And the Lord said, “Whoever is without sin, cast the first stone.” And people in the crowd started looking ashamed, and some of them dropped the rocks they had picked up, and just generally being embarassed, and then a rock came hurtling out of the crowd, smacked the woman taken in adultry right in the head, and she died.
And the Lord said “Mom! Dammit, Mom!”
What makes me viscerally ill? Reading and hearing people who share my faith *celebrate *a death. I am physically sickened and my faith is shaken by people like FriarTed and the OP.
But then I remember my faith isn’t in Christians themselves.
Even if this asshole was a dangerous animal that needed a bullet in the brain, why would you celebrate when he finally gets put down? Did you cheer when Old Yeller died?
It’s one thing to decide that we need to protect ourselves from predatory killers, and the best way to do that is to kill them before they kill us. It’s another thing to high-five each other when we do it.
I won’t take this killing of a heinous murderer as a chance to excuse our use of the death penalty. We should end capital punishment now. I agree that it is barbaric in this day and age. It is a stain on this country’s honor that we still execute people.
However, I think it would take a constitutional amendment to do so. The feds, in my view, do not have the authority to prevent the states from executing murderers. And too few states will willingly ban capital punishment. However, I can’t see an amendment passing for many decades to come.
I am pleased that Mr. Brewer is no longer able to hurt other people. I am unhappy that the State of Texas chose this particular means of ensuring that he is no longer able to hurt others.
If we don’t kill people for killlng people, how can we show people how wrong it is?
Very well said.
Apparently we don’t really need to be better than that.
I am as strong of a proponent of the death penalty as anyone else on this board and, as such, I believe that justice was served in the case of the heinous crime commited. However, I also find the reactions exhibited by some people in this thread to be demonstrative of among the worst of what humanity has to offer. That is, I believe in the death penalty only because I believe that the deliberate and unjust death of another human being can only justly be punished by that person’s forfeiture of his own life. But it is precisely because I value life as much as I do that I believe that. And so, even though I feel justice was served, I certainly feel no joy whatsoever that it was necessary to end the life of a human being, even one who might perform such a dispicable act, in order to achieve that end.
I can understand feeling some sense of relief, particularly by those who were affected, even indirectly, by the murder, that justice was served and that the matter has reached as much resolution as society can bring to it. I can understand expressing opinions on either side of the matter about the justice and necessity of the execution. But I can not understand any form of joy as it seems to have been expressed here. It is a travesty each and every time that it is necessary to result to the justice system to re-establish balance, whether it is something as large as an execution for a murder, or something relatively trivial like petty theft. Justice is as glaring a sign as any that our society is imperfect and it is not the means by which to correct it, only the means by which to prevent it from getting worse.
And to express such joy would be akin to a parent taking pleasure in disciplining their children, and yet surely no one here would think a parent should feel joy from punishing their children. And even in the recent case of one of the most vile humans, Osama bin Laden, though I, and probably most Americans, felt that his death was justified for his actions, I felt no joy and was equally disgusted by the reactions of so many people.
It is not as much an end to a specific murder, but a call to action for us to take steps to prevent this sort of thing from happening again. And so, this is not a time to celebrate, it is a time to mourn.
You would make Jesus sick.
For the record, I cheered when Old Yeller died. But I had been nursing a Super-Jumbo sized Mr. Pibb ever since the Donald Duck short, and I really had to pee. Old Yeller’s demise was the signal that the movie was almost over, and I would soon be enjoying sweet relief in the Little Boys’ Room.
I for one am happy he is dead.
Wait, are we talking about Catholics now?
Hmmm. I’m not much of a Christian (haven’t been to church in decades) and I’m certainly not a Republican. I’m not cheering about the execution, but I’m certainly not mourning the death of someone like this.
I guess my take is practical rather than vengeful: Someone commits a vicious murder, and we don’t want him loose in society anymore, either because he’s a threat to someone else or simply because we want our society to be as vicious-murderer free as possible. We can lock him up forever, which is costly and takes resources that could perhaps be better spent elsewhere. Or we can execute him and spare ourselves the risk of loosing him into society, as well as the cost of supporting him in better style than many of our more-deserving citizens live.
I don’t think we should dance in the streets, but on the other hand I don’t understand being willing to support forever a vicious animal who committed an unforgivable crime.
(I know, btw, that it costs more to execute someone than to support them in prison forever. But it wouldn’t if people like this were executed in a more timely fashion.)
I don’t know what kind of person this makes me. It’s a difficult position to figure out and I’m always surprised when people are so vehemently for or against something like the death penalty. There are so many things to consider.
“If we don’t kill guilty people for killing innocent people” is a clearer statement.
For those who don’t know the horrendous facts of this crime, here is the wiki on it.
I am definitely pro-death penalty for animals who do shit like this.
Thoroughly cosigned.
Happy Lendervedder, I’m sorry to have lumped you in with Friar Ted and his gleeful viciousness and comedy Jew-baiting when I said “Christian theology” - I know you and many other Christians are pro-life in the actual sense of the word, and I’m sorry you and yours are not the most prominent face of the religion right now.
Along with the rest of your post, very well said.
Will you be the final arbiter of which particular crime is outrageous enough to warrant the death penalty?
No. The court system will.
Do you think that’s worth the certain knowledge that more innocent people will be executed if the courts rush executions? Because I don’t see how that’s in doubt.
Cool enough. Personally, I’d say that an eye for an eye, is the sort of degenerate concept a group of stinking, parasite-laden, bronze-age primitives would think of. But you certainly have a right to want what you want.