Are you for or against capital punishment?

[chequita guevara]

nationalist, there was no ad hominum on my part. Kramerman said he would torture someone, though he has since recanted. If someone says they will torture someone, I'm gonna call them on it. Torture is sick and disgusting. People who are willing to engage in torture are a menace and society should be protected from them.

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
nationalist, there was no ad hominum on my part. Kramerman said he would torture someone, though he has since recanted. If someone says they will torture someone, I'm gonna call them on it. Torture is sick and disgusting. People who are willing to engage in torture are a menace and society should be protected from them.

THAT IS NOT TRUE!
I never recanted. I was never serious in the first place! How many times did i say it was just fanciful thoughts of mine? How many times must I say this. I am sorry, I dont have time to continue presently, I just saw this and had to respond.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Kramerman
I never recanted. I was never serious in the first place!

You said it, then after being dragged over the coals for saying it, you said you wern't serious. That's recanting.

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara


You said it, then after being dragged over the coals for saying it, you said you wern't serious. That's recanting.

Here is what I said:

That is too true... such bastards are probably deserving of torture. Death is a cake walk compared to what I would do if put in a room with a sicko like that...

'They are probably deserving of torture'... hmm... that doesnt sound like I want to mercilessly torture them, does it? But wait, there is more...

'Death is probably a cake walk compared to what I would do to them' ... I see. Well perhaps if I send you a picture of myself, you would see the hint of humor in this remark. Me, put into a room of a murderer... not a good idea, none the less I was refering to roughing them up abit in a brawl - not torture - but me roughing anyone up in a brawl is just fantasy. If you consider this torture, then probably every boy I know has 'tortured' someone in the school yard or someplace like that. If I would of known there would be a jerk like you to attack my integrity over such a frivoluce and fanciful remark, I would of held my tounge. But Oh well. For the 9th time I hope this clears up that i dont believe in torture (then again, this depends on your definition. Is corporal punishment torture? Is spanking your children after misbehaving torture? Is pulling someone's teeth torture? It is relative to what one thinks) and I never have. That is why I dont recant torturing people, cause I never wanted to in the first place. Previously Ive used two sentence posts to clarify things that I have said, but you are appearently malicious (i dunno why) and I have needed to write more to explain. Its ok as long as you understand. If not, well, I am sorry you completely misgauge my character .

Kman

EDIT: If you want to go on argueing over whether or not I want to torture people, very well. Though I do not believe in torture, who is anybody to say that R/P/M ( no, not rotations per minute, the other RPM...) should not be or should be tortured. It is relative I suppose, among other things...

[Kramerman]

EDIT: PLEASE BEFORE YOU RESPOND, READ ALL MY FOLLOWING POSTS (two I BELIEVE). I DID A POOR JOB WRITING BECAUSE I WAS IN A RUSH, BUT IF YOU READ ALL I HAVE TO SAY ( I KINDA TIED MY IDEAS ALL TOGETHER) THEN YOU SHOULD BE ABLE TO UNDERSTAND WHAT I MEANT.

What rights are you referring to? Where did they get these rights if society wasn't giving them said rights?

After the Civil War all freedmen were givin the right to vote. However, mostly in the south, through intimidation and Jim Crow laws (like literacy tests, poll tax, and the 'grandfather law') black men were kept from voting in these regions. Through politics and corruption was the civil rights movement surrpressed for years, even though it was in America's best interest, blacks being American citizens after all.

So, you'd say that slavery was justified/right/lawful/whatever since the majority of people two or three hundred years ago thought that slavery was fine and dandy? By the same token, was it fine for the Nazis to kill the Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, etc. because German society at the time generally thought that these things were find and dandy?

*sigh* Do you read through my posts? Or do you just read certain things to try and spite me? I clearly wrote that laws need to be made to protect a society and everyone who lives in that society from harm. DID SLAVES NOT LIVE IN A SOCIETY? Of course they did. Slavery is obviously very harmful and unjustified against almost all. Therefore laws need to be made to protect thse members of society
from unjustified harm. If those slaves had become slaves because they murdered someone, than we can talk about justification. But almost all slaves were either captured into slavery or born into slavery and held there for little if any justification that they had harmed somebody in this society in anyway. Instead their justification is that 'they are inferior'. So be it, but they brought no harm to anyone, so no harm should be brought to them in the act of punishing and detering future acts of harm.

They're only relative to a small extent, but for the most part they're fairly objective. You can't just arbitrarily redefine them or you run the risk of misapplying them.

Hold on a sec. You can very much so redifine arbitrarlily the definitions of good and evil. It is ver ignorant to think otherwise. An alien race on another planet could verywell find murder, thefy, lying, and everything else the 10 commandment frobid to be holy. TO THEM THAT IS GOOD! To us that may be evil, but thats because of your upbringing and such that you believe this. Our human culture has somewhat of a general concensus on the definitions of good and evil, but not all. Satanists may call themselves evil, but in their minds this has the same connotation as being the good guys. In otherwords, no matter what you believe, everybody thinks themselves to be one of the good guys, and then their enemy to be one of the bad guys. This is a complicated topic and it is hard for me to write it well, so I can understand confusion about this. If you have questions on what I mean please ask, but I think you should be able to fairly decipher what I am writing here.

[Kramerman]

And who is to say that ALL American laws are "just" and "moral" in the world's eyes? Sounds like you're going for cultural relativism here... in which each culture, while in their own culture, is "right" and "just" and must respect the actions of other cultures.

But once a country such as the US gets big enough they start enforcing their cultural relativism on other countries.

The cultural relativism of the world (thinking of all the countries that have the DP vs those that don't) would be that the DP is wrong under those arguements.

Who said the US is just and moral. If i got that message across, I am sorry. I was just trying to associate that laws cant be made based on anyones morals, because everybody has different morals. Instead laws must be made to protect a society and those that live within a society from harm. If laws are based on this, it could very well contridict someones beliefs, but it could be justified as in the interests of holding the society together. Laws against murder and such protect citizens from harm, and therefore they dont have to worry about protecting themselves and could function in society. A law like no pre-marital sex is based on religious morals alone, and by outlawing this you are not protecting anyone from harm (argueably). In my dream society a law like this has no place. A law against theft (protects people from certain economc harm). I am sure someone will be quick to point out there are alot of things that can cause harm that arent outlawed, such as flying in a plane, or driving a car. Well, thats becasue harm from this is only a risk, and regulation such as mandatory seat belts are put in place to help negate these risks. Murder on the other hand, is going to harm some one 100% of the time, as will srealing someones things, etc. Please, ask questions. Do read what I say carefully. I understand I am not the best writer and I am probably not conveying my ideas across in the finest literature, but do try. I would like to not have to respond to another arguement because someone just misunderstood. But then again, you may find a viable flaw

Kman

EDIT: Flameflash, after rereading yourpost, I dont really know what you are trying to say/ask? Something about how the culture of the world would think poorly on the DP (If this is what you were trying to say, I am sorry but that is not true. A majority of the world population lives in societies that justify the DP) by some arguements. To what arguements are you refering? It is not my arguement I am quite sure, and if it is then either you misunderstood what I wrote or I just did a really poor job writing that post, which is probably more likely, because you wouldnt have been the first to misunderstand

[loinburger]

Originally posted by nationalist
You answered your own question. Consistancy provides the substantive difference.

Consistency has nothing to do with irrationality. Irrational beliefs don't need to be consistent--they waive that requirement by virtue of the fact that they're irrational.

Therefore, if I base my morals on rational justifications, then consistency is a requirement. If I base my morals on irrational justifications, then consistency gets thrown out the window. "God says that unjustified killing is bad" is substantively equivalent to "God says that unjustified killing is good" because they're both irrational and hence consistency can't provide any distinction between them.

There is no real basis for that consistancy.

Without consistency, you've got irrationality. That's the real basis for consistency: the fact that humans are, by and large, beings capable of reason and capable of recognizing the need for reason. Religion, on the other hand, is notoriously inconsistent due to the fact that it's irrational. Religious culture has nothing to do with consistency.

I don't know if it is more irrational to believe that a higher power created the universe or to believe that it just created itself out of nothing.

I don't know either. That's why I don't believe in either.

Moral consistancy and cultural relativism are, by nature, the result of our particular culture.

I'll agree that cultural relativism is a result of our particular culture (that's pretty much the definition of cultural relativism, after all), but human reason (and hence human consistency) is culturally independent.

The basis of right and wrong is the idea that there are consequences to one's actions.

The basis of right and wrong is the idea that one ought to be righteous and not wicked--the carrot and stick are only thrown in for those who are weak-willed. You decide what kind of life you want to live, and you live it. By and large, people recognize that in order to live a good life they need to be a good person (primarily, I suspect, from their innate sense of reason). You only need carrots and sticks for the people who are too irrational or short-sighted to understand this.

It is the belief that he does that has spawned the morality.

Even if this were the case, then why is belief in God still a requirement if society has taken God's place in wielding the carrots and sticks?

It is called socialization. Indocrinations and taboos are just your way of labeling what a society decides is right and wrong.

Indoctrinations and taboos are my way of labelling what a society irrationally decides is right and wrong. If the answer to the question "Why is [insert "crime" here] wrong" is "Because it is taboo" (or some substantively equivalent response), then that is an insufficient and irrational justification for why the "crime" is wrong. The problem is that when you've had an indoctrination or taboo around long enough, people eventually decide that irrationality is a-ok with them. "It's taboo? Oh well then, I'd better not do it."

Revenge is a type of justice.

It's a type of punishment, not a type of justice. In no way is it justice to inflict cruelty in such a self-serving manner. Justice is about doing what is right, about upholding morality. Revenge is about doing what feels good, about debasing oneself and society as a whole for self-gratification.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Kramerman
I am not dissmissing rehibilitation.

It sure looked that way. I read that to say "Don't try to reform murderers, because then they'll want to commit murder."

The statement in question
Reform!? If someone could murder someone with the knowledge that they could be 'reformed' and put back in the streets, they might do so.

You were making it out like rehabilitation would increase the murder rate.

In that statement I was merely saying that rehiblitaion in prison is not a deterant for murderers, unlike the death penalty, wich is a major deterent for murderers.

Read what you said. You said that rehabilitation would make it more likely for someone to commit murder. That's not saying that it's not a deterrent, that's saying that it's the opposite of a deterrent.

Reread that statement with an open mind, instead of a apiteful one so you can support your frivolous arguements, and you will see what I said.

For God's sake, man, read what you're writing! You said that reform would increase the murder rate. I don't know how else your statement can be interpreted.

I dunno why it is so hard for you to believe that the US prison system is not hard on criminals at all, and barely serves as a deterant of crime.

I can't believe you've led such an insular life that you can't understand how much crap goes on in prison.

I can't be arsed to go traipsing around the internet finding articles, so I just picked up this article, this article, and this article off of the front of the USA page on the Amnesty International website. A google search for "prison reform" ought to yield some results if you are at all interested in enlightening yourself.

Why you think hard labor would be HELLISH is beyond me.

It's essentially torture.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by nationalist
Do you think that all of morality derives simply from the "I won't do it to them because I don't want them to do it to me" situation?

Not all of it, but certainly most of it.

This type of morality seems very easy to circumvent. How easily does it evolve into "I'm going to do it to them before they can do it to me" situation?

They're very different situations, so I don't see how the first naturally leads into the second. "Morality" and "preemptive strikes" don't exactly go hand in hand...

There is no backbone to it , no ultimate authority that one can depend on when one faces a dilemma.

An appeal to rational consistency is often all that you need to deal with a dilemma. Things get a bit more complicated when two (or more) people aren't on the same page WRT consistency, i.e. if person A consistently adheres to rational behavior type 1 and person B consistently adheres to rational behavior type 2, where type 1 behavior is mutually exclusive to type 2 behavior. However, with something like unjustified killing, it is fair to say that all rational parties are on the same page WRT consistency, i.e. nobody wants to be unjustly deprived of their life.

I think that the idea is fairly sound, but it still stands on the foundation of religion.

Religion usually doesn't require internal consistency or rationality.

Even if the God doesn't actually exist, the belief that the God exists gives people more certainty, makes them think twice about violating their moral code when they face a problem.

This is only a requirement if the person's moral code was arrived at irrationally, i.e. "don't do [insert "crime"] because it is taboo." If the person's moral code was arrived at rationally, i.e. "don't do [insert crime] because it violates the Golden Rule," then carrots and sticks aren't necessary for dilemma resolution.

Any enrichment that he has contributed to his society is negated by the lost creative potential of the victim.

Depriving society of potential enrichment to avenge the death of somebody's lost ability to potentially enrich society seems pretty futile. Reasoning like this is what resulted in the saying, "If 'an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth' is the rule of law, then all you get is a society full of citizens without eyes and teeth."

Loinburger was doing it to everyone.

I was putting words in everybody's mouth? You mean like when I "misinterpreted" Kramerman saying that he wanted to torture somebody? Or like when I "misinterpreted" you when you said "If you aren't outraged by his crime then you are the sick ****" WRT Che's outrage at everybody's willingness to torture murderers? Maybe I wouldn't "put words in people's mouths" if they didn't post things that they don't even mean.

Loinburger appears to do the same thing. He put words in my mouth, assuming that I thought that you were pro-murder or something silly like that.

You were asserting that Che wasn't properly outraged at murderers by virtue of the fact that he is opposed to torture, which was a pretty lousy assertion on your part. Then you were offended by some hyperbole. C'est la vie.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by Kramerman
*sigh* Do you read through my posts? Or do you just read certain things to try and spite me? I clearly wrote that laws need to be made to protect a society and everyone who lives in that society from harm.

You wrote no such thing. You wrote:

The statement in question:
You must base laws on what betters society in that societies general view of betterment.

A society's general view of betterment could very easily incorporate the repression or even extermination of a minority. There was nothing about protecting everyone who lives in the society from harm that I saw (unless you contradicted yourself somewhere, because "general view of betterment" does not automatically mean "everyone who lives in the society is protected from harm").

DID SLAVES NOT LIVE IN A SOCIETY? Of course they did. Slavery is obviously very harmful and unjustified against almost all. Therefore laws need to be made to protect thse members of society
from unjustified harm.

What if the majority of the society's members think that slaves are property and may be treated as any other property? Why would their "general view of betterment" be incorrect?

Hold on a sec. You can very much so redifine arbitrarlily the definitions of good and evil.

Nope, you've got to remain internally consistent with your definitions, and your definitions also have to adhere to the objective definitions within language. If I were to pick up a rotten orange and say "This orange is good for sating one's hunger because it is rotten and will cause whoever eats it to get sick and possibly die," then I will have misapplied the term "good" in that sentence.

It is ver ignorant to think otherwise. An alien race on another planet could verywell find murder, thefy, lying, and everything else the 10 commandment frobid to be holy. TO THEM THAT IS GOOD!

They're not changing the definition of the word, they're merely applying the word to things that we would not. This hypothetical alien race feels that murder, theft, and lying are desirable and righteous, therefore they can apply the term "good" to them.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Kramerman
Here is what I said:

That is too true... such bastards are probably deserving of torture. Death is a cake walk compared to what I would do if put in a room with a sicko like that...

'They are probably deserving of torture'... hmm... that doesnt sound like I want to mercilessly torture them, does it? But wait, there is more...

'Death is probably a cake walk compared to what I would do to them' ... I see.

Even with the words you wrote right in front of you, you cannot admit what you wrote. You had to add the word "probably." I'm sorry, you didn't use the word probably. "Death is a cake walk compared to what I would do if put in a room with a sicko like that." There is no "probably" in that sentence. You are stating that given the chance, you would do worse than death to them.

I was refering to roughing them up abit in a brawl - not torture - but me roughing anyone up in a brawl is just fantasy.

I took you at your word. I don't know about you, but death is definately not a cake walk to being roughed up a little bit. I'll take a beating over death any day. Hell, you can break my arms and legs, stick a plunger up my ass and beat me 'till Tuesday if it's that or death. I have a low pain threshhold, but a beating wouldn't have me begging to die.

Now, the fact that you claim to be incapable of performing the actions doesn't mean much. Goebbels was a meely little squid of a man, and look what he accomplished. Just because a murderer could probably eat for breakfast doesn't mean that you would be incapable of doing unspeakable things to him. Most torture victims are restrained, so your safety isn't a factor. More important was you saying that you really didn't mean it. I'm glad. Only truly disturbed individuals could do that to someone else, regardless of whether "such bastards are probably deserving of torture."

But I'm not arguing with whether or not you meant it, you already admitted you didn't mean it. What I was arguing with since then was nationalist's mischaraterizations of what I wrote. nationalist made up in his own little mind what I thought and ran with it. Since the argument was about you originally, some things needed to be cleared up for him.

[Kramerman]

Even with the words you wrote right in front of you, you cannot admit what you wrote. You had to add the word "probably." I'm sorry, you didn't use the word probably. "Death is a cake walk compared to what I would do if put in a room with a sicko like that." There is no "probably" in that sentence. You are stating that given the chance, you would do worse than death to them.

wtf? probably is right there in front of your face

such bastards are probably deserving of torture.

EDIT: I noticed the second probably that you were refering to. I was retyping that sentence by hand. I must have sub-consciously inserted that second probably because the word was on my mind after trying to emphasize it in the first part to show you my non-seriousness. But no matter. It was purely an accident, that second probably should not be there, you are quite right.

[chequita guevara]

Never argue with a master debater.

[FlameFlash]

EDIT: Flameflash, after rereading yourpost, I dont really know what you are trying to say/ask? Something about how the culture of the world would think poorly on the DP (If this is what you were trying to say, I am sorry but that is not true. A majority of the world population lives in societies that justify the DP) by some arguements. To what arguements are you refering? It is not my arguement I am quite sure, and if it is then either you misunderstood what I wrote or I just did a really poor job writing that post, which is probably more likely, because you wouldnt have been the first to misunderstand

*sighs*

You guys are all talking over my head now, actually... I probably misread your post, however a majority of the "civilized" countries don't support it... that's the community of the world that the US is supposed to be a part of, I'd thought.

I'll try and continue to follow this, because I do find it interesting, but you guys are most certainly my better on debating this kind of stuff.

My head hurts now...

Let me guess, che... you did ethical debate?

<-- Policy debater here... probably why I'm sucking it up in getting a grasp on what's going on.

[loinburger]

Originally posted by FlameFlash
*sighs*

Don't back down from a good point. I mean, heck, you pointed out about the biggest criticism of cultural relativism, namely "which culture's justice system is the best?" Like you said, the world community that the US is supposedly a part of by and large is against CP, which would either mean that the US has a better justice system than every other like-minded culture or that the US has a justice system that is fifty to a hundred years behind those of like-minded cultures (and, this being a good instance in which the majority rules, the latter is the more likely scenario). If a nation is going to spread its culture around the place, it first had better make damn sure that it's a culture worth spreading.