Quote:
Originally Posted by Ark2
That line can't always be uncrossed. To suggest otherwise is very naive. Often, the difference between justified killing and murder is the sense of enjoyment that one derives from the act. For those who enjoy snuffing the life out of someone, I don't believe that there is any coming back, and while there are those who can feign remorse and appear contrite for their actions, consider that these are morally absent people who feel justified in senseless murder. Crafting a veneer that appears rehabilitated and "normal" is something that they excel at.
Now, I suppose you will suggest that experts are able to see through such a mask of sanity and weed out the unreformed, but understand that this is not always the case. In fact, if you were to look at the profile of every serial killer throughout the last 50 years, you would likely see that at some point in their early history, before they committed their murders, they were evaluated by these so called experts and deemed to no-longer be a threat.
Sometimes, the point of jail is to prevent the loss of 2 lives becoming significantly more. Sometimes, people are straight evil.
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Nor do I at any point suggest that to be the case. You simply have to try, and you sentence people based not only on the crime, but factors surrounding it.
Some people are indeed straight evil. It's hard to address your comment on the history of every serial killer, being that it doesn't seem to be true and you haven't provided any evidence towards it, but it's possible I suppose. However, how many serial killers start with a mass shooting? I'd be surprised if it was more than zero.
Lortie, for instance, has been out of jail for twenty years. He was a man trained to kill, and it's very likely that what happened was simply a misfire in the brain (paranoid schizophrenic, as was the defence). Is he inherently evil? It's difficult to know for sure, but he spent time in jail, hasn't re-offended, and contributes to society. That, to me, would be a success of the system.
If what you say is true, and nobody rehabilitates, they all just fake it, why not just kill them all? What's the difference really? Why not make every murder punishable by death and clean the slate?