"About 400 people have been hanged in Singapore since 1991, most of them for drug trafficking, giving the wealthy city-state of 4.2 million people possibly the highest execution rate in the world relative to its population, rights group Amnesty International said in a report this year. "
Got this of a news wire service so i am not sure if it is accurate or not
"The death penalty is mandatory in Singapore for drug trafficking, murder, treason and certain firearms offences. Executions are by hanging and take place on Friday mornings at dawn. Families of convicts are normally only informed of the impending execution one week before hand" Amnesty International.
When i was younger, before i went in the army i was a firm supporter in the rule of aboslutes and a death sentance that has been carried out on a convicted person is an absolute and so i supported this. I belived that these people deserved to die for their crimes, murder, drugs and others but as i have grown older i feel that there are many reasons to reconsider the death penalty.
Firstly, if even 1 of those 400 hung over the past 14years is innoncent isnt that too expensive a price to pay? We may like to think its acceptable but tell that to the parents of someone who is wrongly hung.
Is it a deterent, i am not sure what the breakdown is, but 400 over 14years lets say 1/4 were drug dealers, not much of a deterent there isit? Serious drug dealers live in a world where at anythime they could be killed anyway, by competitors or just other hoodlums its not the death they fear, its the loss of everyting else. I mean they know they wll be hung if they get caught yet they still try. (i am not sure there is a deterent for drug dealers)
Murderers generally kill out of passion, one time and thats it, unless they are serial killers.
At the point of the crime they do not think about the punishment, they are are not thinking.
Does it make the child or the husband of a murdered women feel better, maybe but it will not bring the victim back.
In saudi arabia, death is the only sentance a murdere can get unless the male members of the victims families forgive him the murderer will be executed in a public square by having his head cut off. Family members can stop it at any moment, and normally judges, religious and others in authority always ask the family to forgive.
In my opinion, i think life in prison with hard labour is the best option (not a perfect option as well). It is not an absolute so if a mistake is made, the person though suffered is still alive. As a deterent, it may not be as scary as death but it may be a fate worse then death.
The Torah requires that, even in cases that allow the death penalty, Jews try to avoid imposing it. "We should try to find some merit in the person so that they should not receive the death penalty." Sounds the same as islamic practice.
400 hung over 14years, thats almost 2 a month that means every fortnight on friday someone dies by hanging. think about it.
The Commandment says "Thou Shalt not Kill" not "thou shall not kill, but"
i know if my family or friends were murdered i would want the killers chopped up and fed to dogs but that doesnt make it right.
I dont think there will be any pics i can post in here.
Sidebar- i have left the comments section open on this topic should any of the 2 people who read this blog wish to comment.
4 comments:
Totally agree with you...Whenever this topic of converstaion comes up for discussion with me involve I always tell pple..."If the state can determine/pass a law to say that murder is wrong what gives the state the right to execute them in return? Isn't that a cotradiction in itself...?" Thats my arguement always and always be. I would like to add that I also don't believe in abortion..."Life was given to you by some higher being of sort...It is not your right to take yours or anyone else's away for that matter".
i feel..
2 wrongs dont make a right but sometimes it makes it better if not alright..
sometimes doing the best thing is all we can do and thats the only 'right' thing to do at that given time and situation..
sometimes doing the right thing goes beyond right and wrong..
The death sentence is more a deterrent or discouragement for more of the same rather than retribution or punishment..
400 offenders with the death penalty how many more deaths overall without?
i imagine the alternative.. Singapore without the death penalty.. more drugs.. more users.. more drug offences.. more drug syndicates.. more prison space needed.. more rehab centres.. more scapegoats willing to go to prison.. to the extreme even more drug operations runned from prisons.. more problems arising overall..
its not to say it isnt so now.. but abolishing the death penalty will result in more such activity..
one innocent hung{ May God gift them their just reward} versus a higher number of drug related casualties? i can live with being labeled draconian..
i wish we could all do the right thing always and have no need for assuaging our guilt or redeeming ourselves or others..
i wish there was no hate.. no crime.. no war.. no disease.. no suffering..
i wish for all the answers.. i wish for utopia..
Life is one long moment in which exist a continual struggle for balance.. finding and striking that balance for survival if not happiness..
we can yab about contradictions.. we can discuss absolutes.. we can debate rights and wrongs.. but fact is there is no utopia here and now and in the end wot the world needs in order to survive is compromise to find the balance that keep working..
By finding it acceptable that 1 life will be lost to execution we start on that slippery slope to whre 2 lives is ok 3 lives is ok..what is the cut off point? you are balancing the confirmed death of 400 people innocent or guilty agains the supposed or "possible death" of others. on the one hand you have a definate end to life and on the other you have the possiblity. By my standards NOT one LIFE INNOCENT or OTHERWISE is worth the potential problems. NOT ONE, and i will tell you why, because that one life innocent or guilty could one day be yours. No man has the right to take the life of another, the law is pretty clear on that unless it is sanctioned by the state by allowing the state to execute people we acknowledge that the state has the power to kill, not in defence but in punishment. And thus the state has rights over our lives, more rights then you posses yourself.
the last post the one where we "yab", i reckon we cant reach those compromises or balance with out yabbing....how else can we do it?
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