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Advocates for the abolishment of the death penalty tend to see life without the possibility of parole LWOP as a more dignified response to capital murder and other atrocious crimes, as opposed to say, lethal injection or the gas chamber. In making their argument they mention things like the sanctity of human life, the barbaric nature of state-sanctioned executions, and typically conclude with human dignity as a closer.
But despite their best intentions, there is nothing kind, dignified, or beneficial to society from placing someone in a cage for the remainder of their natural life. In fact, I’ll go so far as to say, it's the equivalent of burying nuclear waste in our own backyards: we may be safe for a while, but posterity will not thank us.
Please don't take this as an endorsement for public executions, because it's not. The death penalty is by no means the best of who we are. It's a stain on our history and humanity. But, one that has afforded us a valuable lesson on the need to reevaluate who we are.
Either we choose to acknowledge the overwhelming evidence that most, if not all, offenders can be safely rehabilitated and re-introduced back into society, or we simply stop going through the motions of pretending to care about morality and human dignity, all the while torturing, traumatizing, and otherwise degrading our fellow man. This hypocrisy must stop!
Protestors that Julius Jones not be executed. Source: currently.att.yahoo.com
Criminality has always been a black mark on the triumphs of modern civilization. The question of how to address it, how to discourage it, and most importantly, how to defeat it has confounded us for thousands of years. Collectively speaking, humanity has devised some terrifying methods to punitively address criminality.
The theory being, if people are terrified of the consequences they won't commit the crimes. And the efficacy of sad theory, speaks for itself:
Teen accused of Leaving Baby in Dumpster. Source: nydailynews
Babies are discarded like trash in dumpsters. Children are gunned down in schools. People push those they don't identify with in front of trains. They detonate bombs in public areas. Mobs gather in orchestrated attacks to knock over department stores. The list is long, and our punitive responses haven't made us any safer.
Damian Herrera, NM Man 26, gets 4 Consecutive Life Sentences
Source: Albuq. Journal 1-7-22
In New Mexico, Damian Herrera, 26, was recently sentenced to four consecutive life sentences, plus nine and a half years, for the 2017 shooting deaths of his mother, brother and stepfather at the family’s home in Rio Arriba county. The district judge, Jason Lidyard, who sentenced Herrera, had the following to say:
You have shown this court that you have a penchant for extreme violence and that the only way to protect the community from you is to remove you from it.
Father, Son Sentenced to Life without Parole for Arbery Murder. Source: The Atlanta Journal
In Atlanta, a judge recently sentence Gregory and Travis McMichael, 66 and 35, respectively, to LWOP for the murder of Ahmaud Arbery, a 25 year old Black man whose 2020 killing fueled a national debate on racial profiling and vigilantism. Judge Timothy R. Walmsley had this to say:
We are all accountable for our own actions. Sometimes in today's day and age, that statement is lost upon many… Today demonstrates that everybody is accountable to the rule of law. Taking the law into your own hands is a dangerous endeavor.
Both of these instances are horrific examples of the kinds of tragedies being endured by families across this nation. A family and mother murdered in cold blood by her own son; an unarmed Black man being hunted by vigilantes, are both a testament to the current state of affairs in this nation, at different places for different reasons.
Criminality is an ongoing, existential threat to the safety and harmony of each and every one of us, to our families and communities, and, to a larger extent, to the health and sustainability of our democracy.
As I said, this is not a new challenge. What's different is our tolerance, and our skepticism for the tired rhetoric of politicians who are often times so far detached from our experiences, insulated by wealth and privilege, that we no longer trust in their proffered stratagems for leading us into a brighter tomorrow.
Especially because we live in an information age where we no longer feel compelled to take politicians at their word.
Because the evidence and information available speaks for itself. And what it tells us is that not only are our current responses to criminality not sustainable, fiscally speaking, they also aren't making us safer.
Source: Bob Thaves
Placing our problems in cages makes about as much sense as adopting an energy solution that involves burying nuclear waste in our backyards.
Regardless of how endearing the politicians are who come to our front doors with colorful pamphlets trying to sell us on the fallacy that nuclear energy is clean, affordable, sustainable, and most importantly, safe,
I'm certain that once you learn about the nuclear waste that would be buried in your backyard, beneath your garden, close to your water supply, and right in the area where you would hope to see your children play,
you’ll opt for an energy solution that doesn't offer the added bonus of needing chemotherapy for the remainder of your abbreviated life. Which is why we must open our eyes and see that caging our criminality isn't sustainable, viable, or for that matter, safe.
There is one thing that advocates for abolishing the death penalty get right, they bring to our attention the fact that our response to criminality shows us the current state of our humanity. At some point we were conditioned to believe that if someone harms us in some way and is then captured and punished by the authorities that justice has been served.
I disagree.
Justice implies consequences, yes, but if those consequences are not the basis of efforts to reform and rehabilitate the individual offenders, then all we're doing is exactly vengeance, pure and simple.
And if that is who we choose to be, then let's be very clear about who we are and close the curtain on the puppet show of correctional departments. Because if that is who we are then let's at least pursue our vengeful agenda in a way that is both efficient and sustainable.
We don't need correctional facilities to exact vengeance. LWOP is cruel, unnecessary, and exorbitantly expensive. And the only winners are the shareholders of various companies that make up the current correctional industrial complex.
As I read the victim impact statements of Angela Stewart, daughter of murder victim Manuel Serrano, allegedly killed by Damien Herrera, or that of Wanda Cooper-Jones,
Ahmaud Arbery's mother, I can't help but be empathetic to their losses. My empathy is part of my humanity, and rather than weakness I see it as my greatest attribute.
And I wish we lived in a world where their pain and loss could be mended with a form of justice that could bring their loved ones back into their lives, in this life. But it's just not possible.
Victor Rios, Gang Member turned Professor, Helping Latinos stay in School
Source: Remezcla.com
What is possible is turning a tragedy into a blessing. That, is very much within our grasp and ability to accomplish.
We’ve all seen this in our lives: the rape victim who finds healing in helping others, and in doing so saves lives; or the drug dealers and street thugs who become bona fide role models, living evidence of our capacity to change, and outright heroes who are able to get through to our younger generations in a way that all other methods have failed.
These miracles and blessings are all around us, and without even knowing it maybe they've already saved our lives.
I speak as someone who has suffered a tragic loss – one that I continue to live – and the responsible parties who knowingly condemned me to LWOP for a crime that I didn’t commit (the lazy detectives, the DA, the lying murderer who saved himself at my expense, or the judge who couldn't be bothered with fulfilling his oath in upholding the Sixth Amendment),
all the justice in the world isn't going to give me back my daughter's childhood, reinstate my marriage, or return me to my youth.
I have no use for vengeance pretending to be justice, because it won't return to me what was taken.
All I can do, all that any of us can do, is to amalgamate our losses into who we are now, in this moment, bringing to the forefront of those losses the memories, the wisdom gained, all while trying to help one another as we assimilate, grow, and heal. This is what communities are for, to help one another overcome the seemingly impossible vicissitudes of life.
Sun and Sea Beach Wedding. Source: Weddings.com
Life is beautiful, miraculous, and extremely painful, precisely because loss and tragedy are irrevocably a part of it. The birth of your child may just be the most beautiful memory of your life; just like the blessing in watching your son or daughter grow.
Marriages and relationships confound us while simultaneously bringing joy into our lives. By no means are these the end all to the forms that beauty and joy can shape themselves into. But regardless of their forms, we are without a doubt aware of their transitory nature.
The moments of bliss are numbered and we don't know how many we have. And when these people, experiences, or things get taken from us violently – criminally! – without compassion, we demand something that doesn't exist. What we settle for, we’ll call it justice, but we know it's really vengeance.
And the question we have to ask ourselves, in the fleeting moments of courage that come upon us, is whether or not our vengeance is worth the misguided resources that instead could be directed towards preventing the next tragedy from ever happening to someone else. Shouldn't justice instead be us saving others from what we've had to endure?
I admit, when I read the reporting on Damien Herrera's case, or first learned about Ahmed Arbery's tragedy, I was angry. I still can't get my mind around someone murdering his own mother.
Just like I can't imagine how terrifying it must have been for Arbery to have confronted racism in the way that he did, and lose his life in the process. But unfortunately, as we all know, anger isn't a good companion for sound decisions or rational solutions aimed at preventing the next tragedy.
A Noose. Source: calker.com
Caging our problems is just as dangerous as ignoring or internalizing our traumas. Imagine for a moment if we lived in a world where suicide was heralded as the solution to trauma.
Would this be acceptable? People who are wounded and broken from their traumas need help not a noose, in the same way that those of us who, for whatever reason, temporarily lose our way in life are worthy of being rehabilitated.
The truth is, mass-incarceration has not improved our society; the death penalty is vengeance, pure and simple; and neither represent the best of our humanity or who we claim to be as a nation.
Which leaves us having to confront an uncomfortable truth: saving the next victim just may mean reinventing our concept of justice before it's too late.
And this reinvention is going to require our actual involvement, a willingness to fail, being open-minded to the evidence, and above all, recognizing the predicament in which we find ourselves doesn't have to be this way.
We already know what the precursors to crime are, we even know how to address them, the only reason we haven't is because certain interests – political ideology and business – have discovered that the status quo of failed policies and false justice is profitable.
We've been duped into thinking that violence and criminality can't be rehabilitated. We've been lied to by our leaders when they tell us that the uranium under the garden isn't going to poison our ground water or our futures. And we've allowed ourselves to feel magnanimous about giving someone LWOP instead of the death penalty.
But all we have to do is look at the evidence and follow the truth to the very solutions already being implemented in other parts of the world.
As the truth reveals itself, we’ll come to see that our correctional facilities are grossly overcrowded, underfunded, dehumanizing, violent cesspools of drug addiction, sexual assault, and suicide.
This punishment-oriented abortion that we call corrections is a $1 trillion dollar exercise in futility and misguided intentions. It doesn't make us safer, it doesn't prevent or deter crime, and it's not sustainable.
It doesn't take a Ph.D. To recognize the trauma that these institutions bring forth, both inside and outside, and see the success of nations like Norway in the face of our failure.
Norway’s Bastoy Island Prison. Source: Forbes.com
Norwegians have followed the evidence, they know that people can be reformed, and they've acted upon this knowledge. Which explains why prison sentences in Norway never exceed 21 years, no matter the crime.
Felons are treated like human beings who, for whatever reason have made some bad choices. And if our response to those choices is to hand them a noose, then in all actuality we all have a hard in the tragedy we will fail to prevent.
As one of the head administrators at Norway's Bastoy Island prison said, “It's really very simple. Treat people like dirt and they will be dirt. Treat them like human beings and they will act like human beings.”
Norway treats its prisoners like students, something that draws criticism from those who profit or otherwise benefit from the U.S. correctional industrial complex as it stands.
But, Norway has the lowest recidivism rate in the world, with less than 20 percent of ex-cons reoffending. In the U.S., the return rate is above 70 percent. So what is our goal? Rehabilitation and reform, or vengeance?
The choice before us is quite simple. We either seize this opportunity to heal our humanity, or we forever lose our humanity. To those who advocate for abolishing the death penalty, please, try to not see LWOP as generosity or kindness, because it is neither.
I have lost friends to the trauma caused by your misguided mercy, and the world is a lesser place because of it. And aside from the facts that LWOP is expensive, unsustainable, and the equivalent of burying nuclear waste in our own backyards, it's cruel, ineffective, and not representative of who we claim to be. How will posterity judge us for this choice?
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