(no subject)

[pat]

Starting from a couple of comments in my post about Bell v. Thompson, a couple of links, here (a blog entry from etalkinghead.com) and here (a Salon article reprinted at deathpenaltyinfo.org), about the impact of "death-qualifying" juries (i.e., removing all people from the jury who would not impose the death penalty) on chances of conviction. It's scary, especially the Salon. com article.

Comments

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

This is one of those areas where I have that "The USA really isn't part of the rest of the world, is it?" sensation. As far as I'm aware, no other Westernised country has the death penalty, and yet that point never seems to come up in US discussions about the death penalty.

[elissaann.livejournal.com]

That point comes up a lot among those of us who are opposed to it.

Sometimes I get the impression that those in favor of it think that we (the US) are somehow the progressive ones, while I see it as a barbaric custom (among other things).

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

That point comes up a lot among those of us who are opposed to it.

I'm really pleased to hear that. I was just surprised, given the length of the Salon article, and what I thought was a pretty strong anti-death penalty attitude, that this wasn't mentioned even in passing. And I think all the on-line death penalty discussions I've seen, it's someone outside the US who says "You do realise the US is about the only supposedly civilised country which still has the death penalty?".

One of the problems (it seems to me) in Australia is that there's a conservative upswing at the moment and quite a few people seem to be in favour of re-instituting the death penalty, and given the dominance of the US in the media, in terms of popular culture, particularly police/legal shows, they feel entitled to argue that the death penalty is a perfectly normal feature of a Westernised country.

I understand the death penalty was temporarily suspeneded for being "cruel and unusual"; I'm a bit shocked that didn't hold up.