Witnesses watched through a window at an Alabama prison as Kenneth Eugene Smith became the nation's first person to be put to death using nitrogen gas.

ATMORE, Ala. (AP) — As witnesses including five news reporters watched through a window, Kenneth Eugene Smith, who was convicted and sentenced to die in the 1988 murder-for hire slaying of Elizabeth Sennett, convulsed on a gurney as Alabama carried out the nation’s first execution using nitrogen gas.

  • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
    86·
    11 months ago

    Jailing people for life is also inhumane, solitary is torture that can lead to permanent damage. But what alternatives are left with?

    Rehabilitation and reeducation work camps.

    • SoylentBlake@lemm.eeEnglish
      25·
      11 months ago

      For some, sure.

      I’m all for the Scandinavian model, I just don’t think the John Wayne Gacys of the world are reformable. I think some people are just not meant to live in the group. If ostracization was still a thing, then let’s do that, as if back in the day surviving the wild wasn’t effectively a death sentence. You wanna drop these people on an uninhabited Alaskan island? Sure. I’m all for it

      • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
        46·
        11 months ago

        We should strive for a world where we can cure psychopaths. Mental health isn’t magic. Everyone can be rehabilitated if we figure out how.

        • SoylentBlake@lemm.eeEnglish
          22·
          11 months ago

          I agree. But we are still left with the here and now and a situation that we didn’t ask to be in, that we (as a whole) are forced into.

          Believe me, I think the first job of government, everyday, is to pass objective rationalization for their continued existence. I am beyond critical as a default. Criticism of authority is fundamental to any and all rights of free people. Corruption of those that make up the system should be punished at exponential rates. A police officer commiting a crime should be handled like a criminal, not an officer. Should steps be taken to mitigate and help the masses, based off medical expert advice? Absolutely, whole-heartedly.

          I understand the arguments against capital punishment and at my core i agree, but in the end we still have this shit show we didn’t want to be in to deal with. In an analogy, I don’t think blaming the garbage collectors will make people produce less garbage. Let’s do the things to fix it, across the board, but that doesn’t mean leaving the obvious garbage out to rot and fester in the street.

          • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
            36·
            11 months ago

            I don’t think blaming the garbage collectors will make people produce less garbage.

            Your analogy doesn’t make sense because our governments create much of the crime they arrest people for lol

            • SoylentBlake@lemm.eeEnglish
              11·
              11 months ago

              I feel like you understand what I’m saying and are just being facetious.

              Putting all the moral positions aside, at the end of the day, we are stuck in this situation. That’s the reality and it has to be dealt with, like it or not.

              • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
                36·
                11 months ago

                No, I’m being serious. What you’re saying is that we shouldn’t blame the government (the garbage collectors) because it won’t fix crime (make people produce less garbage). I think that’s absurd. We can, in fact, blame them for creating crime.

                • SoylentBlake@lemm.eeEnglish
                  11·
                  11 months ago

                  No I’m saying that crime exists, period. With or without government, it doesn’t matter, we are born with an internal sense of justice. We know if we’ve been wronged even before we can walk or talk.

                  Somebody has to deal with it. You can pick a side politically or eschew it completely favoring anarchy, that’s your decision, but SOMEBODY HAS TO DEAL WITH IT.

                  Here’s a better question, let’s say the government falls tomorrow. America’s out of money, cops, military, Congress, everyone’s disbanded.

                  Do you think there’s gonna be less killing then?

                  I agree with you that government can in fact create crime, and I don’t mean by just passing legislation, but actual unethical actions - and that’s not to go into war crimes or crimes against humanity.

                  Fuck i contend the existence of poverty is a crime against humanity.

                  So here we are at this question. This or that. We can be critical of government for its punishment focused approach to crime, rightfully so, but absent government, does crime disappear? would theft, rape or murder decrease or increase?

                  I say they’d increase, at least for the initial decade. We’re a long way away from subsistence farming, and not necessarily in a good way. In a prolonged grid down environment it’s expected 90% perish in the first year. How far would you go to get your family medicine? Cuz if my kid needs meds and the only way I can get them is through other people, well, that’s just what I gotta do then. It’s not even a decision.

                  • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
                    25·
                    11 months ago

                    So here we are at this question. This or that. We can be critical of government for its punishment focused approach to crime, rightfully so, but absent government, does crime disappear? would theft, rape or murder decrease or increase?

                    What? I only meant that a different government would produce less crime, and that with the right combination of policies crime could be either vastly reduced or totally eliminated. I’m not an anarchist lol