother Theresa? Uday and Qusay Hussein as much as Orville and Wilbur Wright? Not in my book. People are the sum of their actions. Some lose a lot of points by what they do.
BTW, I have heard several sources state, and agree, that the correct interpretation of "thou shall not kill" is actually "thou shall not murder".
Edit: And although I believe that we are all "endowed by our creator (or whatever's cranking)" with the rights of "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness", I also believe that individuals can squander that endowment by their actions. The converse of rights is responsibilities. Fail badly enough in your responsibilities to your fellows, and your rights are lost.
Quote:For sure, you have a self-defense theme going on in these statements.
"...and just to answer the "all lives equal" question - not to me. For example, the life of an armed housebreaker is not worth as much to me as my wife's life, or mine. I would not risk our lives by giving that person the chance to take them, even if it meant killing them."
And then you make a sweeping generalization that is frankly Hitlerian: "People who decide to violate the social contract in major ways forfeit major portions of their value (as "value" means right to live)." What does this have to do with self defense? In fact, the entire rest of your post discusses how to assess someone's 'worth', and concludes that people who have not 'met their responsibilities' lose their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Through a series of false equations, you equated the immediate need for self-defense with capital punishment of worthless people (who have not 'met their responsibilites').
If you had stuck with self-defense, I would have had no argument. But you didn't. And that's why I commented on your Hitlerian notions.
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by rue:
Well let's see - if the LAWS are WRITTEN to require life sentence for a second conviction, how is that violating someone's 'rights'? It's no different from a 'three-strikes law' and probably more useful. So, what's your issue? Oh, that would be - none.
Laws aren't currently written that way, and I doubt they ever will be. Pubilication of lists of pedophiles was one of the suggestions further up the thread. I'm just wondering what problems, rights-wise, that would cause.
Quote:
In case you haven't been following the literature, castration doesn't work. It's a non-starter. And who suggested it? Oh, that would be YOU.
Actually, it was Hardware, earlier in the thread.
"A long, long time ago, in a sociology class far away I studied pedophiles. Their sexual orientation was children, not male or female. Their level of recidivism approached 100%. The only thing that stemmed the level of repeated behavior was castration, removing the drive to commmitt the crime, not fear of punishment for committing the crime."
Quote:
So many phony dilemmas, so little time.
Hardly phony. Any change in the law to the level you are suggesting needs to be considered from all sides, and the benefits and pitfalls need to be discussed.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by SignyM:
The point, Geezer, is to help US... the non-criminals, so that we have fewer criminals in future to arrest, process, house and- in effect, support. It's like autism- wouldn't you like to find the cause(s) of autism and eliminate it??
I'm aware of this. From earlier:"not necessarily my viewpoint, since I can see the possible overall benefit." I'm just not sure that the same population that would deny rights to gays would see the overall benefit of helping criminals.
Quote:
Well, in fact, we do social engineering every day. We set up a society where we revere greed, we tell people that it's a dog-eat-dog world and only the fit survive; we saturate airwaves, print media, and highways with hosannas to consumerism; we hand out credit like "candy"; we constantly undercut education; we suppress philosophical thought and push hypermoralism and an ideology of personal failure and then we wonder why people steal and take drugs and why they hate themselves and each other. I mean, if you WANTED to create a vicious dysfunctional society, that would be the way to go, wouldn't it?
So it's just your version of "social engineering" you want? Thanks, but I don't prefer yours any more than the examples you cited.
Quote:
So, when I talk about "preventing" crime, it's more along the lines of changing SOCIETY, not intruding on a person's individual freedom.
Lets just say that I'd need a good bit of convincing that your, or anyone else's, idea of changing SOCIETY would not intrude on my personal freedom.
Quote:
BTW- We could cut our prison population IN HALF if we treated the druggies instead of jailing them. The recidivism rate for jailed drug offenses is 80%, for treatment is 50%. Then we could focus on the people who really need to be in jail (people who are a threat to others).
I agree 100%. The money spent on war on drugs makes the Iraq war costs look like chump change. Treat people who have a problem, let folk who use responsibly alone.
Quote:
I think that so many people have a knee-jerk to crime - it's all about moral failure, punishment and revenege- that they overlook practical options.
My only interest in treatment of crime is to prevent criminals from injuring the rest of us. I don't consider some of your plans practical because I don't see any chance the current or any near-term future government implementing them. If I thought you could get actual buy-in for the research into causes, I'd be all for it, but I can't see that happening.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by rue:
And then you make a sweeping generalization that is frankly Hitlerian: "People who decide to violate the social contract in major ways forfeit major portions of their value (as "value" means right to live)." What does this have to do with self defense? In fact, the entire rest of your post discusses how to assess someone's 'worth', and concludes that people who have not 'met their responsibilities' lose their rights to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.
Again, I admit that "value means right to live" should have been "value means right to life and liberty".
Our social contract - our laws - provide that people who violate that contract, by breaking those laws, can be deprived by due process of their liberty, or in some cases their life. Our laws also recognize that in some cases - self defense, or a policeman's action to end a threat to the public for example, people who are violating the laws may be injured or killed to remove that threat.
In both due process and the aftermath of self-defense, there is in effect a weighting of the relative values of the criminal and the potential victim, and the decision of who was in the right and who was not - who is worth more to society.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Has anyone ever looked at why people get so over-the-top emotional about this stuff? At the risk of offending, I'll suggest that it's the very nature of sick, sexually related content that gets everyone so worked up. There are thousands of brutal murders every year, each deserving 'the appropriate level of outrage'. But they aren't peppered with the seedy sexual angle so they are largely ignored. It just irks me the way this type of thing turns ordinarily rational people into an angry mob and the justifications for it don't ring true.
SergeantX
"Dream a little dream or you can live a little dream. I'd rather live it, cause dreamers always chase but never get it." Aesop Rock
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by SergeantX:
Has anyone ever looked at why people get so over-the-top emotional about this stuff? At the risk of offending, I'll suggest that it's the very nature of sick, sexually related content that gets everyone so worked up. There are thousands of brutal murders every year, each deserving 'the appropriate level of outrage'. But they aren't peppered with the seedy sexual angle so they are largely ignored. It just irks me the way this type of thing turns ordinarily rational people into an angry mob and the justifications for it don't ring true.
Consider the media circus surrounding the Michael Jackson trial. You have celebrity, power, child sex abuse - the whole package. Or the Jon Benet Ramsey case. I can understand the outrage at killing or abusing a child, but the sick fascination on every detail makes me wonder about both the media that inundate us with it, and the folks who can't miss a second of it.
Unfortunately, child sexual abuse has been going on forever, and was probably worse in the past than now, just like child labor abuses. You just get beat about the head with it so much by the media that I wonder if folks don't get kind of addicted to it.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Reality: If I ever went crazy enough to attack someone for pleasure, profit, or 'cause a little voice in my head said it was the thing to do, I'd WANT someone to assist me off this planet- in a hurry! If I was ever made sane enough to realize what I had done through doctors or therapy, the burden of it would make me kill myself, anyhow.
Once you step over certain lines, there's no coming back.
But there's always next time 'round. It could be a better one.
Harsh Buddah Chrisisall...
Chrisisall, I like the way you think, I like you too Geezer. I was afraid to read this thread after seeing some of the earlier posts. I managed to push through it, and appreciate you guys.
As for input to the thread, I agree this has been in the news a lot, and it bothers me a great deal. Real solutions will be difficult to come by. Any action/solution that saves even one innocent from such atrocities, without breaking laws or making us monsters in the process, is worth it I think. (I could be wrong)
I disapprove greatly of any solution that begins with the idea of "on the second or third offense", there shouldn't be a second. I also agree whole heartedly with the idea of distinquishing between real offenders(Rapist/Child molester) and not(Streaker/ 18 year old with 17.5 year old consentualy/ homosexual)
Real offenders should never see "the outside" again. I wish there was an easy solution, a place where people who can't live within society without causing harm to others are allowed to live normally (get a job, work, pay your cable bill) but never leave to re-enter society. Maybe they could be studied for causes etc. there.
I used to be more religious, but some of the religious arguements presented here make me shake my head and remember why I'm less religious now. Now I'm all for the "love thy neigbor, and turn the other cheek" but I wouldn't go to letting these offenders out to harm others.
Sorry for the long rambling.
Visit WWW.Marillion.Com for a better way to live
"We rejoice at being 'connected' without touching, Thank God for the internet. We stare at our screens all our lives, what a waste of eyes. 'Til the electrical storm blows our fuses and we gaze, dumbfounded, at the rain."
-Interior Lulu - Marillion - .Com
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Quote:
In case you haven't been following the literature, castration doesn't work. It's a non-starter. And who suggested it? Oh, that would be YOU.
Actually, it was Hardware, earlier in the thread.
"A long, long time ago, in a sociology class far away I studied pedophiles. Their sexual orientation was children, not male or female. Their level of recidivism approached 100%. The only thing that stemmed the level of repeated behavior was castration, removing the drive to commmitt the crime, not fear of punishment for committing the crime."
Just doing my part to keep the pot simmering.
The more I get to know people the more I like my dogs.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Jadehand:
I wish there was an easy solution, a place where people who can't live within society without causing harm to others are allowed to live normally (get a job, work, pay your cable bill) but never leave to re-enter society. Maybe they could be studied for causes etc. there.
This is a tempting idea, and a repeated theme in sci-fi. A prison area, or planet, where criminals are sent to survive or perish and there is no outside interference. In fiction it usually ends up like the movies "Escape from New York", "No Escape", "Chronicles of Riddick", etc. I'm not sure how it would work in real life.
Among the up sides would be lower costs, and the concept of keeping all your rotten eggs in one basket, and watching that basket. Downsides would be choosing a good site that provides easy containment, and the fact that someone, or a lot of someones, might have to give up their homes to provide the space.
Other issues to consider would be: How much room would have to be allocated to provide the current crop of violent offenders enough space to raise enough food to feed themselves? Would you be able to effectively provide enough tools, manufactury, etc., to permit a sustainable society if everyone behaved reasonably well? If the penal colony was not segregated by sex, what would you do with the children that would inevitably result, who had committed no crime?
It's actually an interesting concept.
"Keep the Shiny side up"
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Just because it's not politically acceptable doesn't mean it's impractical. Altho, maybe the better word would be "effective". For example, take a look at health care. The health insurance industry is bleeding every other economic sector, from GM to small businesses, AND it leaves a lot of people uninsured.... ultimately leading to higher treatment costs. That's hardly effective. So, when I'm considering solutions, I like to think about things that are EFFECTIVE. Why should I limit my thinking on the topic? That's like putting my brains in chains.
You know, one of the interesting things I find about FF fans is that altho they identify with Mal, Jayne, or some of the other major characters, they are most often like the older Tams- except not as rich.
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME