Judging the US?

 

Hum.  Complicated issue, capital punishment.   Very complicated. 

 

I’m sure we all know the story of the US revolution, probably called the uprising over there.  Whichever, it may help the rest of the world to understand the situation of why we seem to be such hypocrites about this very complicated issue.  Remember something important about the whole of the revolution:  Freedom.

 

Freedom is not just some Jessie Jackson type character preaching about the necessity to vote.  It’s not limited to being able to drive 200 kph down the interstate.  It’s not just about being able to stand up on a soapbox in the corner of a park and protest the war in Iraq.  Freedom really means the ability for an individual to dictate his own destiny.  This implication means more than simply tangible items.  It means that when I want to turn right, I do so, even though everyone else turns left.  It means that when I want a 50mm prime rib I can get a 50mm prime rib, even in the heart of the darkest vegetarian city (Like Berkeley California). 

 

It also means that it is my own responsibility to protect and defend my life.  Now, that’s a contradiction today, because society is largely filled with people that think individuals do not have the right to defend themselves.  The laws of this country are slowly slipping a noose over our freedom to self determination.   That’s where the death penalty plays its darker role.

 

You see if I’m not in charge of defending the life of those I love then who is?  If it’s the police and they fail, what’s my recourse?  Where is my freedom to do what was necessary?  Where is my sovereignty?  My right as soul bearer of this body to do what is righteous?

 

I accept my fate.  If in the process of being robbed I am killed, so be it.  It’s the nature of life to die, I’ve laid with lady death in her darkest sleep, she’s no stranger and I know that time will eventually creep away from me and life will become impossible.  I accept that.  But if the system says, sorry buddy, you no longer have the right to carry around that 100mm folding knife, then the system is saying that I do not have the right to defend my life and it better be ready to deal with those that would trod on such a gift with a heavy hand.  That’s the point really, we want our freedom and when something happens that steals it away, we are angry.  We are angry that such a thing could have happened.  We are angry that the system said it was all powerful and failed.  We are angry that no one really thought out the potential damage of such an attack!  We are angry and demand this ideological concept Justice…though it is really just masked revenge.  It’s still valid, because we are a free people and revenge onto itself is a valid option for a single soul. 

 

If a terrorist were to blow up my child’s school and kill him, would I be wrong in wanting to kill him in kind?  If the system captured him and sentenced him to prison, would I be wrong in not wanting to pay for his incarceration through the spending of my collected tax monies?  Would I be wrong in feeling jilted that the system merely slapped his wrist and decided that I the victim of his damage was to pay for him the rest of both our lives?  We wouldn’t stand for it!  To many such cases would only raise our ire to levels unseen in 200 years.

 

Yes, innocent people die.

It’s a terrible tragedy when innocent people die…but you attempt to argue that only those that are captured by the system are innocent. Have we forgotten about the victims? What about their lose of innocence, does it account for nothing? And I'm still not talking about the holy government, no! You need to understand that even though we are a society of law, we are still a society of free men, and it's coming to a point where we can't have both.

 

Yes, guilty men often repent.

It’s not about repentance, that’s a socialistic concept, and outside the ideas of our Country.  I’ve been repentant of not finishing college…yet it hasn’t changed the facts.  Personal responsibility is the key to self determination.

 

Yes, victims often feel the same loss after the guilty are murdered.

They have suffered a huge loss, why should they feel any solace?  The very idea that some how murdering the guilty is going to alter one’s feeling for the victim’s is arsine and reeks of kindergarten type reasoning.

 

Yes, I call capital punishment murder.

If some one came into my home at 2:30 in the morning wanting to harm my child or my wife, it would be murder that I did back onto them.  It would not be some sanitized definition like self defense.  I have zero tolerance for those that would damage the things that I love.  Such a person would just disappear from the world.  And if you are the type that would do nothing, but call the police, hoping for them to rescue you, then why are you even still alive?  Why do you waste my precious air by continuing to breathe if instead of standing up and yelling about your mortal greatness, leaving a mark, you cower to a corner of the room and wait for death or help.  What right then do you have to say anything about how those that rule society decide what to do with those that deviate from it?  In other words, if you are not willing to stand up and defend your own life against something that would have you dead, then you’re nothing but fodder anyway, waiting on the grand Uncle Screwtape to guide your soul in to a tight warm cubby.

Why should anyone even listen to you, when you are nothing but fodder? Why should I care about your opinion when I know that I could rise from the darkness and destroy you without a single ounce of resistance? Why should I care about you when you would live through the actions of others? You are already dead, only waiting now for your body to follow, who cares what simple thoughs you have toward the onset of evil, when you yourself would do nothing to stop it? It is a grand intellectaul injustice to stand up and claim superiority over the baseness of your fellow humans, but when they corner you and threaten to destroy you, instead of defending your thoughts you turn to the system to save you. That is true evil.