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Utah Attorney General Tweets Execution Order
Kilrah_il writes "In an all-time low for Internet use, Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff used Twitter to announce to the public his approval of the execution of convicted murderer Ronnie Lee Gardner. 'I just gave the go ahead to Corrections Director to proceed with Gardner's execution. May God grant him the mercy he denied his victims,' the attorney general wrote. The AG's 7,000 followers retweeted the message further on and soon many replied concerning the awfulness of tweeting the execution of a human being. 'Mr. Shurtleff was doing nothing unusual; politicians and news organizations now routinely send out tweets to alert people to the latest developments. But as Twitter users digested endless breaking news flashes alerting them to the death of a man by firing squad in the United States, for some Mr. Shurtleff's remarks stood out from the rest.'"
The Utah AG was 'tweeting' while the murder was 'twitching'? This case received a lot of publicity (as most executions do) and he was just spreading the news as it happened. He's now qualified to work for one of the big networks.
Follow their AG on twitter in order to stay in touch with their government, but they don't want to hear the icky stuff? Is that right?
I am Slashdot. Are you Slashdot as well?
This is a good thing, regardless of your stance on capital punishment.
The most important aspect of the internet, in my opinion, is that it shoves transparency down the throat of government.
For better or worse, this Governor's name and decision is now tied irrevocably to his decision to sign the execution order. He is accountable and his constituents and other voters around the country know what he did.
This is as it should be.
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Tweeting a legal and properly appealed capital conviction is the "all-time low for internet use", but I suppose that using the internet to distribute Jihad snuff films like Daniel Pearl or using the internet to recruit racial and religious hate is just fine.
There are many lows on the internet and this doesn't come close. The prosecution in this case chose to pursue the death penalty in light of the crime committed, the jury found him guilty and found the death penalty appropriate. The AG is doing his job, and while this might seem sensationalistic, I'd rather the officials in my particular state be as open as possible using all available avenues of communication, although I personally do not use twitter.
The primary reason this case is so sensational is that he was killed by a firing squad. Remember that he chose that particular method, not the state.
I still cannot find the droids I am looking for...
Me either. I don't understand why the general public seems to prefer lethal injection to hanging or firing squad as a method, given that the latter two are far, far more dignified. With lethal injection we have things like a condemned man being strapped to a gurney for hours as the personnel search for the correct vein, frequently with very painful results. With a properly-conducted hanging or firing squad, it's quick, relatively painless, dignified, and ends fast.
Firing squad is deemed inhumane in 49 out of 50 states
It hasn't been deemed "inhumane", it just isn't used in those states. Having seen my share of animals that were shot and a handful that were "put to sleep" I would actually argue that being shot is more humane. The ones that were put to sleep seemingly just closed their eyes -- but who knows what really happens? At least with humans, there's a school of thought that suggests the anesthetic used wears off quickly and leaves the condemned man awake but with a paralyzed diaphragm. If this is true you are suffocating to death while awake.
Contrast that to being shot. A well placed rifle bullet will kill you before you hit the ground. No need to sit and watch as they try to find a vein. No danger of them missing a vein and setting your arm on fire with muscular injections of the drug cocktail.
There really isn't any pretty way to end a life but of the available methods that our technology allows I would argue that being shot is the most humane. If the shooters do their job right you will be dead in seconds.
I want peace on earth and goodwill toward man.
We are the United States Government! We don't do that sort of thing.
May God grant him mercy...because we certainly won't.
Beware of the Leopard.
I'm not sure I understand the sentiment that somehow the Internet is different than print media when reporting events.
Putting it on Twitter is not like making a comic strip out of the event and joking about it. It's just another form of communication.
Every time I start to have faith in humanity, I ruin it by driving to work between 7 and 8 am.
"I don't understand why the general public seems to prefer lethal injection to hanging or firing squad as a method, given that the latter two are far, far more dignified."
They are squeamish. They like the idea of killing the bad person but don't want to be reminded of the brutality of it. Lethal injection can be made to look like just another sterile clinical procedure. Hanging, firing squad, and the gas chamber reminds people that a person is being killed. I suspect there is a large segment of people that support the death penalty but could never actually impose the penalty themselves (or would have great difficulty). Hence the preference for "humane" lethal injection.
Where are the bleeding hearts for this asshole's victims and their families?
The bleeding hearts have realized that the sentence the man receives does not in any way undo or mitigate the deaths of the victims and doesn't do much for their families. It just adds 1 more to the body count.
Lethal injection as it's done is ridiculous. 3 drug cocktail, a sedative(barbituate), paralytic, and then the heart stopper. You really only need one. When i was humanely putting down rats for research purposes we just used a large overdose of barbituate. Inject 5x the lethal dose intraperitoneally. No fumbling about for a vein, they stop breathing in under a minute, and are gone in a couple more. There's no reason lethal injection has to be this complicated procedure.
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
Messiness is not a bug, it's a feature. It both allows you to witness that the victim really is dead and, as an added bonus, doesn't hide the reality of what's being done at an execution behind the illusion of a mere medical procedure.
If you don't have a stomach to watch blood splatter from a severed neck, you shouldn't have anything to do with executions. In fact we should televise each and every execution and see how many people are still "though on crime" when they see just what they're voting for.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
That's fine, but my point is that what you say is a matter of interpretation, and depends on where you draw the "murder" line. Because of that, "Do not murder" does not necessarily apply to capital punishment.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Conversely, I think the death penalty is a delicious ice-cream flavour. It doesn't matter, because that's not really what's being discussed. If you want to get capital punishment abolished, don't waste your time here.
Well considering that god then goes on to tell the Israelites to murder other tribes and rape their women, I'd say the translation is pretty much irrelevant anyway. The Ten Commandments should have been called "The Ten Things You Should Not Do, Unless You Really Want To".
In the civilized world, we know that the death of another person is wrong. But sometimes, exceptions must be made for those who've renounced their humanity voluntarily and commit egregious crimes. It doesn't mean that we have to be barbaric in the process of carrying out an execution however.
So Canada, France, Switzerland, the UK aren't civilized? China, Iran, Saudi Arabia are?
The U.S. is in a very select group of nations, could you enlighten us on what other countries are in your "civilized world"?
In what way would showing someone get executed be misleading anyone? Executions are horrific. Or, by "misleading", do you actually mean that they might reconsider their position and pick another one?
This is a flat-out lie. Even if someone has "renounced his humanity" - which is in itself a rather troubling concept, as it basically makes being human dependent on behaving in ways that meet your approval, which is pretty much what every tinpot dictator has used to justify his deeds throughout history - that in no way necessiates his execution. A maximum security prison is perfectly capable of holding an (ex-)human of any level of evil, thus removing the "protect others" argument, leaving only the deterrent and revenge arguments.
And, well, both deterrent and revenge angles would be best served by as gory display as possible.
I'm a firm believer that people who think they're civilized because they performed their human sacrifice rites in the altar of justice in a bloodless manner represent a whole new and fascinating level of self-delusion.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.
Oh, please. Get over this nonsensical idea that there is such a thing as "the Bible's take" on any subject. Romans, Deuteronomy and Leviticus were written by different people with different agendas at different times to different audiences in different contexts.
Even most mainstream Christian scholars will tell you that.
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