It is true that it sounds more benign when called thus: capital punishment. But it is ‘killing’. Let’s call it not capital punishment, not the death penalty, but killing. Stanley Tookie Williams died today after being injected with a lethal concoction. Let us not say that, either. Let us say, Stanley Tookie Williams was killed today. Tookie had allegedly taken the lives of four of his countrymen. That sounds too soft, too; he had allegedly killed four people with a shotgun at point blank. So he deserved to die. Or did he?
Who killed these people? If we kill Tookie for killing, who kills us for killing Tookie? Who kills the person or people who killed 30,000 civilians in Iraq, plus about 2,150 American soldiers, plus non-civilian Iraqis? Tookie had no right to do what he did. What right have we to “do to him what he did to others?”
The pain of family and friends must necessarily come into play. Tookie’s victims had family. The pain must be tremendous, even after such a long time (The crime occurred 26 years ago). Twenty-five years ago someone pressed the trigger of a machine gun and blew my sleeping, three-year-old nephew to bits, brain and all. A few years before the same person or someone else had snuffed out my brother’s life. We don’t know how. We were never given the body.
I’m in no way trying to compare pains, but rather to make my statement more understandable. It is the statement that “if those who kill your loved ones are killed for it, your loved ones do not return.” If you quote that, credit it to me, Rethabile Masilo. What’s more, I feel that the perpetrators of those crimes against my family are now in deep shit, both as human beings, full-stop, and as human beings before God. If my family and friends had gotten them killed, and then gloated, wouldn’t we be the ones in deep shit today? Besides
Killing is wrong, no matter who does it and for whatever reason. Let’s start from there, before we even think of working our way out toward whether Tookie should have been pardoned, or whether the killer of 30,000+ people should go scot free, or whether the system is or is not flawed, killing innocent people, or whether the system is or is not racially biased, killing more minorities than other Americans, or whether religion gives us the right to play God and kill, or whether killing criminals lowers the crime rate… Let us start from the beginning and gently remind ourselves that killing is wrong. Now, what?I know from talking to many others who have shared that chamber with me before that when months or even years have gone by, there will be no real closure or peace after what we saw Tuesday morning. Williams will not be alive for the supporters who wanted to save him, and the people he was convicted of killing will still leave huge empty spaces in the hearts of their loved ones. [Source]
Relevant reading: http://www.huffingtonpost.com
Speaking as a Christian, we need to get it straight. You cannot, repeat, cannot claim to follow the path of Jesus Christ and support the death penalty. Oil and water. Non sequitur. Do not claim to follow the Christian Way if you support this travesty of justice. The only reason one can use to support death as a consequence is for purposes of revenge or retribution, and for Christians there is no such thing as “retributive justice.” To think otherwise is to not understand what Jesus was about. Period. Mankind has no right to put anyone to death, thereby ending that person’s possibility of repentance or redeeming his/her actions. Two “wrongs” never make a “right”.
The end (ostensibly justice) doesn’t justify the means (death penalty, aka murder). If you think about it, the end always pre-exists in the means. Bad means equals bad results. The death penalty will never deter violence…in fact…in perpetuates it by sending a message that it is sometimes justifiable. Bunk. Rationalize it any way you will, but the practice has never been right and it never will be.
The death penalty just puts and exclamation point on the plight of the black and the poor. Shame on us tepid Christians who do not even understand the intrinsic value of all life and who misinterpret Biblical scripture as in the infamous “eye-for-an-eye” phrase. Gandhi displayed his timeless wisdom in his wry comment: “An eye-for-an-eye and a tooth-for-a-tooth and pretty soon all will be blind and toothless.”
Do as you will, but, “Christians” please understand that if you advocate for death, you are not following the way of our Christian namesake.
Comment by Kevin Kirking — 13 December 2005 @ 10:36 pm
“Independent DNA testing has found two Virginia men to have been wrongly convicted of s*xual assault, raising to five the number of people exonerated because of forensic evidence saved by a meticulous scientist, Gov. Mark R. Warner said Wednesday.
The two men, who have requested that their names not be released, had already completed their prison sentences, Warner said in a news release. He did not say what errors were made in their convictions.
Prosecutors in Norfolk and Alexandria, where the cases were investigated, have asked the governor to grant absolute pardons to both men. Warner said the men’s petitions will go through the normal review process.
Three other men who were convicted of r*pe were cleared thanks to samples saved by the late state forensic scientist Mary Jane Burton.”
[Source]
What if they’d been killed? What an utterly wrong mistake that would have been!
Comment by Rethabile Masilo — 16 December 2005 @ 5:58 am
Let’s look at the real issues; In many of these cases, one should consider the environment in which convicted men existed prior to their imprisonment. while poverty, social exclusion and a society based on the right to bear arms may not have pulled the trigger, they have certainly convinced many to take up the gun
Comment by Johnny Ryan — 28 March 2006 @ 10:19 am
this is truly one of the greatest things i have ever read
Comment by Christian Holt — 10 September 2007 @ 9:21 pm