Osler's Razor

My understanding is that he was grandfathered in to the old law, which permitted inmates to choose their method of execution. An inmate sentenced today or after the change in law may no longer select this method of execution.
 

Is there a distinction? Yes; in assisted suicide, the patient chooses to die. The condemned are given no such choice. Regardless, taking a life (including your own) is always a moral wrong, even if sometimes we must permit it.

Is it worse than lethal injection? No; the people that take the shots make them as clean a death as possible.
 

Whether or not it is morally equivalent is debatable, but there can be no doubt that a striking logical disparity exists. In assisted suicide, the person chooses not the method of death, per se, but simply that they want to die. A willing participant then administers death utilizing a variety of methods. In criminal execution under the Utah statute, such as it applies to individuals like Ronnie Lee Gardner, the person chooses not that they wish to die, but rather how they wish to die, with the former being decided by the state. The logical difference, then, is a question of innocence and guilt. Perhaps the same applies to the question of moral equivalence.
 

I initially had the same thought as Lane and Anon re: the distinction between this and assisted suicide, which is that in this case the inmate does not "choose" to die.

Yet, just for arguments sake, isn't this a distinction without a difference. In the assisted suicide situation, at least in the scenario most often offered up by proponents of assisted suicide, the person asking to have their life ended is terminally ill. They aren't choosing to die. They have already been given a death sentence. They have no other choice. So, aren't they, just like this inmate, merely choosing the method of their death. Whether it will be slow, painful, and by natural means or quick, painless, and through the assistance of a medical professional.

When we are talking about people for whom death is a certainty, what is the distinction?
 

The distinction for me goes in to the motivations. I have no doubt that there are people in tremendous pain that wish for a quick, easy and painless end. But I also fear that there will be people that will opt for assisted suicide to spare their families the burden of caring for them during the final stages of illness. I'd hate to think that someone's loved one ended their life for that reason, and so I'm more comfortable with finding a way to make terminal illness more comfortable than providing people the choice to die.

That's not to say I don't understand and respect the "die with dignity" arguments. And I do not think we can draw an equivalence between an execution and assisted suicide in just that regard: the condemned, were they given a choice, would (almost universally) choose to live. So would the terminally ill. But the condemned put themselves in their present situation. The ill did not.
 

Lane said:

I have no doubt that there are people in tremendous pain that wish for a quick, easy and painless end. But I also fear that there will be people that will opt for assisted suicide to spare their families the burden of caring for them during the final stages of illness.

Why should it be considered wrong to spare families the burden? Isn't this the last, caring act of a loving person? How selfish is it to put your family through this agony when it can be avoided?

I cannot stress enough how selfish it is of someone with alzheimers, a vegistative state due to stroke or injury, or any other cause, to continue to drag their family through an almost endless agony just to go on existing - not truly living - just existing. The emotional pain, the financial burden, the hopelessness - how could a loving person condemn their alleged loved ones to such a horror?

I have discussed this with my family at length, and tho I hope I never have to make this choice, I would do so in a heartbeat if I am ever condemned to such a living death.

Lee

I think the only problem with the death penalty is the lack of a prompt and certain end - the endless appeals are a travesty.
 

Anon continued:
RRL, to extend your argument (ad absurdum) the difficult truth that we must recognize is that death is a certainty for all of us. In that way, one might conclude that suicide at any point in life or health is simply choosing how and when to die, not if. One might further conclude that there is more dignity in death as a young, healthy person than as an elderly decrepit with cancer.
Therein lies the distinction (well, at least one distinction). Assisted suicide is still a choice to die sooner rather than later, with the alternative being to die later rather than sooner.
In execution, you have no choice as to if and when you will die, only—in certain circumstances—how.
To me, the more difficult question to answer is “what is the distinction between execution and murder?” You might say that obviously the murderer has malicious intent, and the state is bound by the unbiased, impartial rule of law (i.e. blindfolded lady justice). But reality allows for retribution to play a heavy role in capital punishment.
Furthermore, you might say that in murder an innocent victim is the target, and in execution there is a guilty criminal strapped to the chair/the table/downrange. But in each case an external entity has taken charge, from another, of what has been referred to as an “unalienable right” to life.
 

How come no one ever invokes Malthus in these debates? As to demanding a firing squad, I like the guy's style. And no, it's not as humane as a lethal injection, because there is no needle sterilization prior to injection.
 

I get tired of all this debate about the humaneness of different methods of capital punishment. Is lethal injection more humane, even tho they still haven't quite figured out how to do it quickly and quietly? Or is the guillotine more humane because it's super fast and super effective, tho a little messier?

When we talk about the humaneness of the different methods, aren't we really just talking about which methods make us feel the least icky?
 

I'm curious, does anyone know how many people made up the firing squad? And do they all shoot live rounds? Because I argue that if there are 6 guards that must shoot, they have all been placed in an uncomfortable position of facing this prisoner during his time of death and not knowing if they fired the lethal shot.

In that regard I think that a prisoner being able to choose this method was able to get under the skin of his imprisoners and make them carry the burden of his death. Other methods of death for an inmate expose the guards far less than this method.

Is their a distinction bewteen the two; this and assisted suicide? For me yes, in the level of humanity of all those involved.
 

Christine - There were five shooters in the firing squad, all of which were volunteer police officers.

I am vehemently opposed to the death penalty. However, I give Jeremy credit for saying what I wish I could have when I first heard about this. I cringe each time a man is put to death by lethal injection in Huntsville, which happens too frequently for my taste. But, to be honest, the method used in Utah caused me to do more than cringe. I know that it was/could have been less painful. I understand it was his choice. Still, as barbaric as the death penalty seems, the idea of a firing squad gives me a chill.
 

Personally, I'd prefer a firing squad to lethal injection.

As to the other, until you've walked with a loved one all the way to the end, you don't know that there are unexpected gifts in a long, drawn-out illness.
 

I think in the firing squad, one of the shooters has a blank, but none of the shooters know who has the blank. Guess doubt helps you sleep better at night.
 

No, doubt doesn't help you sleep. Sometimes even knowing the guy is guilty, unable to be reformed, and that all you did was something small in the great chain of events that lead to his death. Certainty that it wasn't you that pulled the trigger won't help you sleep.

You still wake up sweating.
 

Have to agree with Lane; by chosing this method of execution RLG transfered some haunted culpability onto the 'unknown' shooters. I would not sleep well at night.

And thanks to Anon 8:55pm for your information.
 

Or . . . you are one of the many, many sociopaths keeping the streets clean with your own peculiar mix of officially sanctioned justice and vigilantism. Now you get a chance to wipe some scum off the face of the earth and get a pat on the back from the guys upstairs? And all you have to do is keep from smirking when they tell everyone how proud they are of you for your sacrifice.

I would lose sleep if I were assigned to the firing squad, but I doubt the volunteers will. I even doubt this is their first kill, though it may be the first official one.

We live in a very ugly world, quoth the resident of Baltimore.
 

Jeremy, while those people exist (I work with 'em) there are also many people that feel that if the State has to wield awesome power to deprive people of liberty and possibly life, then it ought to be ethical men and women who wield that power.

They're the ones that can't sleep at night, and thank the High Father that they don't.
 

Megan -

I've walked with several friends and relatives thru a long illness, alzheimers, etc., and found no gifts or joy - just pain, suffering, and a longing for death that society denies them, unless someone manages to help them die.

Whatever these 'gifts' could possibly be, I hope me and mine are spared them!

Lee