# Arizona to use Zyklon B to kill prisoners **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 3, 2021, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561 "2021-06-03T19:11:44Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/41 "2021-06-04T02:32:56Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > All that accomplishes is to grievously insult the memory of Holocaust victims, minimizing the horror of what happened and equating Holocaust victims with murderers. > > It’s grotesque insensitivity along the lines of what antivaxers do when they display yellow stars of David with the words “Not Vaccinated”. “Not being allowed to go into a Walmart is like being murdered by the government with poisonous gas!” is a ridiculous comparison. “Being murdered by government with poisonous gas is like being murdered by the government with poisonous gas!” is… somewhat less so. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/42 "2021-06-04T02:34:37Z")
The guillotine is quick, effective, and mostly painless. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/43 "2021-06-04T02:35:43Z")
Would you then accept the DP by that? ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/44 "2021-06-04T02:37:29Z")
Are you saying that a legal execution is _murder_? The Nazis also executed criminals. No one cares about them. It was the fact that they killed _innocents._ ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/45 "2021-06-04T02:43:06Z")
In the highly unlikely scenario that I were to ever do something meriting the death penalty, I suppose I’d prefer being guillotined to a gas chamber or lethal injection. ---
**Author:** ![lobotomyboy63](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobotomyboy63/32/2900_2.png) [@lobotomyboy63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lobotomyboy63)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/46 "2021-06-04T02:47:58Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > What method _is_ humane, then? @Smapti beat me to it. If minimizing the length of time suffering is the yardstick, I once saw a video that said the guillotine is pretty quick. > I’m so afraid of crime because they’ve legalized it now. Do you remember and this was a while ago but do you remember that 560 pound criminal who was released from jail, Jojo? He was released from jail because he had asthma so jail was bad for him? Who made up this rule? I thought that was the whole idea was that jail was at least supposed to be a _little_ bit bad for you. Apparently not anymore. Apparently now it’s like “Sorry, got claustrophobia, can’t go, wish I could, sorry!” “Electric chair? No way, even a heating pad gives me a rash!” ~Paula Poundstone ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/47 "2021-06-04T02:50:36Z")
> [@BigT](#): > > The point of referencing the Xyklon B is that the general public knows how inhumane that was to use that pesticide to kill humans. I don’t think the main reason the Holocaust is seen as evil was because of the method chosen to kill people. The Holocaust was evil because it targeted people who did not deserve to be killed by any method. ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 2:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/48 "2021-06-04T02:57:22Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Look, be honest and say “The Death Penalty, no matter how you do it- is wrong”. Coming with with _this_ method is nazi, _that_ method is inhumane, etc is disingenuous. > > Say what you mean. This is a pattern I see of many opponents of various things these days, not just the death penalty - they can’t bring themselves to just flat-out say, “I oppose X, period,” so they resort to criticizing each proposal for enacting X whenever it is floated, each time nitpicking on some specific detail, but never in fact describing any set of conditions under which X _would_ be suitable or acceptable to them. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 3:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/49 "2021-06-04T03:05:27Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > “Not being allowed to go into a Walmart is like being murdered by the government with poisonous gas!” is a ridiculous comparison. “Being murdered by government with poisonous gas is like being murdered by the government with poisonous gas!” is… somewhat less so. I think the better analogy is _“Being murdered by the government with poisonous gas because I killed a hostage while robbing a convenience store is like being murdered by the government with poisonous gas because they don’t like the religion I practice.”_ I feel this analogy better reflects what some people see as significant moral differences between executions in Arizona and executions in Nazi Germany. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 3:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/50 "2021-06-04T03:50:15Z")
> [@bump](#): > > It’s terrible; if anything the fact that the Nazis chose it means it must have been extra inhumane. I would bet the humanity or inhumanity was not a factor considered. At first prisoners were simply shot. This proved too slow and also distressing for the executioners. Next were the [gas vans](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_van), box trucks with a sealed compartment in the back. The victims would be loaded into the compartment and enroute the driver would admit carbon monoxide, either the truck’s exhaust or from cylinders, so the victims were dead by the time the van arrived at the burial ground. These also proved less than ideal. The compartments were not sound proof and the victims could take as long as twenty minutes to die. A better method was needed. The gas chambers were meant to be quicker and able to handle larger numbers. What happened to the victims was of no account – after all in Nazi eyes they weren’thuman. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/51 "2021-06-04T04:02:13Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > This is a pattern I see of many opponents of various things these days, not just the death penalty - they can’t bring themselves to just flat-out say, “I oppose X, period,” so they resort to criticizing each proposal for enacting X whenever it is floated, each time nitpicking on some specific detail, but never in fact describing any set of conditions under which X _would_ be suitable or acceptable to them. That’s not my approach. My position is the death penalty is wrong, period. Using a method of execution implemented by the Nazis is simply an additional factor in this particular case. Content? ---
**Author:** ![UltraVires](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/ecccb3/32.png) [@UltraVires](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UltraVires)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/52 "2021-06-04T04:11:56Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > My position is the death penalty is wrong, period. Using a method of execution implemented by the Nazis is simply an additional factor in this particular case. I understand your position on the death penalty and that is a perfectly reasonable opinion. However your second quoted sentence contains no logic at all. As has been pointed out several times in this thread, the method of execution that the Nazis used is not “extra” evil in any sense. What made the Nazis evil is that they killed people who didn’t deserve to be killed by any method. The Nazis used all kinds of tools to implement their horrors: guns, trains, trucks. The list is endless. I just don’t see the logical connection that makes a method of execution worse than other methods simply because the Nazis used it. As I said, I understand and respect that you believe that any method of execution is bad. But why is this “extra” bad? ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/53 "2021-06-04T04:39:15Z")
The Nazis were the most evil group imaginable in modern history. Anything that they thought was a good thing is inherently suspect. In particular, anything they thought was a good way to kill large numbers of citizens is automatically bad in my opinion. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/54 "2021-06-04T04:45:09Z")
Bombs, machine guns, tanks, artillery, rifles, rockets… ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/55 "2021-06-04T04:47:09Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Note that Cyanide has been used in the USA before, so the SS reference is unfair. I take it just the opposite. Even if the US used to do something, that then was appropriated and used by the Nazis to kill people, that should force a reexamination of its use. Otherwise, you’re saying that if it was used in the US before the war, that blessed its use by the Nazis. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/56 "2021-06-04T04:48:27Z")
> [@Northern\_Piper](#): > > I take it just the opposite. Even if the US used to do something, that then was appropriated and used by the Nazis to kill people, that should force a reexamination of its use. So, the Army should not use machine guns? Or Tanks? Bombs? ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/57 "2021-06-04T04:57:45Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > The Nazis also executed criminals. No one cares about them. I would disagree. Once the Nazification of the German courts was complete, the courts were simply an arm of the party, to implement the party’s goals. The nazified courts were in no way fair or honest, and in fact perverted the rule of law. Based on research I did ( a long time ago now, admittedly), I would say that no conviction by a nazified court was fair or trustworthy. No sentence could be presumed to be just. In the Nazi courts, anyone brought before the court was automatically a criminal. The fact that the state brought them to court established that automatically. The fact that they used certain means of execution on “criminals” convicted by the Nazi courts doesn’t somehow bless that means of killing citizens. De-nazification of the court system was a major concern, post-WWII, precisely because people were concerned about the individuals who had been convicted of criminal offences by the nazified courts. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 10:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/58 "2021-06-04T10:39:23Z")
> [@Jackmannii](#): > > It is possible to make a case against the use of asphyxiating gas like hydrogen cyanide to execute killers (something done by multiple states in the past such as California) without stupid and offensive references to Nazi Germany. Hydrogen cyanide is NOT “asphyxiating”. It is poison. It is sometimes described as suffocating cells from within, but that’s not the same as simply depriving a body of oxygen, as pure nitrogen would do. There is ample evidence that hydrogen cyanide can lead to a painful, suffering death before it finally kills whereas people who die from too much nitrogen slip into unconsciousness and die. I am opposed to the death penalty but if the government is going to kill people I’d rather it be done with minimal pain and distress. > [@Jackmannii](#): > > All that accomplishes is to grievously insult the memory of Holocaust victims, minimizing the horror of what happened and equating Holocaust victims with murderers. I’m not making that leap - part of the horror of the Holocaust is that the victims were innocent and treated like criminals/murderers. I don’t see that getting lost here. > [@Jackmannii](#): > > It’s grotesque insensitivity along the lines of what antivaxers do when they display yellow stars of David with the words “Not Vaccinated”. No comparison. For one thing, hydrogen cyanide under the brand name Zyklon B actually was the gas used at the death camps. It was the “Nazi gas”. Newsflash: the Hindenburg was a Nazi zeppelin. Also invented by Nazis were the Volkswagen Beetle, Fanta soda, anechoic tiles, Jagermeister, Olympic torch relays, methadone, and jet airplanes. These are all matters of historical fact and labeling them Nazi in origin is not inaccurate or hyperbole. We still use all those things. For that matter, we still use hydrogen cyanide, both in the US and other places, although most places are resistant to the old brand name and have re-named it. For another the current misuse of the yellow star of David is by spoiled brats who haven’t a clue what real oppression is, and thus is a re-writing of history and appropriation of someone else’s suffering for personal gain, which is the real offense there. > [@Velocity](#): > > What’s so special about gas? I dunno - maybe the use of something that is supposedly barred from use in warfare is maybe something we shouldn’t be using in state-sponsored executions? There’s also the “slowly choking and gagging to death” aspect. That’s pretty damn awful. As I said - I’m opposed to the death penalty, but if the government insists on doing it despite my objections I’d rather it be done with minimum pain and distress. Hydrogen cyanide is not a pleasant way to go, based on past evidence from both state executions and certain extremely distasteful practices in WWII. Nitrogen, on the other hand, is apparently not painful and just as certain. > [@DrDeth](#): > > What method _is_ humane, then? Well, there’s an argument that none are… but even anti-death penalty me thinks that is not correct. Lethal injection should be… but because trained medical personnel in the US refuse to participate in executions, and many if not all states would strip them of their license if they did so, instead of people who actually know how to do this properly we get poorly trained, inexperienced amateurs administering drugs. Of course there are screw-ups! And, of course, the US doesn’t seem eager to set up a profession/industry of trained and licensed executioners who learn how to do it properly. > [@Velocity](#): > > Is gas execution really that better if done with some other insecticide? Nope. They’re basically all nerve agents, or they interfere with biochemistry like hydrogen cyanide does. > [@Velocity](#): > > I mean, you could probably find some chemical that causes the exact amount of suffering as Zyklon B, but just without the unsavory name. There is not supposed to be any suffering in state-sponsored executions, hence the search for more humane methods of killing human beings. > [@DrDeth](#): > > So we should not arm our army with guns as the nazis shot many during the Holocaust? One distinction between poison gas and guns in regards to Nazis: Like everyone else, Nazis used guns and bullets on the battlefield. They did NOT, however, use poison gas on the battlefield - apparently Hitler had had first-hand experience with being gassed in WWI. It was fine for killing “vermin” like cockroaches and people the Nazis viewed as human vermin. Nazis used a weapon they considered too horrible for warfare to slaughter innocent human beings. THAT is the horror and offense there, and demonstrates that the Nazis viewed large categories of human beings as they viewed lice, fleas, and cockroaches. We do not view people on death row as insects. Sure, we might call them scum and vermin, but we’re not systematically starving/working them to death, they are clothed, fed, provided sanitary facilities, access to lawyers and appeals… they may not be human beings we like, but we are treating them as human beings. Thus the search for a means of execution that is humane and minimizes cruelty and suffering. So there is a significant difference there. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Look, be honest and say “The Death Penalty, no matter how you do it- is wrong”. Coming with with _this_ method is nazi, _that_ method is inhumane, etc is disingenuous. I agree with this. > [@DrDeth](#): > > Are you saying that a legal execution is _murder_ ? There actually are people who hold that position. It’s not a common viewpoint in the US but it does and has existed a long time. > [@DrDeth](#): > > The Nazis also executed criminals. No one cares about them. It was the fact that they killed _innocents._ Given that some of the “crimes” for which the Nazis executed people ranged from “petty” to “not crimes before or since that regime” it’s probably unfair to say no one cared about them. Political dissidents, gentiles who had sex with Jews, communists, socialists, homosexuals, and pacifists were all criminals under the Nazis and were convicted and sent to camps where a lot of them died, too. The Nazis killed five to six million people who weren’t Jews as well as the millions of Jews. > [@DesertDog](#): > > The compartments were not sound proof and the victims could take as long as twenty minutes to die. A better method was needed. The gas chambers were meant to be quicker and able to handle larger numbers. What happened to the victims was of no account – after all in Nazi eyes they weren’thuman. The big gas chambers at places like Auschwitz weren’t soundproof, either, but they also weren’t being driven through the streets of a city where the noise could cause distress to on-lookers, they were way out in the middle of nowhere (sort of) where no one who cared could hear the screams. And the big gas chambers didn’t kill any quicker than the vans, and possibly took longer in some cases. It wasn’t unknown for workers to open the big chambers to remove the bodies and finding one or two still breathing. Then there was the whole clawing at the walls thing, and outbreaks of violence among the people being gassed before they were incapacitated. The camps were “better” only because of the mechanized efficiency of death and cremation, and it didn’t disturb the neighbors. They sure as hell were worse for those sent there either as prisoners/slaves or to die. ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 11:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/59 "2021-06-04T11:50:15Z")
> [@Broomstick](#): > > Given that some of the “crimes” for which the Nazis executed people ranged from “petty” to “not crimes before or since that regime” it’s probably unfair to say no one cared about them Agreed. It’s simply not accurate to say that no-one cared about what the nazified courts did with “criminals”. The US occupying authority was concerned enough to put several judges on trial for the crimes they committed while wearing their robes: > **[Judges' Trial](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judges%27_Trial)** > > .mw-parser-output .geo-default,.mw-parser-output .geo-dms,.mw-parser-output .geo-dec{display:inline}.mw-parser-output .geo-nondefault,.mw-parser-output .geo-multi-punct,.mw-parser-output .geo-inline-hidden{display:none}.mw-parser-output .longitude,.mw-parser-output .latitude{white-space:nowrap}49°27.2603′N 11°02.9103′E / 49.4543383°N 11.0485050°E / 49.4543383; 11.0485050 > The Judges' Trial (German: Juristenprozess; or, the Justice Trial, or, officially, The United States of America vs. Josef A... The movie “Judgment at Nuremberg” was a fictionalised account of those trials. And then there was the “People’s’ Court” which was pure nazism in action: > **[People's Court (Germany)](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/People%27s_Court_(Germany))** > > The People's Court (German: Volksgerichtshof .mw-parser-output .IPA-label-small{font-size:85%}.mw-parser-output .references .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .infobox .IPA-label-small,.mw-parser-output .navbox .IPA-label-small{font-size:100%}pronounced \[ˈfɔlksɡəˌʁɪçt͡shoːf\] ⓘ, acronymed to VGH) was a Sondergericht ("special court") of Nazi Germany, set up outside the operations of the constitutional frame of law. Its headquarters were originally located in the former Prussian House of Lords in B... ---
**Author:** ![Gyrate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gyrate/32/3588_2.png) [@Gyrate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gyrate)\ **Post date:** [June 4, 2021, 12:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561/60 "2021-06-04T12:11:06Z")
> [@crowmanyclouds](#): > > Have you been the Pit where we’ve established that Republicans are worse than Nazis . . . because global warming. A.k.a. “killing people with lethal gas”. It takes a lot longer, but in the long run the death toll is higher. (I kid - “global warming” is a ridiculous reason to compare Republicans and Nazis. “Far-right authoritarian regimes violently opposed to liberalism and democracy who promote theories of racial superiority” is a better metric. Not to mention the whole “supporters marching in the streets with Nazi flags” thing.) Back on topic: I agree that the association with the Nazis is not an excuse to avoid using a gas that was widely used before and after the Holocaust for legal executions. The fact that it’s a horrific death is a much better reason. If it is agreed that they must die, let it be humanely, if only for our own sake. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/arizona-to-use-zyklon-b-to-kill-prisoners/943561.md?page=4)