Utah proposing to bring back firing squad executions

[Metahive]

[I actually think dehumanizing the condemned is better for society as a whole. They killer gets no last bit of fame and glory, the executioner is spared some small measure of strain by being less involved in the death, and society gets to see that people worthy of being put to death have even the right to go out defiant and standing stripped from them. The only people hurt are, arguably, the condemned and anybody emotionally close to them; and I find that a small price to pay for the benefits gained.

The publicity of an execution and its "humanity" are not correlated. Good ol' hanging, drawing and quartering was done in public and was very humiliating (believe me, the so affected were not screaming FREEEEEEEDUM! while getting shown their own ripped out innards) while the murder cellars of most dictatorships were very discrete about the execution and yet still dehumanized their victims.

Also, dehumanization serves the purpose of making executions more justified, more "normal" and brands the victims of it as "other" that can be stripped of all human rights. It should NEVER be an aim when it comes to capital punishment.

[fgalkin]

Why is it dehumanizing to be pumped full of poison but not to be pumped full of bullets?

Because 1) it's using the same method as to kill animals 2) one dies alone in a room with no human contact.

For the record, I support using the firing squad as an execution method.

Have a very nice day.
-fgalkin

[Jub]

The publicity of an execution and its "humanity" are not correlated. Good ol' hanging, drawing and quartering was done in public and was very humiliating (believe me, the so affected were not screaming FREEEEEEEDUM! while getting shown their own ripped out innards) while the murder cellars of most dictatorships were very discrete about the execution and yet still dehumanized their victims.

Also, dehumanization serves the purpose of making executions more justified, more "normal" and brands the victims of it as "other" that can be stripped of all human rights. It should NEVER be an aim when it comes to capital punishment.

The execution dehumanizes people no matter how you do it. Your rights don't get much more stripped than having the right to life taken from you and a corpse can't exactly enjoy the freedoms of a human no matter how it was treated in the final pre-death moments. I'm not in support of some torturous sideshow execution, my feeling is that if people must die we should kill them swiftly and with a minimum of trauma to the condemned, the execution, the victims, those that knew the condemned, and everybody else involved. Of course the end goal should be to get to a place where we aren't killing people at all, but I doubt that the method of execution plays very much into that.

[Thanas]

I really don't see a way to botch nitrogen asphyxiation, considering that while it's happening, you don't even notice the fact that you are suffocating to death.

Slaughterhouses regularly botch nitrogen and CO2 asphyxiation for cattle and also regularly botch bolt gun shots. So yes, it seems to be possible to botch it.

[PKRudeBoy]

I really don't see a way to botch nitrogen asphyxiation, considering that while it's happening, you don't even notice the fact that you are suffocating to death.

Slaughterhouses regularly botch nitrogen and CO2 asphyxiation for cattle and also regularly botch bolt gun shots. So yes, it seems to be possible to botch it.

Do you have a source for this on the nitrogen asphyxiation, because I've been able to find some issues with co2 stunning, which isn't quite the same thing, but nothing involving nitrogen. Also, some animals are more sensitive to hypoxia then humans, as well as the fact that fuck ups for anything are more likely on an industrial scale. So I'll amend my statement to vastly more difficult to botch instead of impossible, since only Sith deal in absolutes.

[Alferd Packer]

The execution dehumanizes people no matter how you do it. Your rights don't get much more stripped than having the right to life taken from you and a corpse can't exactly enjoy the freedoms of a human no matter how it was treated in the final pre-death moments. I'm not in support of some torturous sideshow execution, my feeling is that if people must die we should kill them swiftly and with a minimum of trauma to the condemned, the execution, the victims, those that knew the condemned, and everybody else involved. Of course the end goal should be to get to a place where we aren't killing people at all, but I doubt that the method of execution plays very much into that.

I was going to say--killing someone is literally dehumanizing them. It's saying "You don't get to be a person anymore," and turning a living human being, by whatever method, into a pile of dead meat. Execution of criminals by the state is and should be no exception. Trying to rationalize the act is ultimately fruitless, because it still distills down to the core notion of annihilating a human being. If that is somehow unacceptable, well, tough. The alternative--life imprisonment with no possibility of parole--is dehumanizing to a lesser degree over a longer timeframe. It says, "You can still be a person until your natural death, but you need to be kept away from the rest of us because you're too dangerous." We don't take the person's life, but we do take just about everything else.

When handling the worst criminals, there really is no good choice. Execution or life imprisonment are horrible, dehumanizing punishments, and there is no amount of window dressing you can apply to them to escape this reality.

[Borgholio]

only Sith deal in absolutes

That itself is an absolute, thus you must be either Sith or wrong.

[Metahive]

The execution dehumanizes people no matter how you do it. Your rights don't get much more stripped than having the right to life taken from you and a corpse can't exactly enjoy the freedoms of a human no matter how it was treated in the final pre-death moments. I'm not in support of some torturous sideshow execution, my feeling is that if people must die we should kill them swiftly and with a minimum of trauma to the condemned, the execution, the victims, those that knew the condemned, and everybody else involved. Of course the end goal should be to get to a place where we aren't killing people at all, but I doubt that the method of execution plays very much into that.

If you declare someone to be inhuman vermin via dehumanization how do you justify giving them a quick and relatively dignified death? How do you argue against people who do want to see that "vermin" to be killed via torturous spectacle when you ultimately agree with them that they're filth? I don't think that's a position you can occupy with a good conscious.

[Jub]

If you declare someone to be inhuman vermin via dehumanization how do you justify giving them a quick and relatively dignified death? How do you argue against people who do want to see that "vermin" to be killed via torturous spectacle when you ultimately agree with them that they're filth? I don't think that's a position you can occupy with a good conscious.

What?!? I've already stated I'm opposed to the death penalty in general, my thought is that if you must do it make it clean and don't let the condemned make a scene of it.

[Simon_Jester]

Why is it dehumanizing to be pumped full of poison but not to be pumped full of bullets?

It is mostly a question of...

One, whether the death is by person rather than by a mechanism. A death inflicted by other humans can be met and understood on human terms; a machine for killing people is a machine for killing people. This may not matter to everyone, but it matters to many.

Two, because there is no realistic possibility of confronting death by lethal injection in a dignified manner; one is strapped to a gurney and wheeled into a room. Again, this may not matter to everyone, but it matters to many.

I actually think dehumanizing the condemned is better for society as a whole. They killer gets no last bit of fame and glory, the executioner is spared some small measure of strain by being less involved in the death, and society gets to see that people worthy of being put to death have even the right to go out defiant and standing stripped from them.

No, that is the opposite of the proper reasoning.

See, you imagine the death penalty in totalitarian terms: "the State will crush you to dust between its gears, insect. You are nothing, meriting nothing, with no rights and no dignity."

The death penalty fits into non-totalitarian societies in a different way. The key idea is that the person being put to death is a citizen, but a citizen who has failed in some critical duty, or acted in a uniquely vicious manner, by committing a crime against individuals or against the state. Even such a failed or vicious citizen still has certain rights, though. It's just that the right to life, specifically, is now forfeit.

The right to dignity remains.

EDIT: Not to say that I want the death penalty, I'm happy that Canada doesn't have it, but if you must have it why not make it as cold, detached, painless, and clinical as you can?

Because if we are going to have a cold, detached, sterile technotopia, the death penalty doesn't make sense in the first place. It is only in terms of a different attitude toward how to build a civilization altogether, with a different set of values, that any reasonable person would seriously consider the death penalty.

There are desirable things in the universe other than pain avoidance.

I was going to say--killing someone is literally dehumanizing them. It's saying "You don't get to be a person anymore," and turning a living human being, by whatever method, into a pile of dead meat. Execution of criminals by the state is and should be no exception. Trying to rationalize the act is ultimately fruitless, because it still distills down to the core notion of annihilating a human being. If that is somehow unacceptable, well, tough.

Again, the essential argument here is that there is such a thing as a 'human' death. "This is how to die like a man," in other words, to borrow from Stas.

It's a parallel to the argument behind physician assisted suicide.

You can lose your life without losing your dignity, and that's important to some people.

[Siege]

Because 1) it's using the same method as to kill animals

Why does it matter that this method is also used to kill other species? Besides, guns are used to kill animals too, and I wager than on average people who take their dying pet to the vet to be euthanized would prefer it be done with a syringe instead of a bullet. But when killing humans the gun is preferable? Why?

2) one dies alone in a room with no human contact.

So how about if the person that sticks the needle in stays in the room?

One, whether the death is by person rather than by a mechanism. A death inflicted by other humans can be met and understood on human terms; a machine for killing people is a machine for killing people. This may not matter to everyone, but it matters to many.

Guns are also machines designed for killing people. I don't understand how a squad of persons lining up with high powered rifles is significantly different in this respect than a person sticking a needle in your veins.

Two, because there is no realistic possibility of confronting death by lethal injection in a dignified manner; one is strapped to a gurney and wheeled into a room. Again, this may not matter to everyone, but it matters to many.

Whereas in your preferred execution method we strap someone to a pole in front of a wall and proceed to blow their head off. How is that a more dignified way to confront death than to be aware of the needle going in?

By all means give executees a choice in the matter, and if they choose the firing squad then I hope the shooters get counseling and the cleaning people are paid extra. But I have difficulty understanding the argument that death by rifle is less dehumanizing than death by poison. The state has decided certain people are unfit for existence; it seems a little late to worry about dehumanization at that stage.

[Broomstick]

Because 1) it's using the same method as to kill animals

Why does it matter that this method is also used to kill other species?

My guess is that killing humans the same way we kill cattle is disturbingly close to treating the condemned as potential food to some people, triggering issues about cannibalism. Or it could be purely cultural tradition.

Besides, guns are used to kill animals too, and I wager than on average people who take their dying pet to the vet to be euthanized would prefer it be done with a syringe instead of a bullet. But when killing humans the gun is preferable? Why?[/quote
Actually, the further you get out into rural America the more likely the folks are to do their own euthanizing, and do it with a gun. Certainly, after an animal vs. vehicle accident where the animal is mortally wounded a gun is the preferred method of putting it out of its misery, largely because one is likely to be readily available when the police show up if not before and thus it's expedient and quicker than attempting to transport an animal to a vet for an injection.

Guns are also machines designed for killing people. I don't understand how a squad of persons lining up with high powered rifles is significantly different in this respect than a person sticking a needle in your veins.

Why was death by hanging once considered more shameful than death by axe or sword? Once upon a time nobility and royals were put to death by beheading and the common trash by rope. That's a cultural thing.

[K. A. Pital]

I wager than on average people who take their dying pet to the vet to be euthanized would prefer it be done with a syringe instead of a bullet. But when killing humans the gun is preferable? Why?

Well, exactly because the human is not a pet. There are some things which matter to humans. Such as, for example, looking your killer in the eye as he executes you. Being able to shout your last words out before a platoon of armed men who may retell them later, thus giving you a final say - something pets don't get when they are put to sleep. The leader of Catalonia in the Spanish Civil War shouted a rallying cry before being shot by the fascists on top of the hill overlooking Barcelona. His words are important to people even now long after he is dead, but if he was put to sleep in a deep dungeon, how would the world know this? Untold prisoners who perished while being executed by other methods than firing squad never had their final say. On the other hand, many of those who were executed by firing squad are well-known and so are their last words.

That is just one example, there are other considerations of such kind, too.

[Siege]

My guess is that killing humans the same way we kill cattle is disturbingly close to treating the condemned as potential food to some people, triggering issues about cannibalism.

But if this is true then it's more about the unease of the executioners, not so much about the dehumanization of the executee. Which is a different kettle of fish entirely. I think most of us here are against the death penalty, and so could agree that if killing people makes the killers uncomfortable, rather than looking into a different way of killing they should be looking into not killing at all?

Why was death by hanging once considered more shameful than death by axe or sword? Once upon a time nobility and royals were put to death by beheading and the common trash by rope. That's a cultural thing.

If I had to venture a guess I'd say it probably had to do with the perceived reliability or swiftness of the execution method. Cutting someone's head off was - ignoring botch jobs for a moment - understood to be quick and comparatively painless whereas hanging, with all that flopping about that a body does, was not. I'm not sure they were entirely right but at the core this strikes me as a fair enough argument: a painless and efficient execution is preferable to a hurtful drawn out mess. Thing is, I'm not so certain gunfire is superior in that manner, and I don't see how it's any more or less dehumanizing than poisoning someone to death.

There are some things which matter to humans. Such as, for example, looking your killer in the eye as he executes you. Being able to shout your last words out before a platoon of armed men who may retell them later, thus giving you a final say - something pets don't get when they are put to sleep.

We have the words of people hanged, electrocuted, crushed to death, gassed, guillotined or executed in many another awful manner. Here's a list. Method of execution has no impact whatsoever on something like a person's final words becoming well known, because that depends not on them or on the manner of execution but solely on whether those words were recorded and published post mortem or not. As the list demonstrates there's plenty people who died via lethal injection whose last words we know too. Clearly the firing squad is no different from the gallows or the electric chair in this respect.

[K. A. Pital]

Hmm, I think that while it is possible that the US gives some criminals the last word, other nations may not and the only way word gets out is if there are many witnesses (as there usually as with a shooting). I also wonder if it is a perception issue, but generally we consider the gallows and/or chemical execution a less dignified way to be executed rather than shooting. Poison was seen as a covert and low weapon during the ages, and I would say this perception still impacts it now. Even I myself shudder at the thought of being poisoned but somehow I didn't really fear being shot all that much.

Maybe it is just me and people will some day realize what is good for animals is also good enough for them. However, the swiftness of poison death will probably stay in doubt a while longer, as we are still figuring things out about our brain.

[Broomstick]

My guess is that killing humans the same way we kill cattle is disturbingly close to treating the condemned as potential food to some people, triggering issues about cannibalism.

But if this is true then it's more about the unease of the executioners, not so much about the dehumanization of the executee. Which is a different kettle of fish entirely. I think most of us here are against the death penalty, and so could agree that if killing people makes the killers uncomfortable, rather than looking into a different way of killing they should be looking into not killing at all?

Why are you assuming it's the executioners that are uncomfortable? State-sanctioned executions have audiences, either overt ones back when such an event was a public spectacle and entertainment or the more modern version where there is a panel of people selected to witness the execution, with the general public at one remove but usually still receiving quite a bit of information about the killing.

Executioners, particularly professional ones, can become quite inured to killing.

Why was death by hanging once considered more shameful than death by axe or sword? Once upon a time nobility and royals were put to death by beheading and the common trash by rope. That's a cultural thing.

If I had to venture a guess I'd say it probably had to do with the perceived reliability or swiftness of the execution method. Cutting someone's head off was - ignoring botch jobs for a moment - understood to be quick and comparatively painless whereas hanging, with all that flopping about that a body does, was not. I'm not sure they were entirely right but at the core this strikes me as a fair enough argument: a painless and efficient execution is preferable to a hurtful drawn out mess. Thing is, I'm not so certain gunfire is superior in that manner, and I don't see how it's any more or less dehumanizing than poisoning someone to death.

Hanging typically had one of three outcomes:

1) Person hangs and basically strangles to death.
2) A "clean hang" where the neck is snapped at either the atlas joint or at the C1 or C2 vertebrae. This typically produces unconsciousness followed quickly by death with no struggling.
3) The drop phase is too long and/or sudden, resulting in a decapitation.

Aside from deliberate sadism, which was more a feature of ad-hoc mobs, lynching, and non-professional executions, the desired outcome, particularly for governments, was the "clean hang". There was a considerable body of knowledge developed in Europe regarding the type of rope, pre-treatment of same, calculations in regards to the weight of the condemned, and so forth to optimize hanging. It was quite the science, and well documented enough that when a condemned men in Washington State and Delaware opted for hanging in the 1990's the old information was used to ensure clean hangs in those executions.

A clean hang is as quick and merciful as beheading, possibly more so given there is some evidence that decapitated heads can retain consciousness for a brief period.

In pre-modern times the status of hanging vs. beheading was about social status and privilege, not the mercy involved in the death.

I don't think feelings regarding methods of execution are typically rational

[PKRudeBoy]

Why was death by hanging once considered more shameful than death by axe or sword? Once upon a time nobility and royals were put to death by beheading and the common trash by rope. That's a cultural thing.

If I had to venture a guess I'd say it probably had to do with the perceived reliability or swiftness of the execution method. Cutting someone's head off was - ignoring botch jobs for a moment - understood to be quick and comparatively painless whereas hanging, with all that flopping about that a body does, was not. I'm not sure they were entirely right but at the core this strikes me as a fair enough argument: a painless and efficient execution is preferable to a hurtful drawn out mess. Thing is, I'm not so certain gunfire is superior in that manner, and I don't see how it's any more or less dehumanizing than poisoning someone to death..

I'm fairly certain it was due to the nobilities origin as a warrior class. Death by the sword is how warriors die in battle, so therefore more honorable.

[General Brock]

I would very much prefer to die like a man rather than being put to sleep like a mad dog.

Um, well, some of these death row folks don't really deserve that much consideration.

That said, yeah, totally against the death penalty. A firing squad just gets more hands dirty.

If its going to be done, minimize the damage all-round. Asphyxiation seems the best way to go about this.

But again, ending the death penalty would be the best solution, and avoids problems like accidentally executing more or less innocent people.

[Simon_Jester]

One, whether the death is by person rather than by a mechanism. A death inflicted by other humans can be met and understood on human terms; a machine for killing people is a machine for killing people. This may not matter to everyone, but it matters to many.

Guns are also machines designed for killing people. I don't understand how a squad of persons lining up with high powered rifles is significantly different in this respect than a person sticking a needle in your veins.

In the customary US system, the poisons are administered through an IV drip precisely because they don't want to have an actual human being personally walk up and stick a syringe full of poison into you; the actual poison is being hooked up by a technician in another room while the IVs go into your arms.

By all means give executees a choice in the matter, and if they choose the firing squad then I hope the shooters get counseling and the cleaning people are paid extra. But I have difficulty understanding the argument that death by rifle is less dehumanizing than death by poison. The state has decided certain people are unfit for existence; it seems a little late to worry about dehumanization at that stage.

I think that question depends on your specific beliefs about what 'death with dignity' means. It may be impossible to resolve between people who don't share a whole overall value set.

I would very much prefer to die like a man rather than being put to sleep like a mad dog.

Um, well, some of these death row folks don't really deserve that much consideration.

The point is kind of that everyone deserves that type of consideration, in that it is this consideration that distinguishes between humans and animals. If we perceive no essential difference between humans and animals, and we are okay with executing people, then using "human slaughterhouse" techniques starts to make more sense. If we do perceive such a difference, it becomes more disturbing and inappropriate.

[Siege]

Why are you assuming it's the executioners that are uncomfortable?

Because I believe the people share collective responsibility for the actions of the government they elected. So by executioners in this particular case I was referring to the people who elect governments that sanction executions. Which is a shorthand that, on second thought, I should've explained. So to restate, if the people are uncomfortable with killing then maybe the people should consider not killing, rather than look for ways to kill that lull them into a false sense of 'we're not actually killing it's the machine we built to kill that kills'.

I think that question depends on your specific beliefs about what 'death with dignity' means. It may be impossible to resolve between people who don't share a whole overall value set.

Yes, I am aware that value sets differ between people. That's why I'm asking why according to yours death by one particular machine is more dehumanizing than death by the other. For the record, I'd agree with you if the state of Utah was feeding executees into a contraption from the Saw movies, but that's because my position is that I'm against the death penalty but if one is going to have it anyway then the most painless, efficient and least-intrusive method of execution is preferable.

[Simon_Jester]

Well, for one, it removes the "we're not actually killing it's the machine we built to kill that kills" aspect. There is a very direct, personal, and causal relationship between being shot by a person pulling a trigger. Especially compared to the customary lethal injection procedure in the US, which is elaborate and has several different technicians performing different steps of the process in an attempt to diffuse responsibility and prevent any one person from fully controlling or even fully seeing the mechanism of death. Even to the extent that this makes the execution method potentially less reliable, because having the substances to be injected in the next room over and fed into the patient remotely is hardly the most efficient way to handle IV drips.

So at best Utah would have to drastically alter its process for lethal injection in order for the process to be anything other than dehumanizing.

There is, moreover, the objection that being doped and poisoned to death is somehow more debasing than being shot. Or that transitioning from life to unconsciousness to death is somehow more degrading than transitioning directly (or with a space of a few seconds) from consciousness to death. Or that being given the opportunity to speak directly and personally to a group that very directly represents one's killers immediately before death is somehow desirable and promotes the condemned's dignity.

All this is not a rational objection and I am conceding that it is not. However, it is an objection many people seem to share emotionally, even if I personally cannot find a good way to justify it as yet.

So that objection (and the preference for firing squad) might well be shared by some of the condemned themselves (including or even especially hardened criminals). Since I suspect Utah will make it a choice between lethal injections and firing squads, as other states have done with multiple modes of execution in the past, that preference may still carry weight with you even if I fail to figure out how to explain it to you.

[K. A. Pital]

I am also of the opinion that dying painlessly (well, or at least painlessly to the best of our knowledge) should be offered to people always. But if someone chooses to kill himself in a way he finds more dignified, even if it causes him more suffering before death, the choice should lie with the executioned. It is kind of like with euthanasia. If a person wants to live in pain several weeks more, he should be granted that wish. If he wishes to die without pain, then it is up to him to call the doctors.

Abolishing the death penalty is a good idea, but whenever it is still present and nowhere near to be abolished, I believe the people should have some choice as to how they are executed.

[General Brock]

I would very much prefer to die like a man rather than being put to sleep like a mad dog.

Um, well, some of these death row folks don't really deserve that much consideration.

The point is kind of that everyone deserves that type of consideration, in that it is this consideration that distinguishes between humans and animals. If we perceive no essential difference between humans and animals, and we are okay with executing people, then using "human slaughterhouse" techniques starts to make more sense. If we do perceive such a difference, it becomes more disturbing and inappropriate.

Oh, well, that's not the meaning I took from Stas. Dying 'like a man' implies a person having lived like a worthy human being and deserving of a high implied level of consideration in incarceration and death despite their crimes. Most death row types don't have that going for them.

Real mad dogs usually are shot on sight the way rogue but otherwise healthy animals are shot. People deserve a fair trial at least, especially where guilt is disputed. America's present-day drone assassination program doesn't grant fair trials let alone sufficient protection for bystanders. Treating human life callously is a cultural reality that maybe needs toning back a little.

As important as it is to respect human rights, those that have proven they can not and will not do so, need to be treated with extra caution. There's no nice way to kill someone in cold blood, even in something like an assisted suicide. Anecdotally, the suffering of condemned inmates in executions is sometimes considered "good for them" by no few people; such vindictiveness isn't a very socially healthy sentiment to encourage.

Unlike an assisted suicide, death penalty recipients are usually only figuratively asking for it. Remove the death penalty and allowing the convicts to live out the rest of their lives in civil confinement where they can do no further mortal harm, and limiting the psychological fallout, seems far better for social health. Giving them the option for an assisted suicide might be the closest one would want to the death penalty. In this sense, the human being, no matter how warped, is still treated separate from a different animal.

Yet, there are those who argue that some animals deserve 'non-human persons' rights, if only for our own good more than theirs.

The benefits to an institutionalized cruelty like the death penalty seem limited to saving a few bucks on bodies incarcerated and gratuitous revenge, not instilling a sense of the value of human life.

[General Brock]

Why was death by hanging once considered more shameful than death by axe or sword? Once upon a time nobility and royals were put to death by beheading and the common trash by rope. That's a cultural thing.

If I had to venture a guess I'd say it probably had to do with the perceived reliability or swiftness of the execution method. Cutting someone's head off was - ignoring botch jobs for a moment - understood to be quick and comparatively painless whereas hanging, with all that flopping about that a body does, was not. I'm not sure they were entirely right but at the core this strikes me as a fair enough argument: a painless and efficient execution is preferable to a hurtful drawn out mess. Thing is, I'm not so certain gunfire is superior in that manner, and I don't see how it's any more or less dehumanizing than poisoning someone to death..

I'm fairly certain it was due to the nobilities origin as a warrior class. Death by the sword is how warriors die in battle, so therefore more honorable.

I tend to agree. A political execution sends a message and is less about the comfort level of the victim and more about the survivors remembering who died well and who didn't.

[General Brock]

Well, the weekend is timing out, and it will be days before I gets back to this thread, if ever. So here are some interesting history-lite minded links for the curious:

History and information on the death penalty can be found at deathpenaltyinfo.org.. The Wiki has a secion on the historical practice of decapitation.

Much of what we understand to be the modern sentiment of crime and punishment as rehabilitaton can be traced to the Enlightenment economist and criminologist Cesare Beccaria. From his Wiki entry:

He openly condemned the death penalty on two grounds:

first, because the state does not possess the right to take lives; and
secondly, because capital punishment is neither a useful nor a necessary form of punishment.

Beccaria developed in his treatise a number of innovative and influential principles:

punishment had a preventive (deterrent), not a retributive, function;
punishment should be proportionate to the crime committed;
the probability of punishment, not its severity, would achieve the preventive effect;
procedures of criminal convictions should be public; and finally,
in order to be effective, punishment should be prompt.

He also argued against gun control laws. He was among the first to advocate the beneficial influence of education in lessening crime.

Beccaria has never really been proven wrong. His ideas seem displaced by the prison industrial complex, but remain pertinent to this day.

The Nonhuman Rights Project, regardless of what some may think of the idea, exists. As does the phenomenon of Zoosadism and possible links to human sociopathy.

NBC did a story on the fiscal cost of the death penalty, and it turns out that the death penalty is not a cost savings opposed to life imprisonment. Something of a surprise but attributable to the lengthy appeals process, which is itself hard on victim's families since they have to relive the trial experience every time.

Innocent people still end up in death row. The article also recounts the experience of Gordon Steidl, who found the peaceful isolation of death row preferable to release into the excessively violent general prison population. Prison reform is beyond the scope of this thread, but the system generally could be said to be failing society.