Cant believe that there are still people in 2016 that advocate for the death penalty. It's such a barbarian thing to lust for revenge.
1786 is the year in which the first country in the world (Tuscany in Italy) decided to abolish the death penalty. Look how far behind you Americans are, it's ridiculous.
[QUOTE=Splarg!;51535878]When people say that they feel the death penalty is the best solution in a certain case or that it should be used in extreme cases I wonder if they feel that they have considered the matter more thoroughly than all of the blue countries:
[img]https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/5/5d/Capital_punishment_world.png/640px-Capital_punishment_world.png[/img][/QUOTE]
Yes.
Norway can keep Anders Breivik alive if they want to. Germany can keep Stephan Letter and Frank Gust alive if they want to. The United Kingdom can keep Peter Moore and John Cooper alive if they want to. Etc. That's their business.
But we choose to not keep people like Dylan Roof, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, Timothy McVeigh, Andrew Brannan, etc. alive. Because we don't want to waste our time with them when it's pointless to try, and the crimes these people committed don't warrant them being "rehabilitated" even if it were possible.
[editline]16 December 2016[/editline]
The people that throw the "but mental health and rehabilitation" argument out there whenever this topic comes up shouldn't even be paid attention to. It's a bit more complicated than "throw lots of money at the institutions incarcerating them, give the inmates comfortable living standards, give them doctors to evaluate them and prescription drugs, and so on-- then they'll get better".
How is keeping these type of people, those without any hope of mental rehabilitation and are clearly aware of what they did, alive, confined and isolated for the rest of their lives considered less barbaric than death?
Even for the people who call it a harsher form of revenge, our system shouldn't be about revenge. Justice is not about revenge. How is it in anyway for people to keep someone alive and stored away until they croak from natural causes in any way morally superior?
If he can't be helped, if he really is the purest example of a racist with no redeeming qualities and evidence shows that he is the one who without doubt committed the crime, why should society keep him around? What is there to learn from him, or to sit and hope prolonged isolation will make him change?
It's not like he was accused of rape or murder and is being sentenced to death without any concrete evidence, only for decades later new evidence is discovered and he wasn't the one who committed the crime. He did it, we all know and have the evidence, he has confirmed it was indeed racially motivated. Case opened and shut.
How can you call yourselves morally superior by preferring prolonged isolation, causing more mental anguish on someone who clearly is beyond any help?
[editline]16th December 2016[/editline]
Especially considering the fact he may end up in a prison that learns about his background, and seeing as our prison population consists of mostly african americans, he'll end up dead on the inside soon enough.
[QUOTE=LtKyle2;51536761]How is keeping these type of people, those [B]without any hope of mental rehabilitation[/B] and are clearly aware of what they did, alive, [B]confined and isolated[/B] for the rest of their lives considered less barbaric than death?
Even for the people who call it a harsher form of revenge, our system shouldn't be about revenge. Justice is not about revenge. How is it in anyway for people to keep someone alive and stored away until they croak from natural causes in any way morally superior?
If he can't be helped, if he really is the purest example of a racist with no redeeming qualities and evidence shows that he is the one who without doubt committed the crime, why should society keep him around? What is there to learn from him, or to sit and hope prolonged isolation will make him change?
It's not like he was accused of rape or murder and is being sentenced to death without any concrete evidence, only for decades later new evidence is discovered and he wasn't the one who committed the crime. He did it, we all know and have the evidence, he has confirmed it was indeed racially motivated. Case opened and shut.
How can you call yourselves morally superior by preferring prolonged isolation, causing more mental anguish on someone who clearly is beyond any help?
[editline]16th December 2016[/editline]
Especially considering the fact he may end up in a prison that learns about his background, and seeing as our prison population consists of mostly african americans, he'll end up dead on the inside soon enough.[/QUOTE]
1. Prove it
2. prison =/= solitary confinement
I have to ask where people are getting the idea that he's for sure beyond any sort of help. I mean, i find it very fucking unlikely, but as far as i know, the public has no solid knowledge on the exact state of his mental condition. That's assuming i didn't miss any news on that matter, though.
[QUOTE=LtKyle2;51536761]How is keeping these type of people, those without any hope of mental rehabilitation and are clearly aware of what they did, alive, confined and isolated for the rest of their lives considered less barbaric than death?
Even for the people who call it a harsher form of revenge, our system shouldn't be about revenge. Justice is not about revenge. How is it in anyway for people to keep someone alive and stored away until they croak from natural causes in any way morally superior?
How can you call yourselves morally superior by preferring prolonged isolation, causing more mental anguish on someone who clearly is beyond any help?
[editline]16th December 2016[/editline]
Especially considering the fact he may end up in a prison that learns about his background, and seeing as our prison population consists of mostly african americans, he'll end up dead on the inside soon enough.[/QUOTE]
Prison doesn't have to be that bad. There are classes, rec time, you can write, read, etc. They get to see society move on without them.
[QUOTE=SIRIUS;51536804]1. Prove it
2. prison =/= solitary confinement[/QUOTE]
have you listened to some of the recordings from the police interview with him? with him laughing after he admitted to the killings, of his views on race and how in his own words "somebody had to do something"?
That was all cold and calculated, and even if he isn't in solitary confinement how long do you think he will really last before he gets killed by one of the other inmates?
Even now I'm undecided on which treatment he should get, but hearing how life imprisonment is somehow morally superior is such a load of shit.
Especially life imprisonment in the US, where we have no real prison standards. Maybe Denmark or some other European country will take him for us.
[QUOTE=RenegadeCop;51536837]You can never know for certain if he can or can't be rehabilitated. No one can ever get into his mind.
Shouldn't we apply a "better safe than sorry" approach?[/QUOTE]
[I]I[/I] can't ever be certain, but his psychiatrists sure can.
[QUOTE=MadPro119;51536841]Prison doesn't have to be that bad. There are classes, rec time, you can write, read, etc. They get to see society move on without them.[/QUOTE]
You're right, it doesn't but I doubt U.S prisons will ever be remotely close to having some form of modest lifestyle for inmates like Europeans have.
[QUOTE=Govna;51536829][url]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antisocial_personality_disorder#Treatment[/url]
[/QUOTE]
So what this tells me is that research is ongoing and inconclusive, and that various treatment options have been explored with varying levels of success. Not sure how this equates to him having "no hope of mental rehabilitation".
[editline]15th December 2016[/editline]
[QUOTE=RenegadeCop;51536880]Unless they can scan and read minds, they can't.
Repeat offenders have happened in the past.[/QUOTE]
Lots of factors can go into repeat offenses, such as an inability to reintegrate with society. I'd say that some of the struggles that ex-cons face when they're released are somewhat similar to those refugees face, except likely worse in terms of discrimination in housing and employment.
[QUOTE=Blazedol;51536828]I have to ask where people are getting the idea that he's for sure beyond any sort of help. I mean, i find it very fucking unlikely, but as far as i know, the public has no solid knowledge on the exact state of his mental condition. That's assuming i didn't miss any news on that matter, though.[/QUOTE]
[quote]Newsweek spoke to Mary Ellen O’Toole, a leading expert in psychopathy and crime scene behavior who served as an FBI agent for 28 years--14 in the behavioral analysis unit, profiling mass murderers and serial killers. O’Toole has worked on the Columbine, Red Lake and Virginia Tech school shootings and was the lead author of The School Shooter: A Threat Assessment Perspective. The seminal guide to school shootings details procedure for determining whether troubling behavior might lead to violence. O’Toole presently directs George Mason University’s Forensic Science program.
[b]What does the suspect’s behavior say about him?[/b]
You had somebody who walked in who was very cool, calm and collected. He left a witness so she could tell the police what happened. He was not agitated. He had said a few things apparently about what the motivation was--according to witnesses, he calmly walked in calmly and walked out, and sat there an hour beforehand. This was somebody who engaged in pre-planning that was not impulsive. This is someone I would call “mission oriented.” The intent is for maximum lethality --in other words, to kill as many people as possible. They take risks even if it can expose them to be apprehended.
[b]Is the suspect mentally ill?[/b]
This was a very cold-blooded act. It indicates there was a lack of empathy for the victims. This does not mean he's crazy. You’re going to find people wanting to find mental defects with this person--that he suffers from depression, that he's bipolar, that he showed signs of mental illness. People are going to look for some kind of mental excuse for why this behavior occurred. You can have a mental health issue but still know right from wrong and be able to understand the consequences of your actions. Then you also have people absent mental illness who kill because they want to kill. It's an important thing because otherwise, people are looking for indicators for prior mental health issues and not the right indicators of threatening behavior becoming more violent. The vast majority of people who do have legitimate mental health problems are not violent.[/quote]
[url]http://www.newsweek.com/charleston-church-shooting-profile-mass-shooter-344317[/url]
Options are limited. If he isn't a psychopath, then he killed because he could/wanted to. We can speculate about it for as long as we want until the official psychopathology report comes out. In any case, shooting 9 innocent people to death (helpless people at that) is extremely heinous behavior. It is not normal. That much we can decisively conclude, and it provides a good framework to speculate off of.
[editline]16th December 2016[/editline]
[QUOTE=Duck M.;51536890]So what this tells me is that research is ongoing and inconclusive, and that various treatment options have been explored with varying levels of success. Not sure how this equates to him having "no hope of mental rehabilitation".[/QUOTE]
Read closer:
[quote]ASPD is considered to be among the most difficult personality disorders to treat. Because of their very low or absent capacity for remorse, individuals with ASPD often lack sufficient motivation and fail to see the costs associated with antisocial acts. They may only simulate remorse rather than truly commit to change: they can be seductively charming and dishonest, and may manipulate staff and fellow patients during treatment.[/quote]
Therapy has a very low success rate, the impulsive and aggressive nature of psychopaths limits the effectiveness of therapy in general (it's a self-defeating cycle), no medications exist specifically to treat psychopathy, a barrage of antipsychotics and antidepressants as well as mood stabilizers [i]might[/i] help regulate some of their aggressiveness and impulsivity... overall prognosis is noted to be extremely poor in both forensic and clinical settings. And this is all concerning people with psychopathy who aren't mass murderers.
Explain why he should be rehabilitated after what he did, furthermore. Assuming we can take somebody who killed 9 innocent people for no real reason, has showed no remorse for any of it, is in all probability a psychopath (or just somebody who killed because he could and isn't mentally ill; I'll leave you to speculate which is worse)... why should we after everything he did?
[QUOTE=RenegadeCop;51536880]Unless they can scan and read minds, they can't.
Repeat offenders have happened in the past.[/QUOTE]
If he's truly untreatable, if he has psychopathy, or has no signs of being able to change his morals or whatever, his psychiatrists can and probably will find out. If he's not, well, with our prison system he probably won't get treated anyway, but that's besides the point. And with repeat offenders, that's more of an issue with our prison system in general and not necessarily their mental stability, though that can contribute.
[QUOTE=Govna;51536900][url]http://www.newsweek.com/charleston-church-shooting-profile-mass-shooter-344317[/url]
Options are limited. If he isn't a psychopath, then he killed because he could/wanted to. We can speculate about it for as long as we want until the official psychopathology report comes out. In any case, shooting 9 innocent people to death (helpless people at that) is extremely heinous behavior. It is not normal. That much we can decisively conclude, and it provides a good framework to speculate off of.[/QUOTE]
This is a really good article and your points do hold up, but i still feel there's still only a handful of information we have that guessing will still only ever be just that; for now, at least. Can't say I'd disagree with you on suspicions, though.
I don't know where people get this idea that the death penalty is quicker or cheaper than life in prison -- they don't just inject them in a month and be done with it, it's unarguably a bigger drain on resources.
From a purely practical standpoint, keeping them alive is the better choice.
[QUOTE=Revenge282;51534788]I genuinely would say that the death sentence may be more fitting for this [b]since rehab or any type of leniency is not an option.[/b][/QUOTE]
Thank you doctor, your medical opinion about mental health was very important. I thought this guy could still maybe be rehabilitated, but thanks to your intense analysis of his psychology you've changed my mind.
[QUOTE=Govna;51536900]
Read closer:
Therapy has a very low success rate, the impulsive and aggressive nature of psychopaths limits the effectiveness of therapy in general (it's a self-defeating cycle), no medications exist specifically to treat psychopathy, a barrage of antipsychotics and antidepressants as well as mood stabilizers [i]might[/i] help regulate some of their aggressiveness and impulsivity... overall prognosis is noted to be extremely poor in both forensic and clinical settings. And this is all concerning people with psychopathy who aren't mass murderers.
Explain why he should be rehabilitated after what he did, furthermore. Assuming we can take somebody who killed 9 innocent people for no real reason, has showed no remorse for any of it, is in all probability a psychopath (or just somebody who killed because he could and isn't mentally ill; I'll leave you to speculate which is worse)... why should we after everything he did?[/QUOTE]
Well I feel like I did read pretty close,
[QUOTE]Residential programs that provide a carefully controlled environment of structure and supervision along with peer confrontation have been recommended.[63] There has been some research on the treatment of ASPD that indicated positive results for therapeutic interventions.[67] Schema therapy is also being investigated as a treatment for ASPD.[68] A review by Charles M. Borduin features the strong influence of Multisystemic therapy (MST) that could potentially improve this imperative issue[/QUOTE]
It's a difficult ethical issue to speak on the merits of even making an attempt to rehabilitate him, because he is the [B]last[/B] person that deserves it. He's a piece of shit. The way I see it, though, is that prison sentences only provide a benefit to society at large by keeping dangerous individuals outside of that society. If those individuals could be reconditioned into becoming productive members of society again, then all we're doing by keeping people in prison is enacting punitive measures which, as far as I've seen, aren't particularly effective in any sense. It's not much of a punishment for Roof if he feels no remorse or empathy for his actions, is it?
I feel like the issue here is that I'm speaking more to broad reform and ethics on the prison system in the US at large when this topic is a bit more specific to Roof in general, who I think is a bit of an extenuating circumstance. He should most certainly receive THE harshest sentence for his actions, and it's incredibly doubtful that he could ever be rehabilitated, but I would have no issue with him being given the option of psychiatric assessments and rehabilitation under a justice system that has a larger focus on mental health in its game plan.
[QUOTE=matt000024;51537011]Thank you doctor, your medical opinion about mental health was very important. I thought this guy could still maybe be rehabilitated, but thanks to your intense analysis of his psychology you've changed my mind.[/QUOTE]
Thank you for your wildly exaggerated response. I'm glad you took the time to think of how to most eloquently relay your thoughts.
However, I never meant to make some professional diagnosis, just an assumption. I suppose I should have added a "likely" in that sentence. But, if you can provide an instance of a mass murderer who plotted his attack, and was successfully reintegrated into society, I will concede.
[QUOTE=Revenge282;51539698]Thank you for your wildly exaggerated response. I'm glad you took the time to think of how to most eloquently relay your thoughts.
However, I never meant to make some professional diagnosis, just an assumption. I suppose I should have added a "likely" in that sentence. But, if you can provide an instance of a mass murderer who plotted his attack, and was successfully reintegrated into society, I will concede.[/QUOTE]
You said it as if it were a fact, I didn't misunderstand your post. Also it's hard to find mass murders who were reformed because until recently (and still so in the US), they were all executed by default if found guilty most of the time.
[QUOTE=mcharest;51534796]While it's a relief that this terrorist has been brought to justice, it saddens me knowing that the families of the victims he killed will never be the same again. Nothing can return their loved ones to them.[/QUOTE]
Thankfully the victim's families were saying they forgave the kid days after it happened
[editline]18th December 2016[/editline]
Which I'll never understand because if that were me I'd chase this kid down and gauge his eyes out myself
[QUOTE=ferrus;51534923]Why?[/QUOTE]
vengeance because life is a Hollywood action movie and not a pragmatic place
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