People who commit violent crimes are mentally unstable. This includes serial rapists, murderers, etc. etc. etc. Some of you even used the word "sick" to describe pedophiles. And that is absolutely correct, they are sick. Now, the question is, how should society respond to this sickness?

My basic point is that mental illness should be treated. If it cannot be cured (which, as Rebecca points out, is often the case) then the mentally ill person should be locked up away from society in an institution. Not a prison, but a mental health facility.

I do not support capital punishment, nor do I support lifetime encarceration in prisons that only exacerbate the problem by a) traumatizing inmates, and b) giving them access to others of their kind, learning new tricks.

My position is very idealistic, and will never be accepted in society because people are generally vindictive. Violent crime is met with revenge. An eye for an eye, and all that. Of course, if someone did something evil to one of my loved ones, I would want revenge, too, and I might even take the law into my own hands. It's human nature. But that don't make it right.

i think i just died of boredom

Dutch - I hear ya, but I'm not sure who you're suggesting even started to act as though they were OK with child molesters??? I for one just think the level of penalty should be harsher for someone actually touching a child than for someone looking at porn online.


Also: I fully understand the desire to, say, rip off the nads off the bastard and shove them down his (or her) throat whilst ramming a red-hot poker up their ass.

I do.

Over time, EVERY SINGLE PERSON I have loved - family, friends, relationships -(except my sister) has ended up telling me about their history of sexual abuse, assault, and mental abuse (mostly at the hands of family members). I can't *begin* to imagine the depth of feeling I would have if I was a mother.



I understand wanting the blood of these sick sons-of-bitches as retribution (though obviously nothing can ever make it better).


But- talking to all of these people, and- on a related note- seeing reactions of victims' families to executions of people on Death Row... There are so many times that it's true that the people MOST affected are the first to- maybe not forgive, but to be willing to move on with LIFE, not become part of the cycle of destruction - I think that should be paid more mind.


"If I was personally touched by violent crime, my impulse would be to respond with violence." -Yo

Hell yeah, just reading about this shit makes me want to go perpetrate some damn violence!

But.

" But this only perpetuates the cycle of evil."
-Yo

People are not disposable. We need to stop acting as though they are.

I know, I know, it's too idealistic to imagine that things could change for the better, to suggest that if people got help at the beginning (say, if CPS could have had the manpower/ authority to step in back when little Billy was "playing our special game" with grandpa, before he started teaching sis, before there was "that incident" at school) - to suggest that instead of turning a blind eye to something that seems wrong but "isn't my business" more people need to be involved - to suggest that maybe people being increasingly treated like numbers, like paperwork -or like some TV show - instead of HUMANS is warping and dehumanizing people in ways we haven't even begun to explore yet....

Yeah, it's too froofy, too idealistic, too- whatever.

But if the option is TRYING to make a difference now or, on the other end, just KILLING people that have become bent and broken, well- fuck that.

"Well, it's too late for these people."

Yeah, but all we're doing is sending the message that people are disposable - that as soon as they stop working right they're only so much trash...

How is that supposed to help DETER people who either already feel that way about other people, so it's just enforced that they're *right* to be sociopathic, or that feel that way about themselves, enforcing that they're *right* about being worthless, so what difference does it make if they just do this thing...

Saying "the world doesn't work like that" is true but a little disingenuous.

The world *should* work like that, but if everyone gives up and gives in to the Disposable Culture, how CAN it change? It needs people to re-learn to help people, to share love with others (365 days a year, not just, say, 1 week a year in the desert), to *listen* when someone is trying to reach out for help...

And not be so damn quick to condemn so many people to DIE.

Yes, they ARE people- they're broken, twisted, warped- but they're humans.

If you're not willing (and you wouldn't know for sure, not really, unless the chance arose) to talk to the person, to look him in the eye, to kill him yourself because you believe that causing another human to *cease existence* is the only way to better the world, well then.

Don't be an armchair murderer.