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Originally Posted by Beth Sweet
[Personal belief time, not necessarily backed by fact as above statement was]
If someone is given the death penalty, someone has to push the button to give them the injection. The button pusher therefore is a murderer himself and must now be killed. He knew about this ahead of time and had everything planned out and did it all in sound conscience.
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What is your definition of "murder"?
Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary: "the crime of unlawfully killing a person esp. with malice aforethought"
When the law allows the death penalty, the executioner is performing a legally-mandated killing and is therefore not a murderer. The majority of killings in this country are not murder. Many of them are accidents; some of them are manslaughter, a lesser crime than murder. And not all murders are intentional (example: an armed bank robber killing someone in the course of committing the robbery, and claiming it was unintentional, will still be held liable for first-degree murder unless the court is very liberal).
In 2004, there was a shoot-out at our motel during a regional competition. Fortunately, most of the team was at the stadium and was not exposed to the danger. This is what happened: a man was misbehaving in the motel lobby. The police came and tried to deal with him. He pulled a gun on them. A running gun battle ensued from the motel lobby, across the front courtyard, alongside some of our rooms, and into the rear parking lot, where the police finally killed him.
Now, the guy was probably on drugs or crazy or something, so it's too bad this happened, but what else could the police do? Let him go on shooting up the motel? Would you call the police "murderers" because they were defending themselves and the immediate community (motel staff and guests) from a clearly dangerous person? (I have pictures of the bullet holes in the wall 2 rooms down from the room where one of our team moms cowered during the shooting; a light fixture was shattered just outside the door of the room where our vice-principal was.)
Please be careful of how you use words. "Murder" is being expanded by some people to include any kind of killing, including killing of animals, or even plants. Overused, the word can lose its meaning and make rational discussion of this subject difficult or impossible.
Another point about the executioner: By instituting a governmental justice system, society takes vengeance for killings out of the hands of the victim's immediate friends and family, thereby curtailing the endless "eye for eye" cycle. Whatever flaws our justice system has, it is still much more impartial -- police, courts, and executioners--than an enraged parent or sibling who is thirsting for revenge.