Capital Punishment: Should the Death Penalty Still Exist In A 'Civilised Society'?

Herndon Youth Soccer? idgi.

I dunno, this whole thing started because someone upthread posited the idea that there are times that some people go about assaulting people with a cool and calm and totally thought out intention, and there are other times that people go about assaulting people with complete spur of the moment, irrational, are-not-thinking because decision making circuits have been inflamed by strong drink or strong emotion and these two cases are just *not* the same, nor should they be treated the same (in either sense of the word "treated" - as in sentencing, and in rehabilitating)

n.b. yes I am one of those bleeding heart lefties who believes that rehabilitation is possible in some subset of criminal cases

otm about these things being clearly different, obv

They are definitely different, but people who go out drinking in pubs and end up in fights are fucking stupid.

I want to reiterate for the record, because it may have been lost beneath the fold, that I don't support capital punishment, but that we moved on to tangential topics such as the nature of evil and forgiveness, etc.

is murdering for meat better/worse than murdering for pleasure?

Wow, that post makes me think that *you* are incredibly stupid, also unrealistic, and incredibly culturally blinkered. x-post

This bit:

They are definitely different, but people who go out drinking in pubs and end up in fights are fucking stupid.

Because you aren't saying that, you're essentially saying

They are definitely different, but people who go out drinking in pubs are fucking stupid.

And this is just unbearably naive.

Does everybody who goes out to pubs get in fights?

I have been out to bars and never been in a fight.

um, not everyone but.......

if people come up to me in a bar and tell me that drinking is stupid, then..

i do agree that getting drunk enough that you're going to get into fights is stupid, i am very confused as to how we got here though

Should pbus still exist in a `civilised' society?

I just...I mean I used to go to bars and drink a lot and I can't have seen more than a handful of fights.

I'd be really happy to agree with you, if you substituted "football games" for pubs, and wanted to argue against football because some football fanatics get in fights, but hands off British/Irish people's pubs or *you* will be in a fight, and not a judge in this country would hang us for kicking you. Oh wait, we don't do that. Or do we?

</blinking irony tags>

are pubs different to bars?

would it make a difference depending on how much you tip?

Establishments that exist primarily for the purpose of socializing and consuming alcohol.

what about if Jason Mraz was playing on the jukebox?

would vordul have got sonned by the wite kid after a aol beef had he been sober?

I am led to understand that British pubs might serve food more frequently than American bars do, but that may just be something I saw in a movie.

eg houses

yeah that was probably a movie (or "fillum")

Honest mistake. : )

you'll prise the pint of harp from my cold dead hands you bastard

You still get Harp? Haven't seen that for years. Does it still stay sharp to the bottom of the glass?

best example of British pubs in films - Eurotrip...

Vinnie Jones as head of Manchester United supporters club...oh dear...

You can have your pint of harp, Dmac! The first time I went to the UK/Europe, I was 18 and had not done much drinking (I was more of a pot and acid guy at the time) so I was eager to take advantage of the loose drinking laws. The first place I went to, I didn't know anything about beers, so I say to the barkeep "Could you recommend me a good lager?" And so Harp is all I drank until I got to Germany.

odd thread

(I was more of a pot and acid guy at the time)

I assume this was before you did your risk management course.

harp is the only beer made from bad eggs iirc, i do not enjoy 'the pint of harp' tho it is a noted ilx/irish meme

I would kill the barman recommended harp to me and i would walk free in any fair court, to tie this back in

i think having harp as your first drink is what put you off alcohol

man i am an hour late but:

If you are capable enough of murder to have committed it, the amount of evil in you is sufficient to qualify you as an evil person, no matter how many rabbits you feed.

― kkvgz, Friday, August 5, 2011

this is crazy. what are we going to use as a gauge of whether someone is 'capable of murder'? most of us are fortunate enough never to have to get close. like i'd say i'm capable of murder in self defence; and while that is obviously a different thing, it maybe still serves to illustrate that being in an entirely different set of life circumstances to the ones i am in now might change how things are. i'm not defending murder!, but it seems very cut and dry to think that it's an arbiter entirely of the person and not their circumstances whether someone committed murder.

self defence by definition is not murder, schlump

'capable of murder' is a fairly useless definition, though.

pre-emptive self defence

what are we going to use as a gauge of whether someone is 'capable of murder'?

Having committed it!

yeah, you're right, but: i just feel like murder is not always the stake to the heart, you know, it can be something that happens in a fight or in a rage or in circumstances that are removed from composed, reasoned analysis of things. i have no doubt that there are examples in which it proves the thing of, 'this person was unfeeling + callous + did this', but like i don't think that this is 'all murder' or reveals anything about people who are capable of murder

shooting a fucker who was pulling a pint of harp on you

lol

it can be something that happens in a fight or in a rage or in circumstances that are removed from composed, reasoned analysis of things.

nah that's manslaughter

i just feel like this does not do justice to the way things unfold in the world; there are people who get in a fight and push someone and the person falls and bangs their head and dies, and if they'd fallen a different way then they wouldn't have died, and it was a fight and it ended in murder, and yet the intention did not necessarily inform the result. they've then entered into yr binary category of murderers. this circumstance is probably slightly mitigated by 'accident', but i'm just trying to say that it isn't so concrete - as above there's 'pre-emptive self-defence' or whatever else.

ha, i am appreciating your corrections here ken even though they are kinda killing my arguments, but i am still stubbornly clinging to the idea that 'you committed murder, you are evil' takes a huge liberty in ignoring everything that lead someone there

pretty sure that most places have a lot of those categories covered, tbf schlump

I'm pretty certain that I'm capable of murder. I mean, please don't o_0 at me or SB for admitting that, but given my life, my history, sets of potential circumstances that could push me to that limit - I cannot rule the possibility out. And that's something I live with, and something I have to work against.

Does that make me "evil"? I don't think that's your call to make.

Without going into details, there are some pretty fucked up things that I have actually done, in the past, in different circumstances, and the fact that I'm sitting in an office right now, rather than sitting in a jail, is proof that people and the circumstances they inhabit can change, and that people sometimes can be redeemed. Since I've been given that benefit of the doubt by the legal system, I want to preserve it for others.

many x-posts because that was difficult to write, sorry for teh serious. Now back to discussing yr Friday pints.

shooting a fucker who was pulling a pint of harp on you

Emotive testimony of Sally O'Brien would see you swing for that.

it can be something that happens in a fight or in a rage or in circumstances that are removed from composed, reasoned analysis of things.

nah that's manslaughter

Can be manslaughter but not always.

i think many people are capable of murder as long as they have two hands, and perhaps a weapon? i mean, if there's a nuclear strike and there's one space left in the bunker and there's another person (let's say a stranger) trying to get in. I'd kill the fucker.

pretty sure that most places have a lot of those categories covered, tbf schlump

yeah i know, & i do sorta need correcting (not ... penally), but i still feel like you end up with grey area some of the time, & that there are people who didn't wake up being all, today is the day i will deliver on my pre-approval to do some murderin'.

f there's a nuclear strike and there's one space left in the bunker and there's another person (let's say a stranger) trying to get in. I'd kill the fucker.

Yeah man, musn't lose that double seat.

You could just put your bag on it though.