YMS_1975

This is true. Religion & religious folks tend to walk through life with blinders on. But not all religious folks are like this. There are religious people out there who need more than faith, more than what a book says, more than what mom and dad taught. Time has a funny way of changing how we see things (E.g : We no longer pray in schools). Not to date myself, but when I was going to school we used to sing the national anthem & say the Lords Prayer every day. I think I was in grade 7 or 8 when they stopped playing the Lords Prayer over the intercom. I still remember the uproar. LMAO. *Deep Sigh* Good times.

Toronto is grossly over rated! Nice to visit at best. Enjoy dodging bullets, crack heads & panhandlers. Let the good times roll!

I'd look at the country with the lowest crime rate (whichever one that may be).

Well, I'd look to the country which has the lowest crime rates. I'd study what they're doing. I mean they must be doing something right, so why reinvent the wheel? Emulate their successful model.

**Criminals

And "lifers" should be rapists & murderers; of course they'd have to narrow that down to much more greater detail though. Was it premeditated, self defense, etc. We can do it, but our government is too soft on crimes.

I'm not concerned in the least bit about their mental wellbeing. If they're willing to risk doing jail time, they don't deserve to have their mental wellbeing taken into consideration. Perpetrators of heinous crimes are not at Club Med. It's time to crack down on these parasites! Time to break their spirits, much as they have broken the spirits of their victims families & loved ones. So much coddling of criminals. It's time for our government to take action! Look at that Marco Muzzo clown! Ten years, and he offed three kids & their grandpa. Ten years for that?!? Get outta here! If I had any say in his sentencing, he would spend the rest his natural life in solitary confinement with no chance of parole. No human interaction whatsoever. The only thing he'd have in his cell is his toilet & a camera (which is out of his reach). Then I'd cut a deal with cable & satellite providers to give him airtime as he descends into madness. Sell it as PPV. The whole nine yards; the trial, the conviction, the sentencing, life in the bin, etc. If people watch Law & Order, CSI or Criminal Minds, there's obviously a market for it. People get entertained by shows about the legal system, both fictional and non-fictional documentary style. Ammend all high school, college & university law-related courses to include real, raw video footage of life in the bin. Teach students how prisoners are given such a sentence (offenses which led them there), solitary confinement life, financial costs to taxpayers vs betterment of society, etc. I'd take the funds from the PPV & invest into the families that have been affected by the crimes. No death penalty, so no blood on my hands & one less monster on the streets.

That's the idea. You commit a heinous crime, and bye-bye freedom & sanity. Our hands are clean of any bloodshed & they're out of circulation. Win-win.

I don't recall advocating sentences of six or seven years. I'm for strict sentences. Strict as in ten to fifteen years. Sentences in solitary confinement, where they won't see other inmates, no visitors, no luxuries, no nothing. Just lots of time to think about whether or not it was worth it. Lots of time to be off the streets.

Clearly you're unable to have a rational discussion without having to resort to being belligerent. On that note, have a wonderful day.

Rape victims are hardly "careless parents", but since you seem to be keen on labeling the would-be parents as "careless", let's discuss those parents who simply didn't plan for the child. But as a side note, it is rather telling that you only see this one side of the argument; that being pro-choice somehow only affects people who didn't think about the consequences of their actions. So you have a couple who didn't abstain or use contraceptives, and now she's pregnant. Is it "careless" behaviour? Absolutely. So now that they were careless, they are now facing the very real possibility of raising an unwanted child. One that they might not be able to afford, or one that won't be accepted by (let's say) old school traditional religious parents. What are the options here? Raise the child & he/she eventually learns they were unwanted Raise the child in poverty if finances are an issue Give the child up for adoption (which is a gamble either way) In the case of the "careless parents" here, if you stripped them of the right to abort that child you've essentially doomed that child to suffer the ill consequences of his/her parents recklessness. What about the effects of that burden on the child? Don't you think those children can very well end up growing warped? Don't you think it will affect their ability to function properly in a society? Imagine that kid being told everyday : "We never wanted you". Think about it. By your words, the parents were "careless". So....what if their carelessness spilled into their parenting skills? What if they were lousy parents? Is that so hard to believe? There are plenty of horrible parents out there! They were lousy at preventing the pregnancy, it's very possible they'd be lousy at being good parents as well. Now ask yourself who truly carries the burden. Is it the "careless parents" who couldn't give a rats behind about the child, or do you think it'll be the teachers who struggle to teach that child? The parents are "careless" so they can't be bothered. So when that kid goes to school, he/she ends up a problem child for teachers to struggle with. Then that kid grows up to be a pain in the rear end for anybody who is unfortunate enough to meet him/her. Being pro-choice doesn't mean you're irresponsible. It means you understand that not everybody is facing the same obstacles as you are, so a choice is available. You don't have to agree with abortion but for many, having the choice is the difference between being able to live their life in peace & being responsible for a chain of preventable horrible situations.

Not at all. Just because I'm pro-choice doesn't mean I'm advocating abortion. It just means I believe people should have a choice, because not everyone is dealing with the same set of circumstances. A blanket solution for everyone doesn't work. Some pregnancies are due to poor planning (no contraceptives were used). Other pregnancies were the result of rape. Most pregnancies result in healthy babies (whether they were wanted or not). Some pregnancies result in horrible disease & a life of pain & suffering. If you think everyone's story is the same then you're sadly mistaken.

Tell that to a rape victim who became pregnant, or to a would-be mother who's just been told by her doctor that her child will be born with a terminal disease; that the child's life would be in constant suffering. I wonder how the mother in those cases could be "responsible". Or perhaps they're not entitled to have their voices heard.

Not sure where you got that definition of capital punishment from. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/capital punishment Regardless....choosing to end a life because that life committed crimes is wrong. Choosing to end a life ("planned parenthood" I believe is the term they use) because you want to be responsible is completely different.

You seem to be hung up on labels like "socialists". You do realize that this is merely my own personal opinion, right? I don't represent socialists, nor do I represent any political parties. I'm not sure where you're getting the "one in ten thousand pregnancies due to rape" number from, but rape happens to be very common (http://sacha.ca/resources/statistics). You also didn't address health concerns. In my previous post I only addressed health concerns for the mother. But what about the child? What if the child is born with a crippling disease? What if he/she can't function normally in society? What if he/she can't even walk or talk? What will happen to the child then? What if nobody can care for the child after mom & dad have passed away? Abortion has several factors to consider. I still maintain it's not comparable to capital punishment.

That's a bit one-sided, don't you think? What about women who were raped? Don't you think a woman who was raped & was forced to carry that child to term might not love the child? What about all the mental trauma that child would endure because he/she eventually would learn they were the product of a malicious crime? How about the negative effects it would have on him/her? What if there were serious health concerns for the mother, if the child was carried to term? Comparing abortion to ending the life of a violent criminal is comparing apples to oranges.

I don't oppose abortion. I don't see abortion in the same light. Yes, it is taking a life but it's before the baby has a chance to fully develop.

I think you hit the nail on the head from your second sentence to the end. But that first sentence is where we reach a fork in the road. I can never agree to ending a life. No circumstance(s) could make me feel otherwise. A former co-worker once challenged me on that and asked : What if he killed your wife, your kids, or all of them? He didn't much care for my answer, but I then told him if he could find someone to administer a lie-detector test, he'd see I wasn't lying. I told him that if somebody killed my loved ones, I'd hate them from the bottom of my heart. I'd wish for their suffering. I'd wish they were made to feel the same amount of pain & suffering I'd be sentenced to when they took my loved ones away from me, but I still couldn't advocate taking a life. It's just so wrong. Nothing could ever justify taking another persons life. At least.....that's how I see it.

I agree that many criminals do hone their skills while in the bin & that it's a "badge of honour". That much we can agree on. But I could never agree to ending a life; even that of the harshest criminal. I'm afraid we'll simply have to agree to disagree.

Violence will not solve anything. You can either accept that, or you can let your delusions take control over you. Free will gives you the power to make that decision. What will deter crimes however, are very strict policies. Our laws are quite lax. If you want to solve this problem, start with pressuring lawmakers to fix their policies. Sentences handed out for those guilty are a joke at best. But for some reason, I'm finding that certain people think capital punishment will somehow fix this problem. It most certainly will not. When a serious crime is committed and the perpetrator is killed as part of his sentence, the only ones who remember the crime are the perpetrators family, the victim & their family. Society quickly forgets and moves on to the next cause of the month. But people who are thrown in prison and kept in prison (yes, at the tax dollars expense) are a constant reminder to those of us on the other side of those gates. Look at Paul Bernardo. We're still reading about him. People still talk about him. And when we remember those criminals & see that they're still doing time, it forces would-be criminals to think twice. Death is an easy out. Those who commit crimes don't really fear death. They live a fast life with little to no regard for consequence. Lock them up & throw away the key, and then suddenly their peer group takes notice. But sensible policy will always lose to mob mentality. I guess that's just the way it is.

If chopping off hands & the death penalty is your idea of justice, I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that you're a Conservative, white male.

I agree with you there, but chopping off hands and/or the death penalty is where we part ways.

Chop their hands off? This is Canada, not Saudi Arabia.