The Death Penalty - are you for or against it and why?

[Faith No More]

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He actually didn't 'equate' your beliefs with Nazis. He observed that there were stark similarities between the 'resource' arguments for the death 'penalty' and the justifications used by a number of tyrants to remain in the right when killing scores of hundreds of people. Although I haven't gone back more than 10 posts looking: I think it was you that brought the Nazis into the discussion in the first place. As if they were bad people, evil people, or even cruel. They were people... each with their own beliefs... and plenty of them similar to the beliefs purported by their propaganda machine.

And the arguments are indeed similar. Both of them say 'X is not worth being a part of our society... so we should kill them'. To draw further similarities still: both arguments involve people in this case... and thus it is murder to kill them. Observe:

Criminals are not worth keeping around, so we should kill them.
Jews are not worth keeping around, so we should kill them.

Pretty damn similar. Where they (might) differ is in extent to which the argument is applied and the group of people negatively valued to the point of killing all (or most) of them.

And I might note: I am not so much 'for' the death 'penalty' as I see the people affected as the property of the state. And I strongly encourage my enemies to weaken themselves.

The Silicoid-Meklar fleet employs most of its criminals

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I understand your point and agree it is a slippery slope to deem someone not worth living. Is that a reason to avoid the situation, or to strictly define the parameters of which it should be applied? I guess I would need first hand experience in the legal system to truly answer that.

Again I have to be honest, the more I read yours and Moros' responses, the less sure I am about this issue. In fact, I would say you guys are just short of getting me to reverse my opinion entirely.