• bostonbananarama@lemmy.world
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    9 months ago

    it definitely will make other people think twice before they do the same thing

    There is absolutely no evidence to support that assertion.

    There is no proof that the death penalty deters criminals. According to the National Academy of Sciences, “Research on the deterrent effect of capital punishment is uninformative about whether capital punishment increases, decreases, or has no effect on homicide rates.”

    US Department of Justice

      • otp@sh.itjust.works
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        9 months ago

        I believe that most developed countries have gotten rid of the death penalty, and a big part of that is because it doesn’t work as a deterrent.

        Very few people decide whether or not to commit a crime based on the punishment. Most criminals think they won’t get caught at all, or if they do, they think they’ll get away with it in court.

        • FatCrab@lemmy.one
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          9 months ago

          This slightly misses the mark. The majority of crimes, including violent ones, are not committed by people performing a risk calculus. They’re done with minimal thought and more often than not in the heat of the moment. Effectively, they are not crimes that you can deter because for a crime to be deterred, the potential criminal has to assess whether it makes sense to commit the crime. This works in cases of like financial fraud and white collar crime. Someone shooting another person during an altercation, not so much.

          • fastandcurious@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            Thanks here for this comment, I feel like I see where my stance might not make sense, ofc death penalty should not be given in cases like this where emotion takes over, I am rather taking about ppl like trump and gates and Netanyahu who are completely sane, they just kill for their own benefit

            Ppl here have assumed that just because I said ‘I see reason’ means I feel like you need to kill everyone who commits this, No, I am saying that I don’t know the exact circumstance, it might or might not be justified, I hope we can clear this up moving forward

          • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            Yeah there’s a way to deter crimes and it’s increasing the certainty of punishment. Overly severe punishment actually has an unwanted effect of increasing the severity of crimes. If a rapist is going to die if caught that incentivizes murdering the victim who is inherently a witness.

              • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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                9 months ago

                No, they convince themselves it isn’t rape. Rape is a lot less dark alley and a lot more sober person and person too drunk to say no or pressuring or some other means of soft power. Look at studies which showed that if you don’t say the word rape a lot of admit they’re willing to do it.

                So what you get from executing rapists is someone who raped their partner either in an emotional frenzy or a coercive stage gets accused or has a flash of realization and promptly gets violent lest they die.

                Also, as a woman I’m a lot less likely to accuse someone of rape they actually did to me if I know it could lead to them hanging in the public square. Suddenly the weight of their life feels like it’s on my hands and I don’t want them dead.

          • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
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            9 months ago

            And what level of certainty do you need? Keep in mind uncertainty means innocents are murdered by the state and 100% certainty is difficult enough that it will generally put you into the anti capital punishment camp.

            Also it sounds like you have a failure of understanding how the rich get out of punishment. Yes sometimes it’s like Brock Turner where it’s blatant. But other times it’s because they can afford the means to hide evidence and sow doubts. And when all else fails they’re more likely to have ins with judges or the ability to flee preemptively.

      • bostonbananarama@lemmy.world
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        9 months ago

        we don’t even need evidence to know

        No matter what follows this…yes, we do. You should need evidence to believe anything; understanding of course that the more extraordinary the claim, the more extraordinary the evidence needed.

        giving them merely some jailtime is not working either, but whatever

        Then imprison them for life. Guess what, life imprisonment is cheaper than the death penalty, and can be overturned if there’s an error.