To ask if you know about the executions taking place today?

[kewtogetin]

I have been following the case of the 'Bali 9' for years but it seems today is the end of the road for Andrew chan and myuran sukumaran. They are due to be executed at 5pm UK time.
I have just watched their families leaving the jail for the last time after saying their final goodbyes. It was heartbreaking. This is not really a post about the rights and wrongs of the death penalty (although I am massively against) but I can't help feeling this is more of a punishment for the families than for those who committed the crime.
I believe death isn't the punishment but fear. Saying goodbye to your children/parents etc, being marched through the rain forest, tied to a wooden stake with a hood over your head and then shot through the heart. It's just barbaric.....
What do you think? And no 'if you can't do the time don't do the crime' spouters please. Two men (actually 2 of 11 I believe) will die today but glorying in it is disrespectful at best.

How can you not be outraged by this brutality? Whatever the governmental response is, this is wrong and any person who lays claim to humanity should be able to say as much.

I would welcome greater intervention by governments but it doesn't make any difference to how I feel. Hiding behind 'well the government don't do much' is just pathetic.

I care about people who are executed by the necks for being gay.
People who are lashed in public for trying to speak out.

Drug smugglers - little sympathy TBH.

How can you not be outraged by this brutality

I am not outraged. Why should I be?

Why is this case more outrageous than any other execution carried out?

Why is it more deserving of attention than other executions?

Orlando, you mentioned Bangkok Hilton.
The main story was of a young woman facing execution after being duped into carrying drugs. Rather like Mary Jane Veloso.

It also showed the execution of a young man with learning difficulties, also duped into carrying drugs. Rather like Rodrigo Gularte.

It isn't really that simple.

The Indonesian goverment ruled that the death penalty is enforceable for drug smuggling. Everyone who travels knows this, especially ones travelling to these countries. Crikey, I'm aware of the regulations about simple foodstuffs going abroad, what I need if I'm driving for God's sake.

These people got caught smuggling, people who didn't think beyond earning an easy buck. Probably didn't give a monkeys behind about the consequences for people who are addicted. Now I don't feel sorry for addicts, they made their choice. I know some people pull the old ' their not right mentally, they were forced into it' etc. My view, not saying that's everyone's.

But the smugglers knew the risks they took in smuggling their disgusting product. But now they've been caught we're supposed to feel sorry for them? PP have said they've reformed. I'd claim to be reformed if it meant I would get away with prison rather than the DP.

These smugglers would probably still be doing this if they hadn't been caught.

I do feel for their families, but as said before, the smugglers didn't think of the consequences before carrying their death dealing shit.

If people are duped - then that's different. From what I understand, the current people were not duped.

If someone knowingly smuggles drugs, I have no sympathy.

All executions should receive this level of attention and opposition. All prisoners condemned to die need every decent human on the planet pleading for them to be shown mercy. The 'crime' is irrelevant.

It's a dangerous error to say 'well that crime deserves it but such and such doesn't' because by doing so you condone the state killing it's citizens. Any citizens. What happens then if it's you or someone you love who becomes the condemned?

Northernlurker, you asked why are we not outraged by this brutality.

Why aren't you outraged that these people chose to break the law and try and smuggle drugs?

Northernlurker,

no crime is irrelevent.

Unfortunately, these aren't decent people so why the outcry?

I will plead on behalf of INNOCENT people, not drug smugglers, murderers, rapists

What would your opinion be if this was perpetrated on you or someone you love to use your words?

Have you ever seen the effects of Heroin? This is one nasty drug, it devastates the lives of innocent families when it causes the demise and often death of their loved ones, I feel immense sympathy for these people.

Sympathy for people knowingly and willingly trafficking this shit? In a country who has the death penalty? Not so much.

I am outraged by the crime. I obey the law and expect others to do so. I'm just not vengeful.

Are you? Ask yourself why? What profit does vengeance reap for you?

NorthernLurker what absolute nonsense. I don't support the death penalty but even I can see that there is a difference between an execution after an exhaustive due process and condoning the state's right to kill any citizen willy nilly.

Do you think that the publicity from this execution will stop at least one person from smuggling drugs in this part of the world?

Who defines what 'due process' is and how do you know that the 'process' won't ever criminalise you and what you do?

I am outraged by the crime. I obey the law and expect others to do so. I'm just not vengeful

I agree with this. For me, it's not about what the crime was, or whether it's a "deserved" punishment (FWIW dons hard hat I felt the same sickness when Saddam Hussein was executed). It's about a state entity deliberately and, according to all evidence, pointlessly killing someone, anyone. It's about a state defining a particular type of murder as a "good" murder, when I can't get past the word "murder".

You don't have to be vengeful to a)accept that other countries have the death penalty and believe those who break the laws of those countries should recognise that there is a chance they might have to face the consequences and b)feel that drug traffickers support a horrendous industry which is responsible for untold misery and crime and again might have to face certain consequences.

No OP sigh, I am not saying that about drug addicts at all. I am talking about people willing to take the huge risks smuggling drugs in countries they know that has the death penalty because they are greedy. Whether you agree if dysagree with tbe death penalty is irrelevant - these countries are well known for having it.

Another Aussie here - well a Brit by birth actually, but with lots of Aussie connections so I've been following this for years and I am very sad for them and their families. However, reluctantly I must gree with LeBear.

I live somewhere (muslim country) where there are very strictly enforced laws surrounding alcohol and drugs and everyone who chooses to live here knows what those rules are. It's a zero tolerance kind of place. No-one goes to a country like that and falls into drugs smuggling without a very clear idea of what they are doing and the huge risks they are taking. The lure of a big bag of money makes people lose all their fears and inhibitions and get arrogant, and they are only sorry when they are caught.

It's awful that they will die tonight but if it makes the next batch of foolish young people with dollar signs in their eyes think twice about not only the risk to themselves, but the full social implications and consequences of what they are getting involved in, then they won't have died in vain.

Northernlurker, it isn't vengeful.

You say you obey the law. The smugglers didn't. It's the law of that country. The smugglers chose to ignore that law. Thought they were better than the law.

They are getting what is lawfully their rewards.

You say you obey the law. If you speed and get caught, do you expect leniency, or a punishment? You know you can expect to get points or a ban.

These smugglers knew that the penalty for getting caught could be the death penalty. They were caught. They got the death penalty.

Extreme examples, I know. But in each case the perpetratoor knows the risks they take. Otherwise, it's anarchy next. Pick and choose what your want to do and be punished for.

And you haven't answered the question about whether you would feel the same way if this was something that was perpetrated on you or someone you love. Don't forget, these were your words, your argument.

I really have to hope it would Orlando, otherwise what on earth would be the point?

And no I don't think this case will act as a deterrent.

You get yourself in some sticky philosophical territory with that argument anyway because if there was a way to prove that one person was deterred then what you'd be being asked to do is weigh the harm that person's smuggling might do against the certainty of the brutal deaths of these people. If you decide these people's deaths are worth that much gain then what next? Who next? Whose life is worth more or less? Whose mistakes are more forgivable and whose are less worthy of a rationed mercy?

This is a sickening and dangerous path to go down. The state should not kill. It's wrong. And yes Ineed that is what I would say if it were my child or loved one or friend as a victim. For the last 20 years as an adult this has been one of my central beliefs and no crime, however vile and however broken it made me, will change that.

Gostraight, exactly.

If you know the law of the land then you will be ok as long as you follow them.

Break them and you have to accept the consequences, however bad.

I worry that the possibility of a death sentence corrupts the criminal justice system of a country: defendants implicating others to avoid the death sentence, or people not appealing in case the death sentence is imposed (some places allow for heavier sentences if an appeal fails), defendants in controversial cases potentially getting the death penalty because it brings the controversy to a convenient close, the effect on the perception of justice if some categories of defedant (based e.g. on race, sex, religion, nationality) tend to get given the death sentence more than others.

All that said, if these defendants knowingly ran the risk of a death sentence for drug profits then, odd as it may sound, they are in a way complicit in what their families are now suffering.

And awful though that suffering is, I don't believe the effect on the family should affect the sentence except in very rare cases.