Sitting down with my new 19" flat screen that I got for Christmas, one of the first stops I made was to the Times home page where I watched Saddam being walked to the gallows. Imagine my horror when I found myself watching the man's confused, terrified expression and feeling sympathy for the doomed sadist. Amazing, truly amazing. I mean, I know exactly how blood soaked his coat tails were--if anyone was a candidate for court ordered hanging, it was Saddam.
But watching that video is still emotional. Even with him, a state-sanctioned killing for something other than self-defense is still murder. It's depraved. I mean, either human life is sacred or it isn't, and just because a person has lived as though life is anything but sacred, I don't see how that gives us the right to abandon our principles. And I don't think it is "soft on crime" to think that--it's more a question of having higher, nobler expectations for man.
I'm sure my opinion would be different if I had more of a direct human connection to the suffering Saddam caused in his life, but this is how I felt watching the video. I'm rather relieved the Times site didn't show the actual hanging itself, and I hope I resist the urge to find it on Youtube.
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It's difficult to truly say if really do have a right judge another. Perhaps excluding crazy people, if a person did something that he or she would consider evil, would they choose to do it? Since everyone is different, that leads to what defines laws. Where the society pools together what it feels is right and wrong. In nearly every society, however, there have been ways if a person does this then he or she is put to death. Therefore, are we to decide how another society deems the treatment of hated criminal?
In war, people are killing each other, yet the winners of the war are never punished for who the common soldier killed. Should those that fought in the war, be punished for killing the enemy? If you say no, then are you saying the killing of human life is okay? If you say yes, then does that mean that you’ve descended to the old phrase, “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth? It leads me to think, is Lady Justice right or left handed? Those are just my thoughts.
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