It is interesting to see that Alice and GTA have difficulty accepting that anyone could commit such a monstrous act without some external cause. They are good people. God knows we could use more like them. They are having as much trouble getting their heads around this as I suspect is most of the general population. We never want to believe the worst of people. Today we tend to deal with it by making victims of all involved. Li is not a cold blooded killer.......He is a victim. How else can we explain such a monstrous act? As they say we don't know all the answers yet. That Li is a victim of anything is just speculation at this point. What do you do with him? Psychology is not an exact science. Can we take a chance that he will not offend again after treatment? Do you want to bet someone's life on it?
I recall one time reading an interview with a death row inmate in the US. This man had committed several vicious and sadistic killings. His kick was to kidnap young couples and force the young man to watch while he pushed the muzzle of his shotgun into the vagina of the girlfriend and pull the trigger. He enjoyed watching her in her death throes and the agony on the boyfriend's face as he was forced to watch. It is not a quick death. I am not making any of this up, by the way. And I recall during the interview his comment that he recognized that he deserved to be executed. He knew he was not redeemable. He was a sadistic killer. He could never be allowed back into the general population. That if he did anything worthwhile with his life it would be that his death would outline the seriousness with which society views such acts. His death would serve to create a context for the values which we apply to the sanctity of human life. By mitigating the circumstances of any act of murder committed by one individual against another we are making a statement about the regard with which we view the sanctity of human life and crime in general. We pride ourselves on the level of sophistication we have achieved. At times we are almost arrogant about it. But in the cold light of reason our legal system is as necessary today to protect us and define the value system which we live by as it has always done in the past. Does the imposition of a death penalty make us no better than those we apply it to? Well I would be prepared to accept life imprisonment if there were guarantees that all who are convicted never walk among us again. Given the present climate of belief in perpetrators being victims and the conviction that psychology can offer the answer to rehabilitation I am not convinced that some will never be released into our midst. There are too many examples of the slippery slope wherein the legal system subscribes or is pressured to subscribe to this train of thought and the tragic consequences born of a sense of entitlement to act out our frustrations violently. There is no answer in reason to definitively deal with the aberrations in the human psyche at present. Until that time there is no argument I have seen that will convince me that the death penalty or unconditional life imprisonment does not have a place in our legal system.
I recall one time reading an interview with a death row inmate in the US. This man had committed several vicious and sadistic killings. His kick was to kidnap young couples and force the young man to watch while he pushed the muzzle of his shotgun into the vagina of the girlfriend and pull the trigger. He enjoyed watching her in her death throes and the agony on the boyfriend's face as he was forced to watch. It is not a quick death. I am not making any of this up, by the way. And I recall during the interview his comment that he recognized that he deserved to be executed. He knew he was not redeemable. He was a sadistic killer. He could never be allowed back into the general population. That if he did anything worthwhile with his life it would be that his death would outline the seriousness with which society views such acts. His death would serve to create a context for the values which we apply to the sanctity of human life. By mitigating the circumstances of any act of murder committed by one individual against another we are making a statement about the regard with which we view the sanctity of human life and crime in general. We pride ourselves on the level of sophistication we have achieved. At times we are almost arrogant about it. But in the cold light of reason our legal system is as necessary today to protect us and define the value system which we live by as it has always done in the past. Does the imposition of a death penalty make us no better than those we apply it to? Well I would be prepared to accept life imprisonment if there were guarantees that all who are convicted never walk among us again. Given the present climate of belief in perpetrators being victims and the conviction that psychology can offer the answer to rehabilitation I am not convinced that some will never be released into our midst. There are too many examples of the slippery slope wherein the legal system subscribes or is pressured to subscribe to this train of thought and the tragic consequences born of a sense of entitlement to act out our frustrations violently. There is no answer in reason to definitively deal with the aberrations in the human psyche at present. Until that time there is no argument I have seen that will convince me that the death penalty or unconditional life imprisonment does not have a place in our legal system.
