I agree with the death penalty in principle. In practice, I would only agree with it under the dictatorship of the proletariat because a bourgeois state should not have that amount of power.

I’m all for rehabilitative justice, but if it can be proven beyond any reasonable doubt that you:

  1. intentionally murdered an innocent person
  2. raped someone
  3. molested a child
  4. are a nazi
  5. committed war crimes

then you have forfeited your right to be a part of society and should be removed from it. Imo there is no amount of re-education or rehabilitation that can fix a person who has done any of the aforementioned things.

Thoughts?

  • @NothingButBits@lemmygrad.ml
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    2011 months ago

    I only support the death penalty during the process of post-revolution purges. Killing reactionary generals, colonels, chiefs of police and even politicians is all fine by me. Assuming they get fair trials of course. Once the revolution is consolidated it should be abolished. The only exception should be during war times.

  • @cfgaussian@lemmygrad.ml
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    11 months ago

    As a rule of thumb: in wartime yes, in peacetime no. However i have perhaps a broader view of what constitutes “wartime”. When an imperialist power tries to sabotage or undermine a socialist state, that is an act of war. Those who do the dirty work of the imperialists - saboteurs, traitors, spies, etc. are fair game.

    In general i would say the use of capital punishment should be inversely proportional to the stability of the society. In times of instability and conflict the risk posed by not executing enemies of the revolution is sometimes just too great. Of course this depends on the circumstances and the specific case.

    As long as imprisonment is an option i do not believe in capital punishment for “ordinary” crimes that lack a political component, that is either a political motivation or a political impact. Because punishment is not about moral retribution, it is about protecting society. And even in the case of politically motivated crimes, re-education may be possible. If someone can be “turned” that is preferable.

    When imprisonment is not possible however, such as while a revolution is ongoing and the manpower to staff the prison is not available or when there is a risk of control over the prison being lost in the course of the fighting, then yes, it probably makes more sense to execute say, a serial killer, who despite their crimes not having a political component would still pose an unacceptable threat to society if they were to escape.

  • Water Bowl Slime
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    1611 months ago

    Tbh I’m not that fussed about the fates of war criminals and Nazis either but I don’t trust any legal system to get a hit rate of 100%. Not to mention that the most humane methods of killing a person aren’t used because they’re ghoulish (inert gas suffocation, decapitation).

    Arguments in favor of the death penalty often use extreme examples as justification but if you look at how the death penalty plays out in reality you’ll see that it’s never as simple as those hypotheticals. People are pretty shit at determining guilt.

    • @frippa
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      1311 months ago

      +1,it should be used only in extreme circumstances like revolution or purges of powerful and dangerous people and only of other option are exhausted

  • Neptium
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    1411 months ago

    This may seem dismissive but I’d recommend you take a look at the previous thread that talked about it here, and the even older one here.

    TLDR: Depends on the country and its conditions, as always. No point in discussing such issues without socio-historical context. It’d be idealism otherwise.

    • @frippa
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      1111 months ago

      your point is a good one, fantasizing about socialist policies in a new hypotetical socialist country is borderline idealism, we can make models for sure but the material codnitions are what impose certain policies, like when the material conditions of the late 70s forced China to adopt mor of a market system or when the material conditions in the USSR forced the NEP

    • @smrtfasizmu@lemmygrad.mlOP
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      511 months ago

      Absolutely. Most people are redeemable. Fascists, rapists and child molesters are NOT. The fact that so many people think otherwise is concerning.

  • @lil_tank@lemmygrad.ml
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    711 months ago

    In a utopian manner we can all agree that ending one’s life is not a desirable option to have in a justice system, for all the classical arguments against death penalty

    But we’re not utopians

    We understand how struggle can sometimes lead to death, we understand that keeping an enemy of the proletariat in detention has a cost and a risk. The question we need to ask ourselves is what is the amount of those costs and risks? If refusing to execute counter revolutionaries and criminals during a period of heightened class struggle lead to escapes, massive logistical problems and draining of resources, then it means we can’t afford to take prisoners.

    If spies working for a powerful imperialist nation are found in the new government, their knowledge and influence might pose massive problems if you keep them in a prison.

    So yes we’re against death penalty as much as we are against the state … eventually, when sufficient progress have been made

  • @Munrock@lemmygrad.ml
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    611 months ago

    Imperfect states in an imperfect world are always going to make mistakes, but if the welfare of the people comes first, accidentally wrongfully executing people is a huge failure. Yeah wrongfully imprisoning someone for decades isn’t really reversible either, but if someone is found to be wrongfully convicted some reparation and restoration is better than none.

    My belief has shifted though, from “execution should be prohibited” to “execution should be avoided”. Life and humanity is far too unpredictable.

  • @Navaryn@lemmygrad.ml
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    311 months ago

    I think that it should be reserved for the most extreme of cases, the truly evil, recidive and irredeemable ones.

    I am generally against it, but i also believe that people like Anders Breivik should be removed from the planet

  • Yang Wen-li
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    -111 months ago

    There is a lot to discuss with capital punishment obviously, and I still feel mixed.

    I do find it odd that one of the justifications of life imprisonment over death, is that it will make the offender suffer more. Which is just legally incorrect, most of the world specifically outlawed capital punishment because it’s seen as very cruel, and states that still use it site it’s cruelty as a deterent.

    It’s odd because it contradicts the point of life imprisonment being more humane. I’ve noticed the arguments for life are not coherent when combined, you either subscribe to the cruelty of life, or the eye for an eye makes the world go blind logic. Yet the death penalty has no such issue, all lines of logic fit together neatly. It is undeniably a powerful legal statement.

    I think for now I lean towards life imprisonment. It should not be the decision of anyone except the offender, if they wish to rehabilitate or not. But I do make an exception for notable offenders. I find it cruel and sadistic to keep a serial killer locked up in solitary for the rest of their years. Allow the appeals to expire and just let them go peacefully.