Welcome home! Please contact lincoln@icrontic.com if you have any difficulty logging in or using the site. New registrations must be manually approved which may take several days. Can't log in? Try clearing your browser's cookies.
Execution of DC sniper
Palzang
Veteran
As I write this, John Muhammed, the "DC sniper", has just been executed in Virginia. May he take a precious human rebirth in his next life so that he may find the Dharma and purify the tremendous harm he did in this one. And may all those whose lives he affected so deeply find peace and forgiveness at last so that they may get on with their lives.
I never take pleasure in executions, no matter how unsavory the character.
Palzang
I never take pleasure in executions, no matter how unsavory the character.
Palzang
0
Comments
although seriously it is a sad NOT so GOOD topic...
anyway...
because I'd like to actually discuss capital punishment...I think it is..probably wrong...
someone I dunno who....said you can't defeat hate with hate, you have to defeat hate with love..
did we do the right thing executing this guy? I'd rather give him lifetime in jail to meditate , grow, change....etc etc come to terms with his problems..
The Buddha?
I'm actually not even sure about that. I tend to think that the only people who can forgive a perpetrator or any sinner for that matter are the victims. But someone who has been murdered can't very well forgive a murderer if they're dead now, can they?
It's the pinnacle of arrogance to forgive someone, especially a murderer, on someone else's behalf.
This is one of those completely unexamined cliches. Name one instance when real, visceral thugs, criminals, madmen, murderers, or all of the above have been stopped with something as vague as "love."
I think the only thing tragic about this execution is that it has been over 7 years since his rampage. Measure for measure...
sometimes a master will play devils advocate..you get it?
I have done so on many occasions :cool:
Well, to be fair, where has hate gotten us? We punish murders by murdering them. And yet the world is just as violent a place as it's ever been.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOoFXOWGC5o
This video was mentioned somewhere else on the forum (I'm sorry, I can't remember who posted it). It's 5 parts. Seems like a good example.
I know I could actually CHANGE after the fact.
Even now I do semi horrible things. Sometimes in a flash of anger or drunkenness I'll do something utterly ridiculous... even though I still KNOW its wrong,
(don't get me wrong I know it's wrong)
but it's in a time of mental turmoil...just the other day i did basically a triple homicide (not in real life mind you) but in a scenario where i would never do that...I was angry and upset, jealous and frustrated, I wasn't thinking straight...anyway I felt i had to exact a type of revenge...and I did...and ...I enjoyed it...it soothed my rage.....but read on....
if someone pissed me off so bad , that i decided to devalue human life and snipe a few people in real life....during that time I was a coldblooded killer..
BUT after a cool-down period... I would be susceptible to change..I would feel horrible like I do now about that triple homicide...
so after a cool-down, if i'm still blood thirsty and violent sure...lethal inject me...but if i've cooled down and really feel horrible....leave me be, even in jail I can work on getting good karma back...I can actually teach and dissuade others who will be reintegrated into society...THAT kind of experience should NOT be wasted..:( neh?
Neh, indeed. The HUGE difference is that you didn't actually commit those crimes you fantasized about. People can come up with the most ludicrous and crackpot ideas in their head, but remain totally decent and humane people so long as those ideas remain private and unindulged.
And all the people who were gunned down randomly by this murderer? Where is their chance to get good karma?
I wonder sometimes what the high and mighty who are against capital punishment would think if they actually witnessed murders take place. If they watched the late DC Sniper actually blow the brains and guts out of helpless people. Or watch 40+ soldiers in a waiting area be gun downed by their superior officer. I wonder just how interested they would be in the killers' "good karma."
Come on now, it makes things more lively don't you think? How interesting would this place be if the only disagreement was on the interpretation of this or that sutra?
Their rebirth will tell what good kamma they accrued.
Can you tell? Can anybody?
Speculation on such matters is futile, isn't it?
If they're not Buddhist, it wouldn't even cross their minds.
if they're Buddhist, I expect it would.
What's your point?
That hasn't been the only disagreement lately. Don't be facetious. If you were paying attention to the current discussions you'd know that.
But as this is predominantly a BUDDHIST forum, this is the main topic discussions revolve around.
Buddhism as practised daily.
Buddhism and how it affects our Perception.
Buddhism in the face of killing, executions and other matters.
Buddhism and how we practise it in our own lives.
Buddhism, KoB.
This is a Buddhist forum.
If you do not practise Buddhism, and don't think discussions should always include that aspect, predominantly - then what ARE you doing here?
Seeing any of it happen wouldn't change my mind in the slightest. I would not let such close proximity to hatred rub off on me. I've always found love to be a better coping strategy than hatred anyways. Love may not have prevented pain in this case, but it will heal it quicker than hate ever could.
It is not about being "high and mighty" for me, but more about social science and psychology. No person in the right mind would kill in such cold-blood. If psychologically something is off with a person then is it moral to kill them? Think back in history when common ailments were cause for intolerance.
Crime does not cause a society to be unhealthy.
instead
Crime is a symptom of an already unhealthy society.
Let us focus our attention to the cause and not the symptoms.
As for capital punishment, you can't grow apple trees from orange seeds. Neither can you grow nonviolence by planting the seeds of violence - and collective violence at that. From a Christian point of view, the eye for an eye approach reflects a more primitive version of "God's will" that was espoused in the Old Testament and that was rejected in the New Testament where Jesus said "Turn the other cheek." The Jews I have talked to about this, who maintain more of what one might call an Old Testament form of canonical law, do not like the idea of capital punishment as it doesn't follow the criteria laid down in the Torah and Jewish law where the death penalty was used only as a very last resort after less violent alternatives had been exhausted.
The fact that the death penalty has been abandoned in virtually every "advanced" society (whatever that means) seems not to matter at all to those who still espouse it. It is still widely practiced in China, but I think that speaks for itself. That pretty much leaves the US as the only rogue state still practicing this barbarism.
Anybody have any idea how much it costs to prosecute a death penalty case, and what the average time between the crime and the execution (if it ever indeed takes place) is?
Palzang
I often wonder if the opposite is ever true where a murderer is motivated consciously or subconsciously by the prospect of his or her own execution. If this is ever the case then some murders occur, to some degree, as a result of capital punishment.
What I find the weirdest is that people even go there to watch it. Now that is just nasty! What kind of person gets closure or their sense of justice fufilled from witnessing another persons death?
Better yet, what kind of person gets closure?
Does closure even exist?
On the topic of Barry Goldwater; during the Iran/Contra scandal, Goldwater was the only Senator with the balls to tell Reagan that he was either stupid or lying. He was a libertarian and opposed social (religious) conservatism on abortion and gay rights. I disagreed with him on many things, but he was a man of principle and I admired him.
There are any number of Buddhist political conservatives. There are also Buddhist bigots. There's nothing in Buddhism that guarantees that a Buddhist is going to have a particular political philosophy. KoB could probably be a more thoughtful conservative (and perhaps I could be a more thoughtful liberal), but I don't see any reason to drive him off because he admires Goldwater or has right wing views.
I know i wouldn't particularly want to see it, it reminds me of olden times where crowds gethered in the square to see heads chopped off. I think they used to see that as entertainment. Using criminals didn't matter, as they were criminals. This is only my opinion on why they go to see it, maybe im wrong?
Personally, i don't think you can get closure.
You ARE kidding, surely, KOB?
Surely you are not suggesting that compassion and opportunities for plumbing its depths and testing its limits are fruitless enterprises.
This key "sentiment" from the opening lines of the Dhammapada is then an "unexamined cliché?" That is an odd thought, I think. For me, those words sum up the teachings on compassion by the Lord Buddha more than any others.
(I must say that I have never heard selections from Christian or Jewish scriptures called clichés before. You must have been writing while sleeping.)
I believe all Scripture that relates to direct human experience is tested and tested and retested by conscientious people everywhere. Plus, there are countless examples from real life and from literature how some very small acts of compassion have turned the wayward heart of many a would-be violent man.
Realistically, punishment has it's place. I drive more safely because I know there are likely to be speed traps on the local roads. But the DC sniper was aware of capital punishment laws, and wasn't deterred. Generally speaking, people who commit spectacular murders are so deluded that capital punishment isn't going to stop them. Any punishment, whether strict or lenient, is going to work only against ordinary criminals who have some some realist notion of the chances of getting caught, and aren't trying to get revenge on the world for years of humiliation. Gang members often have to deal with the choice between the certainty of being killed if they don't follow orders and the possibility of getting caught if they do follow orders.
I've had coworkers with gang tattoos. The honest truth is that love works better than punishment in preventing these guys from committing crimes. They grew up in broken homes and gangs gave their lives rules, structure, and meaning. Give them a community where they can find love and acceptance, and they're glad to give up gangs and the very real possibility of being gunned down.
Sure, there are people who don't change that easily. As a social worker friend of mine says, everyone gravitates to the environment that most closely matches their view of how the world works, and for some people that's a federal maximum security institution. I'm not arguing against punishment or prisons. But you're using the DC sniper and the Ft Hood shooter as arguments for capital punishment. For the DC sniper, capital punishment wasn't any more effective than love. For the Ft Hood shooter, capital punishment wasn't effective and love may very well have been. Part of his motivation seems to be the fact that he was trapped in an environment (the Army) which he felt rejected him and his values. One or two people who he could share his frustrations with might have made a difference.
You say that love is vague. It's not. Love is very specific. You love a specific person, not a vague concept or a vague group of people. I don't love criminals. I fear criminals. I had a friendship with a specific ex-mugger and came to have a lot of respect for him. One of my old martial arts instructors was quite frank about his fear of young black men. His work as a martial arts instructor involved creating trusting relationships with specific people, most of them young black men.
All of us live in a web of social connections. The most effective way of controlling our behavior is not by passing laws and punishing us. It's by working these social connections. The most effective way of stopping wife beating is not prison, but peer pressure. The most effective way of preventing crime is not prison, but community. That's the hard, cold reality.
You refer to people who are opposed to capital punishment as "high and mighty". That expresses a lot of resentment. Who are you resentful against? Why the resentment?
Actually it was a rhetorical question. I attended a seminar in Arizona on the death penalty and shocked to find out that it costs on average over a million dollars to prosecute a death penalty case, much more than a life without parole case, and that's including the cost of the incarceration for all those years. And then there are the endless appeals. In Arizona the average time between the crime and the execution is something like 27 years - if it ever takes place at all. Speedy justice???
In Arizona, if you were going to kill somebody, best not to do it in Maricopa County (Phoenix), as that's really the only county that prosecutes death penalty cases. None of the other ones can afford it. Equality under the law? What a joke!
And oh, it also helps if you're not black or hispanic. There were two cases in Yavapai County (where I lived), one, a brutal drug-related slaying by a white pusher and drug gang leader which was entirely premeditated. Then there was another case where a hispanic guy, in a drunken stupor, killed his girlfriend after he found her in bed with another guy (he was very remorseful when he sobered up, whereas the the white guy wasn't at all). Guess which one got prosecuted with the death penalty...
Whatever your feelings about the morality of the death penalty, even from a practical point of view it doesn't make any sense.
Palzang
It also seems to me from the thoughts and feelings you've been expressing in your posts over the years that you don't even regard the Buddha's teachings as worthy of your time or attention. You've been asked this before but do you consider yourself a Buddhist or not? If you don't I'll repeat what others have asked you; why are you here? Do you get off on pushing your hard-line beliefs on Buddhists? Do you get off on making obviously incendiary statements on this Buddhist board? What's your pay off? I just don't understand.
Everything you hate, Kob, every injustice you perceive, is not made better by your attitude. It's made worse. You're views are extreme, as extreme as any fundamentalist, and extremes make the world suffer. You don't understand that at all. You are what you hate.
Hilarious! I dunno how I missed this before, Kind Sir!
Hahahaha and I thank YOU for pointing it out, because I never would have noticed otherwise.
I have realised that I shall never convince those who believe that it is OK toi kill another human being that it is not so. They are blind to what I see: the effect on the people who pull the switch/inject the drugs/fire the bullet and the effect on the whole society that permits such barbarity.
We no longer execute people for stealing or for their sexual orientation (although both were common punishments supported by the "great and the good"). I pray that the day will come when society achieves enough maturity to stop the killings, whether in the name of 'justice' or on any other spurious and specious basis.
Actually, unfortunately, there are still countries where this exact thing is still done. Remember the teenagers in Iran who were hung for being homosexual a few years ago? And of course under shariah law, while they don't usually kill thieves, they do lop off various body parts. The human race has still got a long way to go to root out its barbarism, and I'm afraid we're losing the race (pun intended).
Palzang
O K , I w i l l t r y t o s l o w d o w n . but you have to realize I am a Gemini!
Palzang
You are right, Palzang, of course. But the fact that another country behaves barbarically does not excuse a supposedly civilised nation when it has such blood-thirsty laws.
Now having said this, I must add that in almost all cases, a human can be rehabilitated. Sadly, in almost all cases, no effort is ever made along these lines. Who has the courage and compassion to devote a significant amount of time and effort to help a convicted criminal?
When a person behaves badly and causes harm and suffering to others, it is a symptom not only of that person's sickness, but of our sickness as a society. Most people place the blame squarely on the shoulders of the criminal. We feel hurt and imposed upon, victimized, and we want to punish them for not playing according to the rules. We call it justice, but it is really only ego-gratification. If we recognized the truth--that we are as much the criminal as the victim--we might respond more compassionately.
The problem is complex. Even with compassionate understanding, we can't simply allow criminals to wander around causing harm to others. Can we? Perhaps there comes a time, in certain rare cases, when killing is the most compassionate solution. At what point do we abandon hope for a human life? Who is qualified to make this judgment? Perhaps nobody. There are no easy answers.
If I held such a life as that of the D.C. sniper in my hands, what would I do? Certainly, he was profoundly sick. Was he beyond hope? I don't know. Maybe he was, maybe he wasn't.
The reality is that, in our society, these decisions are not usually made out of compassion. They are made out of vengeance. A group of people determined a life was valueless and beyond redemption, and they took it. I cannot say they were right or wrong. They acted according to their own levels of understanding, and also deserve compassion.
It is clearly a complicated issue, and not one easily resolved. The best we can do is work together, with compassion and reason as our guides, to transform society, one person at at time. We must continue to cure society of its ills, and have hope in a better future for humanity.
If we accept that it is OK to kill another human being, where do you stop? You are no longer safe.
"When they came for the ......"
This is the reason why the pretty words by Jefferson ("life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness") are no more than pious aspirations because any one or all three can be taken away at the stroke of a tyrant's pen. And the tyrant can be an individual or a government elected into power.
To imagine that we can take Refuge and give credit to the Buddha's Turning of the Wheel of Dharma and then support the murder, judicial, military or for other reasons, seems to me the height of hypocrisy.
It is black and white.
It is rare, these days, that I can find myself so certain of anything but, having accepted that human life has a unique value, I cannot envisage any situation where it is OK to kill another unique human being be their actions ever so wicked.
We are about to witness a trial in New York of people accused of the atrocities of 9/11. Are we to add to that death toll or are we to demonstrate that, as a society, we are better than the murderous terrorists?
Palzang
I appreciate your impassioned response, and find little to disagree with. I wonder, however, if you can imagine any circumstance in which you would take a life?
Elsewhere on this forum, I put forth a hypothetical situation. Let's say you are walking home late one night, and happen across a man raping a girl in an alley. Let us assume you are untrained, and the only means you have of saving the girl is to kill her attacker. What do you do?
Do you leave the girl to her fate?
Let's say you do not intervene, but instead call the police. They arrive on the scene and arrest the rapist. It turns out he is responsible for several other rapes and murders. He stands trial, and is convicted. He has no remorse, and cannot be rehabilitated. If he ever gets free, he will surely rape and kill again. Should he be sentenced to life--knowing he could be paroled in the future to victimize another girl--or should he be sentenced to death?
Is it still black and white?
I am merely playing the devil's advocate here. I have no answers, but I am interested in your response.
THAT issue is not black-and-white, no. But in the case of capital punishment, I've not seen a good argument in favour of it yet.
Everyone deserves a chance, even if that means spending the rest of their lives in jail. Someone may not be able to be rehabilitated and reintroduced to society immediately, but that doesn't mean it won't be possible in the future. And even if they couldn't, so what? There're people who can't care for themselves throughout their entire lives, and can't live a normal life within society - should we get rid of them too? As Simon quoted: "When they came for the ......"
We're all potential criminals, and as such should be put to death, then. If you can't put someone in jail because he "MIGHT hurt someone," then how can you kill someone because they "MIGHT be paroled, and MIGHT hurt someone else"?
Besides, what sort of rehabilitation efforts do we currently make?
Rarely are situations black and white but this looks like a scenario where a sentence of life without parole would be appropriate.
Yes - Christ knew that forgiveness was against the law. It always is. If you forgive someone you put justice and the law aside. How easy is it for us to do that though? Not very.
I cannot respond to everything now, but I will do my best.
As it happens, everyone, I was having trouble finding a suitably sized and workable photo of Harry Truman, my favorite all-time president and a liberal Democrat no less. That didn't work, so I looked for Lincoln and Grant pictures, but no luck there either. Ditto Sherman. So I settled for Goldwater. I believe he was a good guy. I'm curious to know what the reaction would have been had I chosen Bill Clinton as my avatar, who I count as one of my top 10 favorite presidents.
Also, I apologize for my lengthy absence of late. I fell extremely ill last week and probably should have been hospitalized for it. I was told today that I have the H1N1, which I find morbidly comical given how much I made fun of the hype the past few months. (I still think it's over-hyped by the way
Certainly I am fascinated by politics, but my posts on this subject at least are hardly "political posturing." What statement have I made in this thread that is political? Is taking a certain stance on capital punishment (hardly a fringe view) really a political stance, or posturing for that matter?
My primary concern with any discussion of ethics or philosophy is really the same concern I have with all of life; good and evil. Now I know most of you will poo-poo a Manichean heretic like myself for being so "black and white," though interestingly, the same people do not hesitate to label any opposing or uncomfortably crass view as "extremist" or "fundamentalist." (i.e. misguided or wrong)
So I have stated my views as clearly as I possibly can. I believe that if you kill someone (and only kill, not rape or any other crime), then you should be executed for it. I believe it does serve as a deterrence in certain instances, especially robberies where potentially killing the witness often means execution.
Concerning the discussion about love and hate, I acknowledge that love is a beautiful thing. I love my family, myself, my friends, and most people I am closely associated with. And the teachings of Christian scripture we simply have different interpretations of. I have always taken Jesus' command to "turn the other cheek" as being about the micro; concerning individuals. If an individual treats you harshly or rudely, there is no sense in simply treating them the same way. But that teaching does not and cannot possibly apply to the macro. How does it apply to a society at large? When Japan bombed Pearl Harbor, wouldn't the appropriate response then have been to offer the city of Manhattan to them and offer the other cheek?
My main point in though is that love only goes so far. When actually confronted with real, horns-from-the-head, blood-dripping-from-the-fangs evil, be they street gangs, terrorists, or serial killers, I simply don't see how love fits into the equation of dealing with them. A big stick (the military and the police) is a much more practical and realistic, and ultimately more human option. Sure, on a very rare occasion, a Saul will be thrown from his horse and see the light on the road to Damascus, but your run of the mill skull crackers and thugs prowling the streets? I don't know.
About Buddhism, I have deep fondness for the Buddha's realistic and almost scientific acknowledgment of human suffering. Reading through the Dhammapada and other Buddhist writings, it's almost surreal to think that such a religion developed over 2500 years ago. A religion of such tolerance and humility is very difficult to imagine actually being spawned in the Ancient world. I simply don't argue or discuss Buddhism much because I'm an amateur and have hardly enough knowledge of it to add much to discussion. I will try more in the future however, as my free-time readings have shifted once again towards religion and religious history.
This is all I will say for now. As my health improves, I will respond more.
I know you're writing under the influence of a strange virus, KOB, but this makes absolutely no sense to me. I mean, if you wanna evade the death penalty, you'll want to kill all the witnesses, lest someone survive and testify against you. Indeed, here, the death penalty is not clearly a deterrence to killing, but perhaps (for some) a potential motive.
In other words, if you cannot follow me above, given the death penalty as a known punishment for killing, if someone happens to kill someone and there is a witnessing presence there, arguably more killing could result as a deterrence to being tried, convicted by the evidence, and given the death penalty. I know I've not provided a concrete scenario, but I do see a cycle of violence and a catch-22 situation when I read your words.
I'll give it a try. A man, Jack, walks into a corner store where only the owner is in. He holds him up, and the man makes a sudden movement, Jack stumbles, his gun goes off and it kills the owner. Just then a young couple walk in who know him. If the laws are very strict he might be tempted to kill them, too, as he is very fearful of the death penalty for himself...
Do you really think Jack's defense, though true, that his gun killed and not he, would save him?
Or maybe I'm catching the flu too.
Anyhow, it's always good to hear from you! I must confess I kinda like a little bit of irreverence every now and then, so far as it is respectful. Of course, kind sir, you are that!
Get well soon!
__________________
Gentleness is a value that touches down to the soul.
When harsh judgment must come for foul deeds
The heavy slamming of an iron gate
And time beside the tranquil bubbling brook
will heal this Disease called violence.
Love is the natural way and when disease uproots it
the patient must be given time, grace, and space
to Heal.
Only a person in a diseased state
perpetrates violence.
If we have been so neglectful as a society and as individuals
to let this happen, we have also ourselves to blame.
Let us not put all the blame on the perpetrators,
but rather accept our fair share of the blame
and take on the responsibility
of nursing the ill back to health.
I view strangers very much like I view wild animals, with cautious compassion. People are mostly harmless, but unpredictable. A few are dangerous. I love them all, just as I love animals. That doesn't mean I don't defend myself if attacked. I will use the minimum force required to protect myself and resolve the situation. Usually, that means avoiding it entirely. The result of the conflict is not determined by my feelings, but by cause and effect. Whatever the results, I will still have only compassion for my attacker.
There are no evil people, only evil deeds. So-called evil people are just human creatures swimming in a river of confusion and suffering. They are as worthy of compassion as any other.
~ AD
NOTE: There are sometimes exceptions. :-)
Speed traps serve as a deterrence too.
one...'BODY'
these guys the
"DC sniper" and the most recent "Fort killer",
....
never mind , you guys ever hear of the story of Buddha, and the super psycho killer of his time? some kind of forest madman, who would slaughter people everywhere until the Buddha met him..
both the sniper and the fort killer, were confused, and whatever they were stupid mother @!$(%!& ,,,,
the story was, the Buddha was able to change this guy. HE has enough skill to do it. WE and the mother *#$(!@%(*% state, should try to replicate THAT.. an UN-CONFUSING...
maybe a judicial system with lol... this sounds stupid...with BUDDHIST prison guards, LOL or some kinda of ...ffs,
these killers weren't thinking properly and you think any prison REALLY rehabilitates them? NO! WTF of course not, prison guards aren't concerned with helping prisoners and death row inmates CHANGE,
i maybe think now that putting them in prison is useless and that KILLING THEM is BETTER...but what I also believe is that there IS other ways ...
and about the karma...WTF someone kills your friend lets say, and then you advocate DEATH sentence on him, I think you are as bad and WORSE then him. and that your karma will actually be worse.
I've felt real vengeance before, been through the motions...
but let me ask you this:
Would you rather see the guy, FIXED as a human being,
or would you rather see him be (100%), ENDED as a human being.
I guess the ONLY question you can pose to that obvious ultimatum, is : What are the chances of him being FIXED?....
:cool:
THATS what we need to work on...get it to 90%+ and I think we have a good system....the problem is, if he isn't fixed that 10% of the time, he or she, could cause more deaths... comes down to having a SOLID method of rehabilitation or gambling with peoples lives,
and F putting people in jail for life, that's going to cost way too much. we just gotta be skillful or admit we aren't skillful enough
babies will act horribly foolish because of their limited understanding,
think of these killers as that, IDIOT BABIES who didn't know how to deal with things and probably didn't have a sangha to help them...
hell even I might have joined alqaida if I didn't have any friends or buddist online friends, BABIES look for a place to belong, psychology can get so F'd up...
led by ME, we will take over our governments, FORCE BUDDHISM ON PEOPLE for 200 years and after + during they will ALL understand why it was needed to happen...we will save the world..
we will use force, war, but we will do it Quickly and without HATE,
to achieve our goals...
Who will vote for THEFOUND??
I never vote for those who intersperse discursive text with unnecessary upper case....;)
Palzang