alt Hacker News> I wonder if you would feel different after witnessing an execution (by guillotine)?
Not at all. There are kids murderers out there. Recently one in France raped and then killed an 11 y/o girl. Somehow he was free although he'd already been involved in rapes. It's a big thing: there are protests all over France asking for actual laws actually doing something about rapists and kid killers.
To me the guillotine for a kid killer is way too nice: I'd go full medieval style, breaking his arms and legs while he's rotating on a vice. Then cutting his balls. Then finishing it by using horses to dislocate his body.
They used to do that in the middle-age.
From A to Z I'd be thinking about the persons you don't care about: the victims.
The problem is, as someone else mentioned, as soon as you give the state the power to kill people, they'll abuse it.
But, deep down, the harsh truth is very simple: leniency to rapists and murderers is cruelty to the victims, to their family and to their future victims (like just happened in France).
All those begging for leniency for criminals have the blood of that 11 y/o girl who got raped and killed by a repeat offenders on their hands.
Replies
“…the person you don’t care about…”
Your comment is below the intellectual and interpersonal standard that makes HN a good place to be.
I don’t doubt your sincerity and I can abide your opinion, but you should be restrained in ascribing such points of view to others.
> They used to do that in the middle-age.
Not casually and not for "minor crimes" (by the standards of the time) like the killing of a child.
The overly performative hung, drawn, and quartering variations were reserved for high crimes of treason, regicide, etc.
Sound to me like you're thinking about a violent fantasy toward the offender rather than the victims tbh
This may sound harsh, but I believe that anyone who fantasizes about cruelly murdering anyone has something wrong with them. Have you seen a death, saw someone dying in all the glory of their guts splayed around you? If that is something you desire to see, perhaps this death drive of yours requires some introspective.