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Should Charles Manson be released?

Should Charles Manson be released?

  • Yes

    Votes: 14 42.4%
  • No

    Votes: 19 57.6%

  • Total voters
    33

jameslikespie

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What is there to discuss? Did something happen in the news? He killed a bunch of people. No, he should not be released.

But is there any real point to keeping him in prison anymore other than revenge? I don't really think he's a threat to humanity any more...
 

ApostateAbe

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The primary purpose of prison is NOT to keep dangerous people out of society. That is the secondary (often overblown and abused) purpose. The primary purpose of prison is to deter crime among those outside of prison by dealing punishment to criminals inside of prison. Letting Manson out of prison sends the message that the punishment for multiple murders is not so bad. Prison succeeds in that purpose. Therefore, he should not be let out. Moreover, he should have been executed.
 

jameslikespie

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The primary purpose of prison is NOT to keep dangerous people out of society. That is the secondary (often overblown and abused) purpose. The primary purpose of prison is to deter crime among those outside of prison by dealing punishment to criminals inside of prison. Letting Manson out of prison sends the message that the punishment for multiple murders is not so bad. Prison succeeds in that purpose. Therefore, he should not be let out. Moreover, he should have been executed.

He should have been executed? Not to get into a death penalty argument, but the statistics show that capital punishment doesn't lessen crime rates.
 

ApostateAbe

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He should have been executed? Not to get into a death penalty argument, but the statistics show that capital punishment doesn't lessen crime rates.
Not to get into a death penalty argument, but let's get into a death penalty argument. :p
 

ApostateAbe

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Google Scholar has indexed many of the abstracts of the studies of the relationship between capital punishment and deterrence of capital crime, and the studies seem to consistently show a strong positive correlation. Here are those search results:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?start=10&q=capital+punishment+deterrence&hl=en&as_sdt=0,25

You can use Google Scholar to hunt down the studies that you may have had in mind that showed the opposite. I have access to the full texts of many of the articles through the online subscriptions of my school network, and I can relay you those studies if you would like to get into the details.
 

jameslikespie

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Google Scholar has indexed many of the abstracts of the studies of the relationship between capital punishment and deterrence of capital crime, and the studies seem to consistently show a strong positive correlation. Here are those search results:

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?start=10&q=capital+punishment+deterrence&hl=en&as_sdt=0,25

You can use Google Scholar to hunt down the studies that you may have had in mind that showed the opposite. I have access to the full texts of many of the articles through the online subscriptions of my school network, and I can relay you those studies if you would like to get into the details.

Meh, not going to get into a DP argument, nothing will come out of it.
 

ApostateAbe

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Meh, not going to get into a DP argument, nothing will come out of it.
OK, that's cool. I think penalties against criminals serve a fundamental purpose for a peaceful functional society, which is the deterrence of crime. Prison is one of those penalties. Prison is NOT designed primarily to separate criminals from everyone else, nor is it designed primarily as a method of revenge. It is designed as a way to control behavior.
 

thoumyvision

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Meh, not going to get into a DP argument, nothing will come out of it.

This is pretty relevant, actually, because it highlights the major differences in people's views of punishment.

What is the purpose of punishment? Some would say the betterment of society, either by removing the criminal from society as you suggested, or providing deterrence as Abe suggested. Many people, however, feel that punishment is simply what the criminal deserves. Judicial punishment is a wage earned just as much as money for work, and to take away that wage would be as unjust as taking a worker's pay.

So, did Charles Manson deserve his punishment, and, if so, has he done anything to merit it being rescinded?

Persons who object to capital punishment either have to argue that punishment is not intrinsically deserved apart from social considerations, or they have to argue that it is impossible to earn death for any particular action. I would say that either of those arguments are untenable positions.
 

NoID10ts

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Manson didn't actually commit the murders, but he definitely inspired the pack of impressionable youngsters who did. Should that make a difference on whether he should be paroled?

Personally, I think they should keep him in a cage and parade him around the country charging admission to see him rant and rave. That guy is entertaining as hell in a "so weird I can't look away" sense and would probably fetch a lot of money.

All proceeds would go to the victim's families, of course, except for a small cut that would go to me because it's my idea.
 

Melllvar

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What is the purpose of punishment? Some would say the betterment of society, either by removing the criminal from society as you suggested, or providing deterrence as Abe suggested. Many people, however, feel that punishment is simply what the criminal deserves. Judicial punishment is a wage earned just as much as money for work, and to take away that wage would be as unjust as taking a worker's pay.

I think you're missing one, there are three primary reasons that I'm aware of explaining why we would punish criminals:

1) Retribution/revenge.
2) Rehabilitation/behavior modification.
3) Segregation from the rest of society.

There is a fourth reason which is, I think, the real reason behind the US 'criminal justice' system:

4) Profitability.

Of these four, the reason we publicly tout is rehabilitation (hence its being called the 'Department of Corrections'). It seems fairly obvious however that this is purely hypocritical, and that to the extent this is even a priority at all, it is the least of them. Prison actually seems to function in the opposite role, educating criminals and forcing them into a position where further criminal activity is their best option.

I won't bother going into the pros/cons of the other options.

thoumyvision said:
Persons who object to capital punishment either have to argue that punishment is not intrinsically deserved apart from social considerations, or they have to argue that it is impossible to earn death for any particular action. I would say that either of those arguments are untenable positions.

Nah, there are other arguments. For example, that the judicial system is too inherently flawed and biased to ever apply such a punishment fairly.

Nothing personal, but as a tangential thought, it always amazes me how Christians seem to give such widespread support for the death penalty, despite it being effectively against the teachings of their supposed messiah. If you care to enlighten me how they justify this, feel free to PM it or something (as this thread is getting off-topic quickly enough as is).
 

Aramea

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Those in favor of capital punishment must establish a metric for tolerance of "false postives". Executing the innocent has ramifications that we can all appreciate, aka "it could happen to me".
 

EyeSeeCold

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Him staying in prison is more a matter of maintaining boundaries than ethical consideration. Sure no one probably even cares anymore, and he might not have the capability nor interest to do anything more criminal, however, it's not the role of the penal system to be soft and hand out reliefs like an empathetic human.


I suppose I would release him, maybe on an island or something.
 

Aramea

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Him staying in prison is more a matter of maintaining boundaries than ethical consideration. Sure no one probably even cares anymore, and he might not have the capability nor interest to do anything more criminal, however, it's not the role of the penal system to be soft and hand out reliefs like an empathetic human.


I suppose I would release him, maybe on an island or something.

I forgot the original question. Manson is batshit crazy and should probably remain locked up. I would like to see the girls released. They realized how fucking stupid they were very early in their prison terms and playing "Lucy and the Football" with their parole once a year seems a bit extreme. Susan Atkins is dead. They even let out the one that tried to kill Ford.
 

jameslikespie

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I forgot the original question. Manson is batshit crazy and should probably remain locked up. I would like to see the girls released. They realized how fucking stupid they were very early in their prison terms and playing "Lucy and the Football" with their parole once a year seems a bit extreme. Susan Atkins is dead. They even let out the one that tried to kill Ford.

So, free the girls who did the crimes, but keep the person who simply told them to do it in prison for 42 years? *Sigh*.

I've always wanted to talk to him, he just seems interesting.
 

Cheeseumpuffs

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Do it Ancient Greece style

Kill people for any crime.

That'll keep people from doing it.
 

Aramea

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So, free the girls who did the crimes, but keep the person who simply told them to do it in prison for 42 years? *Sigh*.

I've always wanted to talk to him, he just seems interesting.

*shrug*

Watch the interviews with Manson and the girls. I can see that Manson is as crazy as he was the day he was arrested and they are little old ladies that realized they were played. Read up on the Manson murders. I would be all in favor of letting him out but I think that there is a very strong chance that he would immeidately start shit. It is merely a "hunch" :storks: ...
 

ApostateAbe

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Those in favor of capital punishment must establish a metric for tolerance of "false postives". Executing the innocent has ramifications that we can all appreciate, aka "it could happen to me".
Capital punishment is the best moral option if:

x > wy

x is the proportion of people in a society without capital punishment who are murdered because of the lack of deterrent.

y is the proportion of innocent people who are executed in a society with capital punishment.

w is the weighting coefficient of y such that the moral value of wy (innocent people executed) is equal to x (the number of innocent people killed because of lack of deterrent).

If the life of a person in the x group is morally equally to the life of a person in the y group, then b=1.

Studies consistently show that the death penalty has a significant deterrent effect on murder. For example, one study concluded in 2003 that "each execution results, on average, in eighteen fewer murders—with a margin of error of plus or minus ten" (Does Capital Punishment Have a Deterrent Effect? New Evidence from Postmoratorium Panel Data).

In this case, 18 is the multiple of innocent lives saved to executed prisoners killed. So, that forces w has to be at least around 18 in order for the inequality to be false. An innocent human life on the right side has to be worth more than 18 times the life of an innocent person on the left side.

We are not done yet, however. The right side of the inequality is made much smaller because not every executed criminal is innocent. If we were to speculate that a tenth of all executed criminals were innocent, then we would be forcing w to be multiplied by 10.

The life of an innocent person who is wrongfully executed by the state has to be worth 180 times more than the life of an innocent person who is brutally murdered by a criminal.

There are two rooms. In one room, you have one innocent man.In the other room, you have 180 innocent men, women and children. If you do nothing, then the 180 people will be brutally slain. If you kill the one innocent man, then the 180 people will live on. What do you do? If you value human life far more than you hate having "blood on my hands," then you kill the one. Otherwise, you let the one innocent man go free and the 180 people be slain. From the perspective of an unemotional moral machine, the choice is clear. From the perspective of a fallible moral creature with a sensitive but near-sighted conscience, maybe you just don't have it in you.
 

Aramea

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Risk Analysis has two components, impact and likelihood. Despite the fact that the likelihood of being wrongly executed is low the impact is very high. Using your formula I am only marginally safer from murder if executions are allowed. I suck at math but I am not convinced the risk is worth the marginal increase in safety given the impact of a mistake.

The above depends on the validity of that study. It would take an additional study to assess the deterrent of life w/o parole. I know of no one personally that would go ahead and murder someone if it was "only" possible to get LWP. It is a penalty that most of us would not prefer to receive.
 

ApostateAbe

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Risk Analysis has two components, impact and likelihood. Despite the fact that the likelihood of being wrongly executed is low the impact is very high. Using your formula I am only marginally safer from murder if executions are allowed. I suck at math but I am not convinced the risk is worth the marginal increase in safety given the impact of a mistake.

The above depends on the validity of that study. It would take an additional study to assess the deterrent of life w/o parole. I know of no one personally that would go ahead and murder someone if it was "only" possible to get LWP. It is a penalty that most of us would not prefer to receive.
The formula has nothing to do with the increase in safety, but it has to do with the salvation of innocent lives. If we are concerned primarily with saving innocent lives, then the death penalty is very clearly the superior option. Your increase in safety is only marginal, yes, as with every state policy decision, but the position is fully justified in terms of our primary values. If you wish to defend your position against the death penalty, then you must explain and justify how allowing 180 innocent people be murdered is better than killing one innocent life, or else you must explain and justify how the inequality is inaccurate and how a more accurate inequality is in favor of your position. You are the one who requested that defenders of the death penalty should "establish a metric", and I took that literally because I thought that was reasonable. If you are not so good at math, then be careful what you ask for. :)
 

pjoa09

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They should release him. I would feel very safe if he lived next to my house.

"Good morning Charles Manson! Killed any aspiring pregnant actresses lately? You know my wife is pregant with my child. 6 months."

Okay fine, a bit harsh, but fucking hell. Even if he turned into a turtle I wouldn't release him.
 

Aramea

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The formula has nothing to do with the increase in safety, but it has to do with the salvation of innocent lives. If we are concerned primarily with saving innocent lives, then the death penalty is very clearly the superior option. Your increase in safety is only marginal, yes, as with every state policy decision, but the position is fully justified in terms of our primary values. If you wish to defend your position against the death penalty, then you must explain and justify how allowing 180 innocent people be murdered is better than killing one innocent life, or else you must explain and justify how the inequality is inaccurate and how a more accurate inequality is in favor of your position. You are the one who requested that defenders of the death penalty should "establish a metric", and I took that literally because I thought that was reasonable. If you are not so good at math, then be careful what you ask for. :)

I very much like that you provided a metric. As you probably already know intps generally use debate as a learning tool. My rebuttal serves to restate my assumptions and refine my position. This is a difficult issue for a rational type because it relies on a value judgement at the end. Neither position makes sense without taking a moral stand.

You are going with quantity of saving lives and I am going with the "moral hazard" of the government essentially murdering people. That is a worthy debate for us to have.
 

ApostateAbe

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I very much like that you provided a metric. As you probably already know intps generally use debate as a learning tool. My rebuttal serves to restate my assumptions and refine my position. This is a difficult issue for a rational type because it relies on a value judgement at the end. Neither position makes sense without taking a moral stand.

You are going with quantity of saving lives and I am going with the "moral hazard" of the government essentially murdering people. That is a worthy debate for us to have.
This debate relates very closely to an interesting dilemma in moral philosophy. It is called "the trolley problem." Many people are about to be run over by a trolley, and you can save them only by pushing a switch that changes the trolley's course where it will run over only one man. Given this thought experiment, people very much tend to prefer to take no action, to let the many people die and the one man live. It is perhaps because people have a moral imperative against murder that is greater than the moral imperative to save lives. And/or it is because no action on your own part may help you elude all moral responsibility for anyone's death, letting someone else, or nature, or God, take the responsibility.

Radiolab had a wonderful episode on this problem, here:

http://www.radiolab.org/2007/aug/13/
 

ApostateAbe

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I am listening to that episode again, and the dilemma emerges, not from flipping a switch (most people would do it), but when saving the people on the tracks requires that you push a fat man off the tracks (most people would not do it).
 

ItsRelative

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This guy is very intelligent with unique perspective on life partly because of the prison and all the ups and downs, lucky dude not having to play by the rules. Just not fit to society or even wants to be fit, so don't release him, should be obvious. Not evil person in my mind, not the most benevolent either :rolleyes:

What a trip when really listening to him :D

 

nanook

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i can't convert this into a math formula, but many people die in war, in a culture where killing for a reason is deemed okay. also many people who are capable of being a-moral like to argue, that all moral is just hypocrisy, that those who claim to be moral will still act amoral, when they think that they have a good reason to. it should be comprehensible to a Ti type, that a principle like moral can only function coherently on a level (levels being: one-on-one conversation, family, community, state, world) if there are no regular exceptions. a state/gov, which kills people in war and which executes people, sends the message, that moral should be established only on the one-on-one and the family level, but on further levels there only has to be a reason for the murder, or more generally: a reason that excludes the killed person from the protected rungs. the subjective reasoning behind the murders related to charles manson happened beyond that, on a political level and so it was not even affected by one-on-one or family moral. likewise a mafia is rather strictly moral on the one-on-one and family level, but in the political rung they are amoral and they have no doubt, that they are no different from/worse than politicians. and they are not different from those particular politicians who are pro death penalty. those politicians establish moral on the conformist rung, which is ethnocentric, which excludes "other" ethnies from it's protection. in contrast a rational moral (the next higher rung) is uni-centric, it knows no exception to a universal principle, it protects life, meaning the lie of innocent (by locking away murderers) AND the lives of murderers - or else whatever it protects isn't life itself. for instance, if rationality chooses to protect only the lives of so called innocent people, then it clearly only protects innocence as a standard - while seemingly rational - in the moral line this equates ethnocentrism, it protect those who subscribe to the "innocent ethnie". rationality does not have to be moral. which is to say, that rationality can exist on other lines of intelligence, beside the moral line. only morality protects lives for it's own sake. rationality needs to be uni-centric. combine the two and you are against death penalty. the rational level isn't the highest understanding of moral, but let's start where we are STUCK at, as a culture, which is the conformist/ethnocentric nigger klobbing evolution outlawing terrorism, called right wing or whatever - and move on. homework: make funny metric, weighting war victims of conformist/ethno-centric logic against people, who's life get's saved by it, in today's western society.
 
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Jesse

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Criminal Punishment servers three purposes; justice, rehabilitation and deterrent. Based on his crimes justice should be no less than life. The other two factors don't contribute to the length of the sentence any more.
 

Lot

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I'm surprised that this thread is still going on. It's funny how this turned into a death penalty discussion. But to keep the ball rolling, I'm all for Keeping him locked up. There are people, even now, who idolize him and it wouldn't be hard for him to find them and use them. He is very persuasive and domineering, which makes him still a very real threat. I also agree with Aramea about the girls, but then again if they stayed in jail till they died I think justice is served either way, and maybe it might be best for the living ones to stay there any ways, because they have spend a very long time away from society and they don't really have to skills developed to thrive. I don't think that is a reason for them to stay in jail, but I do think that at this point it might be more beneficial for them to stay.
 

Jelly Rev

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Justice: An eye for an eye....such an outdated concept. makes anyone who believes in it no better then the original perpetrator.


to kill a prisoner with premeditation can never be equivalent to fighting back in the heat of an attack.

btw that link was showing conflicting studies.

To kill someone that we are supposed to be rehabilitating??? lol. The non-impulse murderers, usually have some deep issues. These people are broken and need to be rehabilitated, The prison just reinforces their broken behavior.
They should be taken away from society till they are fixed.

The people should have incentive to try and improve themselves, make prisons have a step down system where at first they are locked up but gradually they moved into a more free system all the way down to a pseudo-city where they can have a job and such, chance to function normally.
The parole system is gone and its an incentive based system.

Also the prison system is flawed and horrible....The classic Stanford prison study.

Lastly, War is murder. Why is the killing of others in this situation alright?? Do people who believe that their country is not in the wrong and defend it, and die bad people?? were Iraqi soldiers bad people, there children prolly didnt think so.

Murdering anyone has conquences beyond the body count.
 

thoumyvision

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Justice: An eye for an eye....such an outdated concept. makes anyone who believes in it no better then the original perpetrator.

Why?


to kill a prisoner with premeditation can never be equivalent to fighting back in the heat of an attack.

btw that link was showing conflicting studies.

To kill someone that we are supposed to be rehabilitating??? lol. The non-impulse murderers, usually have some deep issues. These people are broken and need to be rehabilitated, The prison just reinforces their broken behavior.
They should be taken away from society till they are fixed.

The primary purpose of punishment is not rehabilitation. The very concept of prison as a place of rehabilitation is pretty new. Punishment for crime is deserved, which means that it should be meted out regardless of the opportunity for rehabilitation. It says well of our modern judicial system that rehabilitation now plays a part, but that does not mean that it should become the sole focus.

The people should have incentive to try and improve themselves, make prisons have a step down system where at first they are locked up but gradually they moved into a more free system all the way down to a pseudo-city where they can have a job and such, chance to function normally.
The parole system is gone and its an incentive based system.

Also the prison system is flawed and horrible....The classic Stanford prison study.

There's a good argument for the fact that prison should be horrible, that's kind of the point.

Lastly, War is murder. Why is the killing of others in this situation alright?? Do people who believe that their country is not in the wrong and defend it, and die bad people?? were Iraqi soldiers bad people, there children prolly didnt think so.

Murdering anyone has conquences beyond the body count.

Do you have any standard by which you judge the killing of persons in war to be murder? The judicial standard of every nation in history is against you.
 

thoumyvision

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So was the idea of a round earth a few centuries back.

True, but discovering the earth to be a globe did not mean it wasn't the same place people always talked about when talking about "earth".

Prison is a place of justice; providing rehabilitation is an act of mercy. Justice and Mercy are coequal virtues, to favor one over the other is a moral imbalance. It was good that society started to offer rehabilitation. It would be bad if the same society ceased to serve justice, even if they were focused on rehabilitation.
 

Philosophyking87

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But is there any real point to keeping him in prison anymore other than revenge? I don't really think he's a threat to humanity any more...

Most likely, as long as Manson's alive, he's a threat to humanity. You think he's at all changed, just by spending some years in prison? The guy's completely loony, and I'm sure he would start his nonsense again if he were paroled. Honestly: we're not talking about some guy who lost his temper in 1986 and just happened to shoot someone who insulted him, but has now learned the error of his ways. Manson basically created a cult of young followers who all believed he was some sort of messiah, and killed dozens of people in the name of his visions. So he's fundamentally rotten. It's very unlikely he's at all changed, given he's pretty much a manipulative mastermind who's probably just itching to get his hands on a few more people.

So long story short, he shouldn't be paroled. It's not about revenge; it's just being rational.

The primary purpose of prison is NOT to keep dangerous people out of society. That is the secondary (often overblown and abused) purpose. The primary purpose of prison is to deter crime among those outside of prison by dealing punishment to criminals inside of prison. Letting Manson out of prison sends the message that the punishment for multiple murders is not so bad. Prison succeeds in that purpose. Therefore, he should not be let out. Moreover, he should have been executed.

There are a number of purposes of imprisonment. Some people will emphasis one or certain ones, while some will emphasis another, or other ones. It's just a matter of perspective. Hence, there can be more than one reason why certain people are imprisoned at any given time, according to the particular circumstances. In Manson's case, it's not really about "deterring" other mass murderers from brainwashing young kids and going on giant killing sprees. Would someone like Manson, we're he able to live life all over again, choose to avoid his bad actions, just because a few other high-profile mass murderers were sentenced to life/death for their crimes? I highly doubt it. The guy was a mastermind criminal who just didn't care, so long as he wasn't caught.

Thus, for people like Manson, it's very much about keeping the rest of society safe. Serial killers like him have proven that they are an absolute danger to other people. And regardless of rehabilitation, regardless of deterrence, regardless of issuing punishment, the main purpose does seem to be that this loose cannon maniac be kept from the streets of society (although issuing punishment for his crimes is also a very big reason). So it's much more about the welfare of society and his particular actions, that Manson is in prison. It's highly unlikely imprisonment ever really deters honest, stone-cold, crazy killers/masterminds like him.

And as for the death penalty, it's all subjective. We all have our reasons for believing some deserve death, or that no one ever deserves death due to the limitations of the legal system (due to a lack of omniscience, or inherent epistemological limitations). So let's just leave it at that. The last thing people need is a lame death penalty debate. But I would just like to point out that plenty of innocent people have been executed in many states, and I don't see how some people can ever truly feel right about ever putting someone to death without absolute knowledge (certainty), as death is permanent and final -- you can't just reverse the damage, compensate, or make up for things. Someone's life, when it is taken, can never be given back. And how often do we find out a jury's decision was incorrect??? Limited data, limited human capabilities, limited technology: all these can result in an erroneous unjust verdict that leads to the imprisonment, and sometimes deaths, of innocent people.

Really: how often do people ever really feel safe about the fact that juries are composed of "average people"? Average people who have their limited talents, many of which have nothing to do with philosophy, psychology or law (in other words, how best to judge evidence according to a certain amount of logical rigor and scrutiny). Given the limitations of humanity, and the fact that jurors are never ever really qualified to judge people they don't know, I don't see how anyone can ever believe execution is at all reasonable.


He should have been executed? Not to get into a death penalty argument, but the statistics show that capital punishment doesn't lessen crime rates.

Indeed. The notion that capital punishment deters crime any more than any other form of punishment is absurd.
 

crippli

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So long story short, he shouldn't be paroled. It's not about revenge; it's just being rational.
To me the question is. Are ideas a crime? If he was at the crime scene, now that is a crime. But I find it ludicrous to compare the instigator to the executioners. As in war. I think it's retarded to execute the leaders, and not the soldiers. The way I see it. The problem isn't the ideas, but that people believe in them. And without soldiers, the leaders will be little more then any other person.

Like the bible and religion. The believers, tend to not even understand what is being said. And even less, what is not being said.
 

crippli

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True, but discovering the earth to be a globe did not mean it wasn't the same place people always talked about when talking about "earth".

Prison is a place of justice; providing rehabilitation is an act of mercy. Justice and Mercy are coequal virtues, to favor one over the other is a moral imbalance. It was good that society started to offer rehabilitation. It would be bad if the same society ceased to serve justice, even if they were focused on rehabilitation.
Imbalance? Who has decided that either is a valid measure?
 

ApostateAbe

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Most likely, as long as Manson's alive, he's a threat to humanity. You think he's at all changed, just by spending some years in prison? The guy's completely loony, and I'm sure he would start his nonsense again if he were paroled. Honestly: we're not talking about some guy who lost his temper in 1986 and just happened to shoot someone who insulted him, but has now learned the error of his ways. Manson basically created a cult of young followers who all believed he was some sort of messiah, and killed dozens of people in the name of his visions. So he's fundamentally rotten. It's very unlikely he's at all changed, given he's pretty much a manipulative mastermind who's probably just itching to get his hands on a few more people.

So long story short, he shouldn't be paroled. It's not about revenge; it's just being rational.



There are a number of purposes of imprisonment. Some people will emphasis one or certain ones, while some will emphasis another, or other ones. It's just a matter of perspective. Hence, there can be more than one reason why certain people are imprisoned at any given time, according to the particular circumstances. In Manson's case, it's not really about "deterring" other mass murderers from brainwashing young kids and going on giant killing sprees. Would someone like Manson, we're he able to live life all over again, choose to avoid his bad actions, just because a few other high-profile mass murderers were sentenced to life/death for their crimes? I highly doubt it. The guy was a mastermind criminal who just didn't care, so long as he wasn't caught.

Thus, for people like Manson, it's very much about keeping the rest of society safe. Serial killers like him have proven that they are an absolute danger to other people. And regardless of rehabilitation, regardless of deterrence, regardless of issuing punishment, the main purpose does seem to be that this loose cannon maniac be kept from the streets of society (although issuing punishment for his crimes is also a very big reason). So it's much more about the welfare of society and his particular actions, that Manson is in prison. It's highly unlikely imprisonment ever really deters honest, stone-cold, crazy killers/masterminds like him.

And as for the death penalty, it's all subjective. We all have our reasons for believing some deserve death, or that no one ever deserves death due to the limitations of the legal system (due to a lack of omniscience, or inherent epistemological limitations). So let's just leave it at that. The last thing people need is a lame death penalty debate. But I would just like to point out that plenty of innocent people have been executed in many states, and I don't see how some people can ever truly feel right about ever putting someone to death without absolute knowledge (certainty), as death is permanent and final -- you can't just reverse the damage, compensate, or make up for things. Someone's life, when it is taken, can never be given back. And how often do we find out a jury's decision was incorrect??? Limited data, limited human capabilities, limited technology: all these can result in an erroneous unjust verdict that leads to the imprisonment, and sometimes deaths, of innocent people.

Really: how often do people ever really feel safe about the fact that juries are composed of "average people"? Average people who have their limited talents, many of which have nothing to do with philosophy, psychology or law (in other words, how best to judge evidence according to a certain amount of logical rigor and scrutiny). Given the limitations of humanity, and the fact that jurors are never ever really qualified to judge people they don't know, I don't see how anyone can ever believe execution is at all reasonable.
If we care about saving innocent lives, then, following very starkly from the science, one policy decision is clearly better than another. If you are very very very concerned about keeping innocent blood off of your own hands, then the death penalty is not an option.
"He should have been executed? Not to get into a death penalty argument, but the statistics show that capital punishment doesn't lessen crime rates."

Indeed. The notion that capital punishment deters crime any more than any other form of punishment is absurd.
I believe that it follows very directly from common experience that one is far less likely to commit a crime where the penalty is death rather than life in prison. The fear of death is an instinct that has strong influence on the behavior of a human being even in the most impassioned and delirious states of mind. That may be why the statistics show that the death penalty has such an impact on murder rates, despite the inclinations of those who oppose the death penalty for non-objective reasons. And I believe that those who stand behind asserted statistics should be willing to provide them, especially those who are on the Internet, where a wealth of statistics are available. I provided my statistics. Where are the statistics to speak for the opposing side? I know that there are criticisms of the statistics, but those are not the same. Show me a well-controlled scientific study that shows no significant correlation between capital punishment and deterrence of capital crime.
 

jameslikespie

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To me the question is. Are ideas a crime? If he was at the crime scene, now that is a crime. But I find it ludicrous to compare the instigator to the executioners. As in war. I think it's retarded to execute the leaders, and not the soldiers. The way I see it. The problem isn't the ideas, but that people believe in them. And without soldiers, the leaders will be little more then any other person.

Like the bible and religion. The believers, tend to not even understand what is being said. And even less, what is not being said.

This. I never really thought he was a threat to humanity, I think the followers were.
 

crippli

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This. I never really thought he was a threat to humanity, I think followers were.
It depends I guess, If you need to protect the people against influences. The thing is that all people may be as 'evil' as the chicks. In that case you may need to lock inside those that can unlock those aspects, even if that is a form of backwards logic when if comes to justice. As justice is the crime committed.

So the followers may be humanity.....you can continue the thought if you like.
 

Words

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This. I never really thought he was a threat to humanity, I think followers were.

Problem is that the majority of the world are 'followers', if not potential followers.

---

My opinion, though I don't really know much about the issue, is that he is not released nor executed. Both are extremities that could affect the sensitive social-American mindset on the function of imprisonment. anarchism vs. tyranny.
 

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I feel that nothing I could say about this would be anything more than a moral bias on reality. It's just a decision, one that you make by putting weight on certain aspects of morality over others, which can be backed up with any sort of reasoning of facts that won't represent a whole truth, but a suggestive one. It's almost as if philosophy's only true purpose is to try to sort out what is moral, but instead finding only relative answers and achieving arguably nothing.

So I don't know and I guess I don't really want to think much about it. Then whatever you think sounds good, I suppose. It's funny how people are so against the death penalty though when most of human history had no problem with it. I wonder how long this heavy consideration against the death penalty will last. Are we fooling ourselves into thinking a life of prison is somehow better than the death penalty? It doesn't seem to matter, either way no one cares about that guy or he wouldn't be locked away somewhere for the entirety of his own life. Personally I think it's cruel to do that rather than just kill them, but it's just my opinion of course.
 

Philosophyking87

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To me the question is. Are ideas a crime? If he was at the crime scene, now that is a crime. But I find it ludicrous to compare the instigator to the executioners. As in war. I think it's retarded to execute the leaders, and not the soldiers. The way I see it. The problem isn't the ideas, but that people believe in them. And without soldiers, the leaders will be little more then any other person.

Like the bible and religion. The believers, tend to not even understand what is being said. And even less, what is not being said.

No. Brainwashing people and masterminding killing sprees is virtually equivalent to actually killing people -- you're just using people as a means of doing so, as tools by which you are basically killing. So it's not merely that Manson "thought up" certain ideas; instead, he actually went through much trouble to "order" and "instruct" his "disciples" to go out and engage in killings. And that's pretty much known as "conspiracy to commit murder." It's a very serious crime. So this entire blaming it on the kids who actually did the killings is a giant load of crap. Manson was a charming, charismatic figure, and he essentially seduced them into doing his bidding. So while you can blame the kids for the actual killings, you can still hold Manson accountable for inciting them to such vile behavior.

This. I never really thought he was a threat to humanity, I think followers were.

Here's a few interesting facts about Manson that make me question your stance on this issue:

* At the time the Family began to form, Manson was an unemployed ex-convict, who had spent half of his life in correctional institutions for a variety of offenses.

* By committing burglary of a grocery store, Manson obtained cash that enabled him to rent a room. He committed a string of burglaries of other stores, including one from which he stole a bicycle, but he was eventually caught in the act and sent to an Indianapolis juvenile center. He escaped after one day, but was recaptured and placed in Boys Town. Four days after his arrival there, he escaped with another boy. The pair committed two armed robberies on their way to the home of the other boy's uncle.

* Caught during the second of two subsequent break-ins of grocery stores, Manson was sent, at age 13, to the Indiana Boys School, where, he would later claim, he was brutalized sexually and otherwise. After many failed attempts, he escaped with two other boys in 1951. In Utah, the three were caught driving to California in cars they had stolen. They had burglarized several gas stations along the way. For the federal crime of taking a stolen car across a state line, Manson was sent to Washington, D.C.'s National Training School for Boys. Despite four years of schooling and an I.Q. of 109 (later tested at 121), he was illiterate. A caseworker deemed him aggressively antisocial.

* In October 1951, on a psychiatrist's recommendation, Manson was transferred to Natural Bridge Honor Camp, a minimum security institution. Less than a month before a scheduled February 1952 parole hearing, he "took a razor blade and held it against another boy's throat while he sodomized him." He was transferred to the Federal Reformatory, Petersburg, Virginia, where he was considered "dangerous." In September 1952, a number of other serious disciplinary offenses resulted in his transfer to the Federal Reformatory at Chillicothe, Ohio, a more secure institution.

* Around October, about three months after he and his pregnant wife arrived in Los Angeles in a car he had stolen in Ohio, Manson was again charged with a federal crime for taking the vehicle across state lines. After a psychiatric evaluation, he was given five years' probation. His subsequent failure to appear at a Los Angeles hearing on an identical charge filed in Florida resulted in his March 1956 arrest in Indianapolis. His probation was revoked; he was sentenced to three years' imprisonment at Terminal Island, San Pedro, California.

* Manson received five years' parole in September 1958, the same year in which Rosalie received a decree of divorce. By November, he was pimping a 16-year-old girl and was receiving additional support from a girl with wealthy parents. In September 1959, he pleaded guilty to a charge of attempting to cash a forged U.S. Treasury check.

* The woman's name was Leona; as a prostitute, she had used the name Candy Stevens. After Manson took her and another woman from California to New Mexico for purposes of prostitution, he was held and questioned for violation of the Mann Act. Though he was released, he evidently suspected, rightly, that the investigation had not ended. When he disappeared, in violation of his probation, a bench warrant was issued; an April 1960 indictment for violation of the Mann Act followed. Arrested in Laredo, Texas, in June, when one of the women was arrested for prostitution, Manson was returned to Los Angeles. For violation of his probation on the check-cashing charge, he was ordered to serve his 10-year sentence.

* By March 21, 1967, his release day, he had spent more than half of his 32 years in prisons and other institutions.

As you can see, the guy was in and out of prison most of his life -- a clear pattern of behavior that suggests he's prone to such violence/crime. Hence, when someone in and out of prison for various crimes -- whom many professionals considered "dangerous" and "antisocial" -- and then becomes involved in conspiracy to commit murder in a chain of killings, and is known to be the mastermind of such killings, it sort of stands to reason that this person is indeed a threat to society, along with his followers. (Not to mention it's said that he actually killed a black man in 1969, who was a member of the Black Panthers.)
 

Jesse

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Justice is not revenge.
 

jameslikespie

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First off, I fucked up my last post, it was meant the say "the followers" rather than just followers. I'm unsure what to think. I agree with Words.
 

Philosophyking87

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Reluctantly

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Justice is not revenge.

It just seems to be a matter of word choice. Reparations can usually be swapped with revenge and it's the same thing wrapped in a more politically thought out wrapper. What exactly is justice to you?
 
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