Atheist and the Death penalty

[Napoléon]

Is there a common view among Atheist about the Death Penalty? 

I dunno, is there a common view among 'atheist' about cheese?

What does one have to do with the other?

[Ravenshire]

What does give me pause about the Death Penality is this: that there are people who are up for the death penalty that have been found to be innocent, mostly through the work of The Innocence Project. So, I would support that The Innocence Project work with every person on death row prior to execution, to ensure that nothing has been overlooked for them.

Putting innocent people to death is not good.

And yet, it's inevitable in our "justice" system. The death penalty is not a deterrent to any crime for which it is applied as a punishment nor does it serve any function to rehabilitate the convicted. It is, essentially, a legalized system of revenge and serves no purpose in a just legal system.

[Javaman]

What does give me pause about the Death Penality is this: that there are people who are up for the death penalty that have been found to be innocent, mostly through the work of The Innocence Project. So, I would support that The Innocence Project work with every person on death row prior to execution, to ensure that nothing has been overlooked for them.

Putting innocent people to death is not good.

And yet, it's inevitable in our "justice" system. The death penalty is not a deterrent to any crime for which it is applied as a punishment nor does it serve any function to rehabilitate the convicted. It is, essentially, a legalized system of revenge and serves no purpose in a just legal system.

Not only is it not a deterrent, but states without the death penalty have lower murder rates than states that have it. The evidence strongly suggests that if you wish to reduce the number of capital crimes in your jurisdiction, you should immediately abolish the death penalty.

The weird thing is that right wing conservatives are usually the ones in favour of the death penalty; at the same time, they're all about reducing taxes. The evidence plainly shows that applying the death penalty is a remarkably ineffective and inefficient use of tax dollars. So why are so many conservatives in favour of the death penalty? The range of possible answers is getting smaller and smaller.

[Cephus]

Of course, which shows that the majority of atheists are in favor of the death penalty.  Not sure why this is a question at all.

First, this statistic is about the US. Do it in any other country and you get different results. Second, even in the US less people with "no religious preference" (mind that it doesn't say atheist), are in favor of capital punishment than religious people - protestants as well as catholics.

And a pew research poll from this year claims that the overall support dropped to an all time low in the US.

http://www.people-press.org/2015/04/16/l...democrats/

None of which changes anything that I said, a majority of people (more than 50%) support the death penalty.  Spin it however you want, the facts are still the facts.

[Ravenshire]

First, this statistic is about the US. Do it in any other country and you get different results. Second, even in the US less people with "no religious preference" (mind that it doesn't say atheist), are in favor of capital punishment than religious people - protestants as well as catholics.

And a pew research poll from this year claims that the overall support dropped to an all time low in the US.

http://www.people-press.org/2015/04/16/l...democrats/

None of which changes anything that I said, a majority of people (more than 50%) support the death penalty.  Spin it however you want, the facts are still the facts.

So, the majority supports it. Doesn't make it right. The majority supports religion as well.

[ScepticOrganism]

Death penalty = Institutionalized murder

Same function, different name for a barbaric uncivilized behavior.

But consider this little dilemma ( Warning, whats written bellow is quite graphic, and has indeed occurred )

Someone rapes a 5 months old baby countless amounts of times, then proceeds to choke it. The baby does not die, the man frustrated by its resilience, takes a nail and hammers baby's head on the wall.

The man who did this is called Peter Scully. He is currently facing a lifetime in prison.

Should he be executed?

[abaris]

None of which changes anything that I said, a majority of people (more than 50%) support the death penalty.  Spin it however you want, the facts are still the facts.

More than 50 percent in the USA, since these are only US stats.

[Ravenshire]

Death penalty = Institutionalized murder

Same function, different name for a barbaric uncivilized behavior.

But consider this little dilemma ( Warning, whats written bellow is quite graphic, and has indeed occurred )

Someone rapes a 5 months old baby countless amounts of times, then proceeds to choke it. The baby does not die, the man frustrated by its resilience, takes a nail and hammers baby's head on the wall.

The man who did this is called Peter Scully. He is currently facing a lifetime in prison.

Should he be executed?

Is he going to nail any babies to the wall from a prison cell?

[Redbeard The Pink]

The simple answer to your question is no, there's not really a consensus, but I think it's likely that the raw majority (to whatever degree) is probably against it. Personally, I'm against virtually every instance of humans using violence against each other, and I'm especially uncomfortable with the prospect of the government using legitimized force against its citizens in any way. Not only am I not ok with the death penalty, I also think the American prison system is in dire need of reform. Really, our legal system in general is in need of reform; we have the highest proportional prison population of any developed nation. We should not be ok with that.

[Wyrd of Gawd]

The simple answer to your question is no, there's not really a consensus, but I think it's likely that the raw majority (to whatever degree) is probably against it. Personally, I'm against virtually every instance of humans using violence against each other, and I'm especially uncomfortable with the prospect of the government using legitimized force against its citizens in any way. Not only am I not ok with the death penalty, I also think the American prison system is in dire need of reform. Really, our legal system in general is in need of reform; we have the highest proportional prison population of any developed nation. We should not be ok with that.

While it's true that every conceivable act known to man has been, is, or will be illegal somewhere in the US are people in other countries really better behaved than Americans are?  

The main problem in America seems to be that the nuts who run things have severe cases of the Moses complex.  They think that if they could only get another 100 million laws on the books that everything will be perfect.