An excellent quote:
Lord Justice Denning, master of the rolls of the Court of Appeals in the United Kingdom, once said: "Punishment is the way in which society expresses its denunciation of wrongdoing: and, in order to maintain respect for law, it is essential that the punishment inflicted for grave crimes should adequately reflect the revulsion felt by the great majority of citizens for them."
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3 comments:
Hey! I had no idea you were in Germany. It's crazy to think about where we all are in life now. but happy Chinese new year!
I totally hate the idea of punishment. I recognize that it's a very natural and human thing to have in our society, but I don't think it's justified to inflict suffering on someone, just for the sake of making them suffer. Protecting the rest of society is a different matter.
That's a really interesting point, Sunny. Yeah, I guess it comes down to an even more fundamental issue: to what extent do we try to satisfy our human desires? (Here, revenge and punishment being one of them). And what do we do when multiple desires (revenge vs. compassion & forgiveness) conflict? At some point stifling our natural feelings will result in an explosion - pent-up anger often manifested in things like riots and vigilante violence. However, you're right, the alternative is not really appealing either.
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