Tookie Williams will be put to death. Arnold Schwarzenegger has denied clemency to a man who has turned his life into an inspiration for those who have fought against gang violence. The Governor's message is that, once you are convicted, you might as well not do anything to change for the better. There is in fact no hope of redemption, the most un-christian message that can be promulgated, ironically enough. More below.
The death penalty is totally wrong for the following reasons:
- The very concept of law is the even and fair application of penalties. No one would defend the idea of fining 99% of speeders on the road while sentencing the other 1% to 5 years in jail. There are thousands of murders in the USA every year but only a handful are executed. Unless you support the execution of all murderers without exception, you cannot support singling out a few. It is clearly a huge ethical and human rights lapse.
- When the State executes people, it claims a power that it does not rightfully own. It tells people that life can be taken under certain circumstances, even when the object of the exercise does not save other lives. This encourages people to believe that they are in fact justified in killing other people at some time. The Stae is thus encouraging murder, the opposite of its stated aim.
- The law has made many errors and executed innocent people. It is a penalty with no remedy.
- The application of the law is racist. Minorities are much more likely to killed by the State.
Finally let me say a word to the victims of crime. You have no valid say in the application of penalties. It is not for you to weigh in on the subject of how you feel about the criminal. When the State prosecutes someone on your behalf, it takes over from you as an individual and makes it an important community activity. The law is not about revenge. The law does not hate the criminal. The law does not do anything but seek to apply in an unbiased way the dictates of society. In that ideal world, the feelings of the victim are superceded by the interests of the community. In that sense, this unhealthy focus on how people feel in the criminal justice system represents a reversion to an earlier time where revenge is an accepted part of how we settle disputes.