Just Say Why

Capital Punishment and Justice
by
Paul Johnson

So, it’s just a coincidence that the Bush Administration has decided to wait until now to prosecute bad guys #1, #2, and #3, all responsible for 9/11. (By the way, I thought Bush was responsible for failing to protect us from 9/11, but that’s another story.) So, if we ignore the unreliable nature of tortured confessions, and ignore the totally unethical and deceptive Bush Administration, and ignore all the questions about how Saddam (oops, I mean Osama) has gotten EVERYTHING he demanded from the US, ignoring all these things, if we find the bad guys guilty and everyone really believes it, how do we punish them?

On another note, there has been new evidence discovered around the finding of the latest dead victim of the Nevada UNR serial rapist. The charity fund to help find the poor missing girl is now redirecting their efforts from finding the girl to exacting “justice”.

In yet another news story, there have been hundreds of deaths every year caused by greed in the medical industry. Back when our country was young, and for thousands of years before that, when someone killed or crippled a friend or neighbor or customer through greed or stupidity, we felt obligated to ensure that the victim and his family were taken care of.

So, what is justice? I should remind you that justice is not, in any way, the same as revenge. Revenge is a lousy moral trait. No amount of killing or suffering will ever bring back someone’s ability to walk or live and breath.

What is capital punishment? It’s nothing more than revenge, plain and simple.

Electrocuting someone to death doesn’t bring back loved ones, it only causes more pain, suffering, and death, and not just for the hopefully correctly convicted convict, but for his friends and family as well. And why should we care? Because we’re better people than that.

The Death Penalty does not exact justice, but only revenge.

Pay attention to the number of people on death row and in lifetimes of incarceration who have recently been  found innocent. Imagine how many have already been put to death who were also innocent. In these cases, the “justice” in the form of revenge, has become murder, cold blooded murder on our parts. That’s not something we want to be a part of.

So, what is the purpose of our penal system if not for revenge? I suppose everyone can answer that. Our penal system is supposed to serve two purposes, first, it acts to discourage wrong-doing through fear of the consequences, and the second is to protect society from the bad apples.

In the first case, the term penal system is incorrect. What we really need to call it is a re-education system. The best way to ensure that convicts, innocent and guilty alike, turn to crime when they leave the penal system is to fail in our efforts to rehabilitate or re-educate them.

In the second case, the penal system isn’t intended to reform or re-educate criminals, but to prevent them from doing further harm to society.

In neither of these cases is “Penal System” the correct solution. No wonder it doesn’t work.

So, we seem to have a pretty good handle on what “Justice” is not. But what, exactly, is it? How, exactly do we reform our penal system into a correctional system?

Looking at the three examples in the beginning of this essay, we have three overlapping solutions to three very different crimes, and yes, malpractice is a crime.

#1. Will fear of death prevent religious zealots from trying to infect the rest of society? I guess that’s pretty obvious, but needs to be stated. Punishment, especially the death penalty, does not discourage the mentally unstable. This is true not just of religious fanatics, but applies equally well to any crimes done out of emotion. In other words, the only crime that punishment will discourage is crimes done by high-society aristocratic spoiled kids getting their kicks. This will not discourage emotionally driven people, and will obviously not discourage desperate people.

Putting to death religious zealots will only breed more religious zealots.

#2. What is justice for the doctor who is performing so many operations that he can’t keep them straight and ends up cutting off the wrong limb? Just as in the past, this greedy doctor should be responsible for the victim and his dependents for life.  What about cases where the perpretator has no means of supporting the victim and family? Then a life of servitude is in order. Serve that family in any way you can, and if that means going door to door begging for food for the victims, then get to it.

Will a million dollar punitive damage settlement be fair justice? Perhaps, if that’s what will make the victim feel fairly compensated for the loss of his sight, or hearing, and if the family will feel fairly compensated for the loss of a loved one and the loss of decades of care, help, and income. But, really, would you trade your eyesight for a million dollars? How do you put a price on something like that?

Keep in mind, that this corrupt industry is trying their best to limit their need and inclination to provide restitution to those they’ve harmed. This is immoral in so many ways. Yes, we need to reform our medical industry.

#3. The serial rapist currently preying on the girls and young women of Reno’s UNR campus is not discouraged by fear of death. He is encouraged by his belief that he will not be caught. I guess if we had the cops that are currently busting people for smoking pot, or watching adult movies, or prostitution out there on the streets dealing with real crime, then the criminal would be much less inclined to rape and kill, but he would still yearn for it and would eventually succumb to his weakness.

When caught and convicted, will the correction system be able to rehabilitate him? Was Willie Horton on the path to rehabilitation? I’m not a psychologist, but I know that some people are not able or willing to rehabilitate. Can a jury decide this? I suppose not. Since I’m not a psychologist, I couldn’t decide, and nor could all but a very few jurors. However, many jurors are driven by emotions, especially in cases like this. Decisions based on emotion, are what got us in this mess, it’s obviously not the solution.

In cases where the bad apples must be separated from society, rehabilitation should still be a regular part of the incarceration, but keeping the bad apples out of society has to be the primary focus in these cases. For those who we are unable to keep out of society should then be considered candidates for a more permanent solution. Is that solution Capital Punishment? I don’t think so.

In conclusion, what do we do with the people responsible for 9/11? I suggest we start with impeachment. If we fail to impeach, will that encourage criminal behavior by future presidents? Maybe in some cases, but it’s not a solution in itself, either.

What do we do with the three 9/11 suspects delivered by Bush? Maybe we could start by apologizing for being so un-American and torturing them and refusing them legal council. Then, if they truly are guilty, we could rehabilitate them and use them as poster children on anti-terrorist propaganda to broadcast to religiously fanatical groups here and abroad.

by Paul Johnson

The Conservatives are out in full force disgracing Christmas. However, from listening from the O-Reily liar, one would think that the problem was that we Christians are showing tolerance for other religions. Gosh, tolerance, what an un-Christian thing to exhibit.

Lying to the American people about the war and then accusing everyone else of disgracing the military and then voting to strip the rights and benefits from the military is just oh, so un-Christian.  The Conservatives like all of O-Reily’s brain-dead followers, think the war on Christmas is about Christians’ mistake of being understanding, compassionate, and tolerant (all the things Jesus encouraged). That’s not the real war on Christmas. The O-Reily war on Christmas is the Conservative war on all things that Jesus taught.

Next time you hear “War on Christmas”, stop and think about what it really means. The Conservatives are destroying everything Christian in America. If they have their way, we’ll be just be like another Islamic republic.  That’s the real war on Christmas.

by Paul Johnson

We all know that a major part of the American revolution from England was about the need for religious tolerance. The “Church of England” or “The King’s Church” wasn’t to be imposed on America.

There are many references to this in the country’s founding documents, including the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.

So why do we exclude certain religious beliefs on every single piece of money printed by our government? Why do we denigrate so many of our fellow citizens who don’t view religions as we do? Why do we point out our intolerance of them every day in our Pledge of Allegiance?

Isn’t this exactly what our forefathers were trying to get away from?

You even hear some saying that America is a Christian Nation. Oh, come on, now. Get real! Nobody really believes that trash. Thirty seconds reading the Constitution or the Bill of Rights would convince even the the most thick skulled amongst us.

“In God We Trust” is saying “Anyone believing in another god is not part of WE THE PEOPLE. Yes, that’s exactly the opposite of what our forefathers wanted.

“One Nation, Under God, Indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for all” means if you don’t pray to OUR GOD, you’re not Indivisible and aren’t part of Liberty and Justice.

Does anyone really believe that this is what our forefathers wanted? I’m all for holding my religious beliefs and don’t like others thinking they have liberty to try to convert me relentlessly. But, it’s immoral for me to force these views upon others just as much as if enough got together and passed laws to change our pledge to say, “One Nation, Devoid of God…” or having all our money changed to say “We Trust in No God”. It sounds silly, but that’s exactly what we’re doing to others.

It’s not right. Let’s take a breath and try the golden rule. Would we like others doing to us what we’re doing to others who don’t think like we do? We’d scream bloody murder, and so should they. And — we should be sensitive enough to know it’s wrong.

by Paul Johnson

From the BBC:

Pope Benedict XVI has appealed for renewed respect for Sundays

When the world’s churches come clean, then and only then can they start asking that those of us with morals change our behavior. That’s right, the pope and his church has the morals of barbarians from 3,000 years ago. In fact, that’s where their rules and morals have come from.

That’s right. read the bible, rape your wife, your slaves, your children, even kill your children, just like the bible tells us, and then tell the rest of the world that we need to show respect. Do people with functioning brains really listen to these immoral cult leaders?

Hey Benedict, how about showing respect for the living by donating some of your millions of dollars to stem cell research? How about selling your multi-million dollar churches and help the poor, the unfortunate, the uneducated, the sick. How many people would be saved by closing just one church, Benedict?

Follow Jesus, ban the churches. Read the bible and you will see that Jesus opposed organized religion. Ever wonder why? Follow Jesus, ban the churches, or — follow the Pope and show some more respect for Sundays.

This issue has been beaten up enough on the blogs, as of late, that I hate to be just another post, but there’s one issue that I feel has been tragically missed.

In the August 20th USA Today, Tom Krattenmaker’s article was down on the secularists for being, well, so much like the overboard theists — close minded. But, his rant started from a comment he had made that garnered a not-so-open minded reply, in his mind.

Tom says, “… religion should leave scientific research to the scientists and devote itself, along with the fields of ethics and philosophy, to the mighty issues of the human condition: good and evil, the meaning of life, the nature of love and so forth.”

The handbook for the Christian religions, the Holy Bible, is thick with unethical and immoral recipes for living our lives. There are dozens of recommendations to own and rape our slaves, and our women’s slaves, to rape our daughters until they’re pregnant, to sexually abuse young men, to rape, pillage, plunder, and destroy entire races.

Yes, Tom, these are the people who should be spending their time on such wieighty issues as the meaning of life, love, and so forth. No point in expecting to see any morals from someone who doesn’t pattern their lives after the Good Book, now is there?

For a quick run-down on the true nature of the Holy Bible, read it yourself, or spend 5 minutes on the Internet looking it up. Here’s a good place to start — The Annotated Bible. Check out the categories on the right hand side of the page, for example of the things condoned by the Bible.

Now, don’t get me wrong. Don’t pretend that I’m saying all religious people are sickos. I’m not. I am a spiritual person, myself. However, we need to pay attention to what we’re being fed. Religion does not teach us morals. If we don’t get them from within, the Bible will only corrupt us.

Balkinization has an interesting read regarding the possible religious foundation of morals. It was eerie to follow the link and read the review of Michael Perry’s Toward a Theory of Human Rights.

Balkinization’s Brian Tamanaha does a good first stab at analyzing the view, but seems to be approaching Perry’s fallacy with kid gloves. Perry’s perspective is that all morals come from religion and a lack or loss of religion would spell a break-down of our rights, laws, and courts.

Now, let me state that I haven’t read Perry’s works, here, and am only going on the review and on Brian’s blog, but both seem so obviously lacking. The most obvious destruction of Perry’s religious morals perspective are the facts in our every day news. Look at how much more religious our government and especially our courts have become in the past few years. It is not a coincidence that this is one of the most immoral governments that we have seen. Again, this is not a coincidence. Any time over the history of mankind that has been controlled by religion has been a time of immorality.

How could these two arguments be so devoid of this knowledge? Of course, the naive excuse would be to say that all the examples are just coincidences.

Is there really any reason to spend more time listening to biased authors explain how their world view is fact, regardless of all the facts to the contrary.

Time magazine published a survey showing that 59% of American voters would vote against an atheist because of his religious view. Where does this 59% get this twisted notion? Who has been feeding them lies?

Like the religious fanatics, it’s easy to believe that homosexuality is a choice, in the absence of any facts. However, anyone who has really known a gay person knows that this is a stupidly ignorant perspective. It is not a choice.

If you’re interested in knowing if religious people are really less moral than atheists, get to know some atheists and use that knowledge to decide who is immoral and who is improving the human race. You’ll be pleasantly surprised to know that there are a group of people out there doing a much better job than those church-goers you and I know from church.

Perhaps it’s my imagination, but it seems there are a very large proportion of SUV drivers that attend my church.

Why do people prefer SUVs over more reasonable transportation — like cars that get twice as much gas mileage, cars that don’t support the terrorists as much, cars that are easier to drive, park, clean…

Why? It’s easy, there are two main reasons, and each is as immoral as one can imagine. 1. It’s safer for me and my kids, at the expense of the safety of all those around me every single day, and 2. It makes me feel more powerful so I can bully my way into traffic.

Of course, there are the stupid lies they tell themselves about how they need the SUV to get the kids to soccer practice, or maybe we’ll have to transport a king sized bed sometime in our lives, or, well, you name it. The real reasons are one of the first two.

Now, who would steal the safety and lives of those drivers around them just so they can feel safer or more powerful? Who would risk killing someone unnecessarily, by driving a big tank, just so they feel safer?

Certainly, not someone who has A SINGLE THREAD OF MORALS!

However, these are all the people we see at church every week.

So, is it the chicken or the egg? Does church make you immoral or does it attract the slime of our society?

Either way, shouldn’t it be fixed some day? Today? Are you giving money to churches that support and encourage this immorality?

Does your church discourage this needless killing, or condone it?

We all think of Religious Murderers as the fanatics who flew planes into our buildings trying to kill as many innocent people as possible. Sick, real sick. That one act took 3,000 lives.

That is horrific, but, that is peanuts in comparison!

Religious zealots are knowingly killing many times more than that every year, right here in America. But, we seldom hear about it.

Let’s take a simple example. 73,000 Americans died of Diabetes in 2005, and the number is skyrocketing. Many of these are children who have done nothing wrong, but being born.

What if we could flip a switch and save all these 73,000. It would be pretty immoral to just let them die. It would also be considered murder, and rightfully so.

Stem Cell research may have already cured this disease if we were allowed and encouraged to research it. The vast majority of Americans want us to aggressively pursue this research. However, a small number of religious fanatics in our government have hijacked our country and our tax dollars and are refusing to flip the switch.

No matter how you look at it, 73,000 Americans die each year because blindly-religious zealots are preventing us from doing the research we want to do.

Are these people murderers?

Are we complicit by letting them do it?

Speak up. Say NO to America’s zealots.

There was a time, not more than 10 years ago, when we would look at the occasional kook, standing on a street corner with a banner saying, “The End Is Near! Repent!” and feel honest pity. We would often want to give him $5 so he would be able to find some place to stay the night and have a hot meal.

Today, we share our churches with these extremists.  They’re all around us, in our churches, in our grocery stores, in our government, teaching our kids. Even our church’s sermons are sprinkled much more liberally with Hellfire and Brimstone. No wonder people are getting the impression this is okay, or acceptable. The $700 Club is sick with it.

When the Islamic radicals see us and want us dead, do you really think they’re any different than the extremists on our side? If you honestly think there’s a difference, you’re sadly mistaken.  Religious extremism is religious extremism. Period. The only difference is the way we pronounce god.

Don’t think for a moment that Christian radicals don’t cause hate, despair,  and death. Hisory if full of endless examples.

Churches, like governments, are good when kept in control. Religion, like government become harmful when run by radicals.

By the way, have you read the Bible lately? If so, then you know that Jesus opposed organized religion. He opposed the very people who have kidnapped his teachings. The very people you’re paying with your contributions. How much of your contribution goes to shield the sexual abusers? The rapers? The sodomizers?  That’s what happens when religion gets strong. That’s why Jesus opposed it.

Has anyone done any research to see who are all those parents that are doing home schooling? Of the few home schoolers that I know, all have elected to do this to save their children from the evils of a “Progressive School System”, that teaches such evil topics as biology and evolution.

Shouldn’t this be an imprisonable offense? Isn’t this causing irreparable harm to the youth, soon to be new voters, of our country? Shouldn’t these parents be relieved of their parental duties like a parent who refuses medical treatment for their kids for religious reasons?

We have a growing problem that needs to see the light of day.

The Atheist Ethicist has a good essay on the perils of remaining quiet when people around you are doing harm by their dogmatic pursuit of pure faith. Check it out.