Death penalty - for or against?

Last week Alabama carried out its first, and America's first, nitrogen gas execution. How is this allowed?

The victim, Kenneth Smith, said in his last words that "Alabama caused humanity to take a step backwards".

Th US Supreme Court rejected a stay of execution. Sonia Sotomayor dissented. "Once the nitrogen is flowing into his mask, his executioners will not intervene, and not remove the mask, even if Smith vomits into it and chokes on his own vomit", she said. Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson also dissented.

Kenneth Smith was already tortured on a gurney 14 months ago after an attempt at lethal injection went wrong. A report by five Alabama newspeople who witnessed the execution said Smith "shook and writhed" for at least two minutes and then proceeded to breathe heavily for several minutes after that.

"Justice has been served" declared Alabama state atttorney Steve Marshall.

Has it?

I oppose the death penalty for two reasons: (1) Killing in cold blood, as opposed to direct self-defense, is never justified. (2) I don't trust the State to make decisions about life and death.

“Fun” fact.

We all know that Louis and Marie Antoinette were beheaded after the French Revolution.

Did you know that France continued to use the literal guillotine right up until the 1970s? Shocking. Still, they finally learned. Hopefully we will too.

 

Jay Lerner-Z said: "I do confess to wondering if I’d feel the same way if somebody I loved became a victim of murder. My resolve would certainly be tested"

While I agree with this and Zeppie's similar comment, it doesn't make me question my current stance at all. If someone close to me were murdered, I would not be in a state where I was capable of forming a reasoned, objective opinion about the death penalty. I'm pretty sure that someone who had recently suffered such a tragic loss would also be excluded from serving as a juror on a murder trial for a similar reason: their decisions would be driven too much by emotion and too little by evidence and reason.

Only for royals.