(January 11, 2017 at 9:24 am)FatAndFaithless Wrote: The guy is an unrepentant piece of scum, but I'm still against the death penalty. We (should) make laws based on what's effective, humane, and reasonable, not based on feelings of vengeance or personal emotion, which seem to be the only arguments I hear in favor of the death penalty.
BINGO,
The rise of fear and revenge has a long hand going back. I think lots of that came about because of high profile serial killer cases like Bundy and the murder of Adam Walsh back in the early 80s. Then you had the rise of "America's Most Wanted" and shows like Nancy Grace.
It isn't that we should not have a free press reporting crime, of course we should. But the sensationalism bombarding the public poisons attitudes of objectivity long term. It can cause law to be over zealous as well as potential jurors going in wanting revenge instead of the right thing, which is merely fact finding.
Even one of the family members said about the Roof case, "It is a hollow victory and won't bring my loved one back".
We have too much poverty, both rural and urban, lack of livable wages, too many non violent people who end up going into meat grinder prisons only to come out worse than they came in. Too much demonizing of those with mental health issues, and yes I will say it again, a flooded gun market that does not stop mostly suicides in the home and mostly domestic violence in the home, and accidental deaths in the home.
But, as long as we allow this GOP gerrymandered map, and allow that party to hold our nation hostage, we will keep having events like this, be they race based shootings, mentally ill, terrorist or work place grudge.
