Ep. 99: Is the death penalty more humane than life imprisonment?

The Mindcrime Liberty Show discusses the death penalty by inverting the usual way it is discussed: is it more humane then life in prison? If punishment in itself is just and an institution or individual desires to carry it out, which is the best form? Generally punishment is done for reasons of justice, isolation or deterrence. Maybe punishment in itself is unjust but if a heinous act occurs (someone murders an innocent person’s entire family) are most people or societies going to go full Anabaptist and forgive them? Thus, for most societies and individuals some form of punishment is required. 

Lifetime incarceration, especially if it’s done humanely, is expensive (which requires taxing the innocent or using charity) and doesn’t really function as a punishment. It only meets the isolation criterium. Oftentimes actual existing lifetime incarceration isn’t that humane. For one thing the conditions of many prison’s aren’t particularly humane either (hence it’s inhumane to keep someone locked up for ones whole life): take a look at some second or third world prisoners, or for that matter American prisoners in Guantanamo Bay or where Julian Assange is being kept. Some prisoners are locked in solitary confinement without human interaction, sunlight or for that matter any stimulus. Other prisons are inhumane precisely because the other prisoners create a very toxic culture. One solution to resolve the cost problem is to make prisoners labour. This is not a new phenomenon and as Jimmy Dore points out California has used prison labour to fight forest fires while paying them next to nothing. Making prisoners work resolves the cost problem; however, creates an incentive problem that could promote entrapment of some kind. It also furthers the prison industrial complex as well which gives the prison ward a kind of free revenue. The dilemma seems to be that lifetime incarceration if done “humanely” is expensive for the broader society and doesn’t really function as a punishment if a particular heinous act is done. If prison labour is used to fund it this creates inhumane conditions which create incentives problems and undermines the usual way society operates. Would the death penalty be more humane then the actual existing alternatives while not undermining the broader labour market? The death penalty can be quite cheap and quick. Finally, what is the death penalty’s relationship to Christianity? Is punishment “Christian”? Wouldn’t most criticisms of the death penalty also apply to the brutal forms of lifetime incarceration? If the prison isn’t “brutal” then why bother with punishment at all? Would the death penalty resolve many of these issues?