The best objection to the death penalty is indeed that we can't be trusted to administer it.
I disagree with a lot of comments in this thread. The death penalty is in fact the appropriate punishment for murderers. This is not true in order to deter crime or so that we can create a better society or any other similar rationalization. Justice, by which I mean reciprocity, is an end in itself. A crime should be punished proportionally and the only justification for punishment is guilt.
A simple explanation of this theory of justice:
> A great crime offends nature, so that the very earth cries out for vengeance; that evil violates a natural harmony which only retribution can restore; that a wronged collectivity owes a duty to the moral order to punish the criminal (Yosal Rogat).
Please don't take HN threads into ideological flamewar. If you start with "morally clueless" and end with Eichmann, god help us, that's pretty much guaranteed. We're trying for a very different sort of conversation here.
If the third party carrying out the "justice" is merely implementing the vengeful wishes of the most irrational party (i.e. the victim or their family) then I wouldn't say they are "disinterested" in any practical sense.
Also, by the supposed logic of "restoring natural harmony", if someone kills your family, should you be allowed to kill theirs?
I disagree with a lot of comments in this thread. The death penalty is in fact the appropriate punishment for murderers. This is not true in order to deter crime or so that we can create a better society or any other similar rationalization. Justice, by which I mean reciprocity, is an end in itself. A crime should be punished proportionally and the only justification for punishment is guilt.
A simple explanation of this theory of justice:
> A great crime offends nature, so that the very earth cries out for vengeance; that evil violates a natural harmony which only retribution can restore; that a wronged collectivity owes a duty to the moral order to punish the criminal (Yosal Rogat).