The 4 of them have been sentenced to death. They bit that I don’t like is that when they committed their offences their crime was not punishable by death.

Pretty sure murder has been punishable by death in India for a long, long time. I think OP has got the wrong end of the stick here.

the notion of the state sanctioning something so violent as murder is not something I could ever support in any circumstance.

Yup, that’s it for me.

lemonysam – Member

Romanticising nature much?

dolphins gang rape females to death
ducks gang rape females to death
bears rape female
snakes gang rape females
baboons maul females to prevent them mating with other males
sea otters rape baby seals to death
dog’s penises are designed to tear the female if she attempts to leave copulation

And don’t get started on the invertebrates…

which of these animals used the iron bar?

which of these animals used the iron bar?

The only one to have invented wheel jacks.

Iron rod would be fitting

An iron rod that didn’t fit might even more fitting.

So we should blame contemporary violence against women on a man who died over 60 years ago?

Yes, that’s exactly what I meant. 🙄

I understand what glupton is saying and agree with it. That doesn’t stop me thinking that the death penalty is the most fitting sentence for them.

I don’t think India care too much about human rights for law abiding citizens let alone scum like this. I think their justice department will probably sleep soundly with this decision.

Yes, that’s exactly what I meant.

Then tell me what you did mean!

Romanticising nature much?

Anthropomorphising nature much?

Then tell me what you did mean!

I meant that a man preaching “an eye for an eye makes the world blind” in one breath and then possibly (not sure of the sources) believing that “Indian women who were raped lost their value as human beings.” and “arguing that fathers could be justified in killing daughters who had been sexually assaulted for the sake of family and community honour.” Is maybe not the best role model for a civilised (and equal) society that one first assumes. Therefore the irony is not so ironic after all.

Does that make sense?

PS – Sorry for being glib.

Brakes

I’m prepared to let this clear contravention of law slide. just this once.

That’s also against the Rule of Law, it’s there so laws can’t be changed/made up as we go along.

You can’t just pick and choose, that’s the whole point.

no shit Sherlock

Anthropomorphising nature much?

Not really, no.

Pretty sure murder has been punishable by death in India for a long, long time. I think OP has got the wrong end of the stick here.

Possibly, and I hope so.

Although the offence at the time may have been rape, it looks pretty clear to me that what was done with the iron bar led to her death. So the offence is murder at most manslaughter at least as even the most uneducated know that sticking iron bars where the sun don’t shine is bad for your health. Seems to me that when truly shocking incidents occur that we as a society rather not look at the elephant in the room and will react by either clearing the room by state sponsored murder or look the other way and make sure that the crockery is all adjusted and in line in an OCD manner by insisting that these monsters are treated in the most civilised way possible and afford them every right possible.

Its difficult to read the accounts of what happened and not feel a deep down visceral disgust at what these men did.

The disgust quickly gives way to anger and the need for retribution. This is a totally understandable emotional response.

But laws should not be based upon emotion.

Sentencing these men to death doesn’t change the fact that the poor woman is dead, nor does it go very far towards addressing the wider issues with violence towards women in Indian society or the traditional caste system as a whole.

They bit that I don’t like is that when they committed their offences their crime was not punishable by death. Surely their punishment should only be the maximum allowed at the time they committed the offence

That’s not correct—murder is punishable by death under the Penal Code (s 302); also the imposition of a retrospective criminal penalty would be unconstitutional (see art 20(1): ‘No person shall … be subjected to a penalty greater than that which might have been inflicted under the law in force at the time of the commission of the offence …’)

I meant that a man preaching “an eye for an eye makes the world blind” in one breath and then possibly (not sure of the sources) believing that “Indian women who were raped lost their value as human beings.” and “arguing that fathers could be justified in killing daughters who had been sexually assaulted for the sake of family and community honour.” Is maybe not the best role model for a civilised (and equal) society that one first assumes. Therefore the irony is not so ironic after all.

Does that make sense?

PS – Sorry for being glib.

Thanks. I’m not sure it’s not ironic: my point was simply that the state – which has just sanctioned killing – was founded by someone who spent his life opposing vengeance. That Ghandi may well have been flawed, repressed and held misogynistic views is unpleasant indeed, but not altogether surprising for a man of his time.

I’m hard pressed to find anything in this judgement that is unacceptable to me on an emotional level, but I’m also not a great believer in the death penalty on an intellectual level. However, I do wonder if a life time in solitary in an Indian Jail, with the constant threat of a violent unsanctioned death hanging over them is any more or less abhorrent than a quick exit.

Difficult all round IMHO.

Patriot, the 17 y/o was the worst of the lot of them

Maximum-sentence syndrome then.

He’ll suffer in jail I would have thought *shudders* maybe the deathers got off lightly…

Why not ask her family what they’d like for a punishment?

Killing people is wrong. Why because human life is important.

So we demonstrate how wrong killing people is….by killing them. Hmmmm.

I disagree with the death penalty. I think it’s an affront to our humanity to plan and carry out an execution. Regardless of what that person done. How behaving like animals deters others from behaving like animals is beyond me. And the relative subjectivity justifies people killing others in the name of God/Allah whoever (after all insulting a superior deity must be worse, right?).

They did something unconscionable. Unforgivable. Disgusting. Killing them doesn’t make it better. Adding another inhuman act to the heap just makes us a little dirtier.

Dead easy.
Its none our business.

Thanks. I’m not sure it’s not ironic: my point was simply that the state – which has just sanctioned killing – was founded by someone who spent his life opposing vengeance. That Ghandi may well have been flawed, repressed and held misogynistic views is unpleasant indeed, but not altogether surprising for a man of his time.

Well, when you put it like that… …Point conceded.

Not really, no.

No? Pretty sure rape is a purely human construct. Not that forced sex doesn’t occur in animals but I struggle to apply the same moral dimension to their behaviour compared to ours.

Each to their own though.

Killing people is wrong. Why because human life is important.

why is human life important – is this some religious reasoning or something. If so then

“And a man who inflicts an injury upon his fellow man just as he did, so shall be done to him [namely,] fracture for fracture, eye for eye, tooth for tooth. Just as he inflicted an injury upon a person, so shall it be inflicted upon him.”

Death is fair enough for them considering their crimes.

What if they had raped your sister like that – how would you feel then?

Bad cases, bad laws

What if…

Hypotheticals are useless in debates such as these.

What if they had raped your sister like that – how would you feel then?

Yes I’d want them dead, which is generally why victims families don’t decide the sentence and we have a judicial system instead.

What if they had raped your sister like that – how would you feel then?

If it was your sister I’d still want them dead.

I used to have an idealized view that human life is special and should never be taken but now I just think too many people treat others like sh!t so lets get rid of them.

why is human life important

It’s just this crazy whacked out notion that some of us have.

It was stated on the radio that 1 in 4 men in 6 Asian countries admitted to raping someone during their lifetime. Admittedly none of them were India but it is the same region. My mind was slightly blown by this.

Article.

In regards to the OP, thou shalt not kill. No ifs, no buts. Anything less is barbaric. Changing the law so you can execute people speaks volumes about the quality of their justice system and will no doubt come back to haunt them in the future. I reckon it is a big mistake. They should chuck them in the clink and let the other prisoners do the job for them.

They should chuck them in the clink and let the other prisoners do the job for them.

Provide weapons or just turn a blind eye? Actually a Thunderdome approach might be quite good, get it on pay per view for some well needed revenue raising.

Provide weapons or just turn a blind eye?

Neither. It is the duty of the authorities to protect those in their custody. It was a flippant remark but it is far more satisfactory to have an individual break the law than it is for the law to be changed on the whims of victims.

it is my view that with an act as despicable as that they have lost the right to any existence in society.

The only reason to let them live is if they were so intellectually challenged to not realize that they were committing a gross crime against society, let alone the victim.

Having a bit of a conversation about this in the office and I one of my colleagues came up with a bit of a blinder that left me a bit stumped.

I was arguing that we should not be able to apply a new law to an old crime as that undermines the rule of law and people should be punished according to the law at the time that the offence was committed.

He then asked if we should be executing people who were proved to have committed murder in 1963 when capital punishment was legal?

Changing the law so you can execute people speaks volumes about the quality of their justice system and will no doubt come back to haunt them in the future.

Just to re-iterate, this is not what has happened. Pretty sure people are mis-interpreting the last comment in the article that OP linked to.

committing murder is not necessarily as gross a crime as theirs, in my view.

In addition, rape is one thing, rape with an iron bar is in a different league.

He then asked if we should be executing people who were proved to have committed murder in 1963 when capital punishment was legal?

No. The UK is a signatory to the ECHR, which makes capital punishment illegal.

No. The UK is a signatory to the ECHR, which makes capital punishment illegal.

you <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<—————–>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> the point

At the time we weren’t, which was the question, if it’s moraly wrong to retrospectively up the punishment, should the reverse be true?