Debate help?!

[Red Celt]

A moral relativist and utilitarian (among other things) I have no problem with the notion of the State killing some people as punishment,in principle. EG for the rape or murder of a child or murder for personal gain. I say in principle because as far as I am aware there is no legal system on earth which guarantees a safe conviction for ANY crime. However, I think an argument could still be made on utilitarian grounds.

As a liberal, I'm probably on fairly lonely ground when it comes to the death penalty. To me, there are some crimes which just void your right to continue as a member of society - and lifelong incarceration isn't an answer; indeed, lifelong incarceration could be called crueller than the death penalty.

I would need to expand on that, however. For a death sentence to be carried out, there would need to be no doubts whatsoever as to the guilt. The death of a single innocent is too high a price to pay. They would basically need to be caught doing it (on CCTV, perhaps) with no grounds for appeal... but even then, the judiciary would need a level of confidence above and beyond what has been demonstrated in the past.

Anders Behring Breivik would be a good (recent) example. I applaud Norway's liberalism and their refusal to take the path of countries like the USA or UK, where acts of terrorism have resulted in the abandonment of civil liberties... but the end result should have been the death penalty.

Taking a cue from my earlier humorous remark, imagine Muslim-hating Anders being parachuted into a remote part of Afghanistan. He wouldn't be a happy bunny... and, having taken 77 lives, he doesn't deserve to be a happy bunny.