# Will Clayton Locketts Torture be the Rosa Parks moment of the Campaign against judicial killing? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 30, 2014, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339 "2014-04-30T05:47:23Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 11
**Author:** ![Peter\_Morris](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/peter_morris/32/359_2.png) [@Peter\_Morris](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peter_Morris)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/201 "2014-04-30T16:01:43Z")
> [@Hector\_St\_Clare](#): > > Revenge is a loaded term, but I’m struggling to see where ‘the Bible’ says that exacting retribution on the offender is a sin. Matthew 5:38-9 _You have heard that it was said, ‘Eye for eye, and tooth for tooth.’ But I tell you, do not resist an evil person. If anyone slaps you on the right cheek, turn to them the other cheek also._ John 8:7 _But when they persisted in asking Him, He straightened up, and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.”_ Romans 12:19 _Don’t seek revenge yourselves, beloved, but give place to God’s wrath. For it is written, “Vengeance belongs to me; I will repay, says the Lord.”_ Just FYI, not that I accept it as literal truth. ---
**Author:** ![Honesty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f04885/32.png) [@Honesty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Honesty)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/202 "2014-04-30T16:16:55Z")
Pjen, I think what you’re doing here is great, but you’re wasting your time. The guy was black and he killed a white woman. The issue is over in most people’s minds. The peanut gallery celebrates vengeance over justice when victims are white but exhibits mild indifference when the victims are black. White people could only spare us 80 or so years before restarting their Tuskegee-esque experiments. The people celebrating his death and the botched execution are not unlike the monsters on _Attack on Titan_. Over the last few weeks, it has never been so clear that white people want us gone. Treating us like some Palestinian step-children and shit. We don’t fire missiles nor we don’t engage in terrorism but still treated like animals. I just wish they’d move forward on a reparation and repatriation package so we can get the hell out of dodge. I move the idea that we should turn death row into mini concentration camps. That way, white people can use death row inmates for life-long experimentation followed by organ harvesting and burning the remains. You can broadcast the human experiments on pay-per-view television and use the proceeds to fix your broken, pot-hole riddled roads and your crumbling bridges that you’ve intentionally neglected for over three decades. - Honesty ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_fun_ball/32/17664_2.png) [@Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Fun_Ball)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/203 "2014-04-30T16:17:26Z")
> [@Pjen](#): > > Nejp, as a slavery opponent, I want to say that you totally dropped the ball in this debate. There are some very convincing arguments against slavery including the removal of children from slave families for sale, but your immediate dismissal of the opponents in the debate as barbaric and uncivilized completely poisoned the well and made any debate impossible. I am opposed to slavery but I immediately had my hackles up when I opened this thread due to your dismissive, condescending, and judgmental stance. Just my opinion… Whatever. Slavery is not an accepted practice in the majority of countries around the globe. Nor is slavery[supported by 60% of the American populace](http://www.gallup.com/poll/165626/death-penalty-support-lowest-years.aspx). Your arguments suck and this thread should be in the pit IMNSHO. ---
**Author:** ![BobLibDem](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/boblibdem/32/3149_2.png) [@BobLibDem](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BobLibDem)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/204 "2014-04-30T16:18:25Z")
> [@Peter\_Morris](#): > > John 8:7 > _But when they persisted in asking Him, He straightened up, and said to them, “He who is without sin among you, let him be the first to throw a stone at her.”_ And immediately a stone flew out from the crowd, killing the woman instantly. And Jesus said, “Really, mother!” Back to the topic: The state has a legitimate interest in preventing killers from killing again. It does not have a legitimate interest in exacting revenge. Imprisonment fulfills the legitimate interest of the state, capital punishment is an appeal to the lesser nature of our being. ---
**Author:** ![Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/happy_fun_ball/32/17664_2.png) [@Happy\_Fun\_Ball](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Happy_Fun_Ball)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/205 "2014-04-30T16:18:26Z")
> [@Honesty](#): > > Pjen, I think what you’re doing here is great, but you’re wasting your time. The guy was black and he killed a white woman. The issue is over in most people’s minds. The peanut gallery celebrates vengeance over justice when victims are white but exhibits mild indifference when the victims are black. White people could only spare us 80 or so years before restarting their Tuskegee-esque experiments. The people celebrating his death and the botched execution are not unlike the monsters on _Attack on Titan_. > > I move the idea that we should turn death row into mini concentration camps. That way, white people can use death row inmates for life-long experimentation followed by organ harvesting and burning the remains. You can broadcast the human experiments on pay-per-view television and use the proceeds to fix your broken, pot-hole riddled roads and your crumbling bridges that you’ve intentionally neglected for over three decades. > > Over the last few weeks, it has never been so clear that white people want us gone. Treating us like some Palestinian step-children and shit. We don’t fire missiles nor we don’t engage in terrorism but still treated like animals. I just wish they’d move forward on a reparation and repatriation package so we can get the hell out of dodge. > > - Honesty Wow. ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/206 "2014-04-30T16:20:20Z")
> [@Honesty](#): > > Pjen, I think what you’re doing here is great, but you’re wasting your time. The guy was black and he killed a white woman. The issue is over in most people’s minds. The peanut gallery celebrates vengeance over justice when victims are white but exhibits mild indifference when the victims are black. White people could only spare us 80 or so years before restarting their Tuskegee-esque experiments. The people celebrating his death and the botched execution are not unlike the monsters on _Attack on Titan_. Over the last few weeks, it has never been so clear that white people want us gone. Treating us like some Palestinian step-children and shit. We don’t fire missiles nor we don’t engage in terrorism but still treated like animals. I just wish they’d move forward on a reparation and repatriation package so we can get the hell out of dodge. > > I move the idea that we should turn death row into mini concentration camps. That way, white people can use death row inmates for life-long experimentation followed by organ harvesting and burning the remains. You can broadcast the human experiments on pay-per-view television and use the proceeds to fix your broken, pot-hole riddled roads and your crumbling bridges that you’ve intentionally neglected for over three decades. > > - Honesty I mentioned up thread that it seems that most victims of judicial killing are black- strange fruit as they used to say. I am white btw. ---
**Author:** ![Honesty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/f04885/32.png) [@Honesty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Honesty)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/207 "2014-04-30T16:21:24Z")
[QUOTE=Love Rhombus] There are certain people who, by their horrific actions, deserve to die. Those examples are not many, but you know them when you see them. The fact that other nations don’t do this is odd to me. We kill bears that eat people and mad dogs-some people are no different. It’s not revenge-it’s safety. [/QUOTE] > [@Pjen](#): > > Excellent example of dehumanisation of people who are obviously fully human. Exactly. They don’t get it! - Honesty ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/208 "2014-04-30T16:25:20Z")
> [@Honesty](#): > > Exactly. They don’t get it! > > - Honesty In my view, all people capable of thought are human and should always be treated as such. Killing will happen, (Wars, self defence, necessity, etc) but this should never be engaged in wantonly. I just happen to value people who are able to control their anti-human drives. Killing a murderer just reduces the State and their supporters to the same moral position as the perpetrator. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/209 "2014-04-30T16:36:29Z")
> [@Honesty](#): > > Pjen, I think what you’re doing here is great, but you’re wasting your time. The guy was black and he killed a white woman. The issue is over in most people’s minds. The peanut gallery celebrates vengeance over justice when victims are white but exhibits mild indifference when the victims are black. White people could only spare us 80 or so years before restarting their Tuskegee-esque experiments. The people celebrating his death and the botched execution are not unlike the monsters on _Attack on Titan_. Over the last few weeks, it has never been so clear that white people want us gone. Treating us like some Palestinian step-children and shit. We don’t fire missiles nor we don’t engage in terrorism but still treated like animals. I just wish they’d move forward on a reparation and repatriation package so we can get the hell out of dodge. > > I move the idea that we should turn death row into mini concentration camps. That way, white people can use death row inmates for life-long experimentation followed by organ harvesting and burning the remains. You can broadcast the human experiments on pay-per-view television and use the proceeds to fix your broken, pot-hole riddled roads and your crumbling bridges that you’ve intentionally neglected for over three decades. > > - Honesty To make sure I understand what you’re saying, when you say “white people” in these two paragraphs, do you mean “all white people”, “most white people”, “some white people”, “conservative white people”, “white people who are racists”, “a few white people”, or something else? ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/210 "2014-04-30T16:45:30Z")
> [@Honesty](#): > > Pjen, I think what you’re doing here is great, but you’re wasting your time. The guy was black and he killed a white woman. > > - Honesty Please. Really, give it a break. I am an equal opportunity proponent of the death penalty and wouldn’t shed a tear for anyone convicted and sentenced for such a crime (even if the execution was “botched”). I resent the broad brush you are painting me with. ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/211 "2014-04-30T16:52:25Z")
> [@iiandyiiii](#): > > To make sure I understand what you’re saying, when you say “white people” in these two paragraphs, do you mean “all white people”, “most white people”, “some white people”, “conservative white people”, “white people who are racists”, “a few white people”, or something else? I am afraid that there is hidden racism in this debate. Any rational person would be concerned about the incarceration and judicial killing rate of African Americans even over the years since the Civil Rights Movement. It has not happened by accident alone. Some people (white or otherwise) support this, others condone or ignore it. I am very aware that when I see people due to be killed by the state in the USA, they are predominantly black. As I said, strange fruit- lynching by the state, conscious or not. Do check the Tuskegee reference! ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/212 "2014-04-30T16:53:26Z")
> [@KarlGauss](#): > > Please. Really, give it a break. > > I am an equal opportunity proponent of the death penalty and wouldn’t shed a tear for anyone convicted and sentenced for such a crime (even if the execution was “botched”). I resent the broad brush you are painting me with. Are you not worried that a disproportionate number of those killed by or due to be killed by the state are lack men who killed white people? ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/213 "2014-04-30T16:56:38Z")
Innocent black people in Tuskegee were intentionally allowed to suffer from untreated syphilis. Black people on death row may be sentenced to death at a higher rate than their peers, but they aren’t (mostly) innocent. It’s not a comparable situation. Most of the people arguing against you in this thread (I included) are death penalty opponents. Some of us (including me) are primarily opposed to the death penalty because it is disproportionally black criminals who are executed. You’re not helping. ---
**Author:** ![KarlGauss](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/karlgauss/32/3713_2.png) [@KarlGauss](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/KarlGauss)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 5:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/214 "2014-04-30T17:01:04Z")
> [@Pjen](#): > > Are you not worried that a disproportionate number of those killed by or due to be killed by the state are lack men who killed white people? Sure I am, and I have posted sentiments to that effect. I am also worried that sadistic killers often escape their due. Just because the death penalty may not be applied equally does not make it follow that it should be abandoned. (Are you saying you’re ok with it if it’s applied without discrimination?) ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/215 "2014-04-30T17:03:29Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Innocent black people in Tuskegee were intentionally allowed to suffer from untreated syphilis. Black people on death row may be sentenced to death at a higher rate than their peers, but they aren’t (mostly) innocent. It’s not a comparable situation. > > Most of the people arguing against you in this thread (I included) are death penalty opponents. Some of us (including me) are primarily opposed to the death penalty because it is disproportionally black criminals who are executed. You’re not helping. It is trying to frame it so that people can see it as a similar moral issue to slavery or torture and other extreme moral failings of recent society. I am not against it because black people are unfairly killed. I am against it because human beings are unfairly killed. Arguing even with people who have a mild distaste for the death penalty misses the point that it is a moral issue. It is like arguing with Apartheid era white South African, or Racial Bigots in the South before the Civil rights Act, or people who defend Fascism and Nationalism - people do not see it as in a context of the importance of treating humans as humans. Orwell had it well: "George Orwell, while in the Burmese police, watched a prisoner walking to the gallows, and later wrote: “When I saw the prisoner step aside to avoid the puddle, I saw the mystery, the unspeakable wrongness, of cutting a life short when it is in full tide … his brain still remembered, foresaw, reasoned – reasoned even about puddles.” ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/216 "2014-04-30T17:04:30Z")
> [@KarlGauss](#): > > Sure I am, and I have posted sentiments to that effect. > > I am also worried that sadistic killers often escape their due. Judicial killing is not their due; incapacitation is. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 5:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/217 "2014-04-30T17:05:47Z")
Do we prohibit slavery and torture today because they are _morally_ wrong, you think? Or is there a more fundamental reason? ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/218 "2014-04-30T17:06:05Z")
This piece shows the harm it does to the people who carry out these killings. Here is a man who committed judicial killings and he now calls them murders: > **[Electric chair haunts US former executions chief](https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-26273051)** > > Why Dr Allen Ault, a man who once administered capital punishment in the US Deep South, is campaigning against the death penalty. ---
**Author:** ![iiandyiiii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/iiandyiiii/32/7924_2.png) [@iiandyiiii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/iiandyiiii)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 5:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/219 "2014-04-30T17:06:32Z")
> [@Pjen](#): > > I am afraid that there is hidden racism in this debate. Any rational person would be concerned about the incarceration and judicial killing rate of African Americans even over the years since the Civil Rights Movement. It has not happened by accident alone. Some people (white or otherwise) support this, others condone or ignore it. > > I am very aware that when I see people due to be killed by the state in the USA, they are predominantly black. As I said, strange fruit- lynching by the state, conscious or not. > > Do check the Tuskegee reference! I agree with you on all of this. I was asking **Honesty** for clarification, because I want to completely understand his point. ---
**Author:** ![Pjen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Pjen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pjen)\ **Post date:** [April 30, 2014, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339/220 "2014-04-30T17:07:09Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > Do we prohibit slavery and torture today because they are _morally_ wrong, you think? Or is there a more fundamental reason? We choose not to reintroduce them because they are morally wrong. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339.md?page=10) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/will-clayton-locketts-torture-be-the-rosa-parks-moment-of-the-campaign-against-judicial-killing/687339.md?page=12)