Rapists destroy lives. With brutal violence, with cruelty, and with a complete disregard for any humanity present in their victims. They kill the person that was there before their attack. While not commonly physically lethal, rape scars the mind, it damages natural social responses, and can, and has, harmed people so completely that they literally killed themselves rather than live the rest of their lives "damaged". While there are people who refuse to be broken, people strong enough to come through such a terrible ordeal still strong and vital, that is not an excuse for the crime or the criminal. Murder is often sudden and violent, where rape is deliberate and often takes more time. Closer to torture than murder, and in many cases equally, if not more damaging.

Rape is still one of the most vile crimes in human knowing. It is also one of the most ignored. For millennia we have overlooked women as second class citizens, or worse, property. Many of laws regarding rape are throwbacks to time periods when women could not vote, own land, or be seen as the equals of any man, especially their husbands/masters.

Still, the death penalty? Normally I would argue against the death penalty, after all it has been shown time and again that it does not work as a deterrent. So if it is not preventing crime, then it is merely an act of vengeance; and vengeance has no place in justice. But in rape, even more so than in murder, it is about neither vengeance nor deterrence. With Rapists the rate of repeat crimes is massive. Sexual predators commit the same crimes over, and over, and over again. Some have admitted to successfully abusing over a hundred innocent people in the course of a decade or two. In the case of rapists and child molests the death penalty does not prevent OTHER rapists from committing future crimes, it prevents the ones on trial from committing them.

If stopping a child rapist for good, by following through on the death penalty can save the other 20 or 30 people that person would have abused; then it is worth it.

However, I do not agree that the death penalty should apply to a first time conviction without biological evidence. If there is physical proof showing the crime and the accused are solidly linked, then absolutely. Otherwise, in cases without solid evidence, the death penalty should not be on the table unless it is a second or even third offense.

This is not a normal crime people. This is a vile act only recently being acknowledged for being the crime women have known it to be all along. It can be prevented. Unfortunately in the present that prevention will be had through extreme measures. With work, it can be prevented in the future through better education and better understanding.

But why is the death penalty better than life in prison?

The death penalty, as you note, has never really worked as a deterrent. So if a child abuser is engaged in sexual molestation, he/she must now consider that either way--let the child live or not--he/she is subject to execution, what is going to happen?

Recidivism among sexual offenders is a huge problem, there is no argument there. But there is also no problem with a life sentence. There are no children in jail, and for those that want blood vengeance, it should be noted that child molestors are often treated terribly by the other prisoners.

I don't really see where executions achieve anything, other than a vague feeling from the victim that vengeance has been wrought. Is that reason enough?

>>Rapists destroy lives.<<

Oh, please. I know plenty of people, both men AND women, who have been raped and who have healed - who have gone on with their lives and led them like you or I have.

Just because some weak-willed individuals obsess over the past and can't quite stop yanking the scab off of their wounds doesn't mean that everyone's life has been destroyed that's been in that position.

Now I don't blame you for being ignorant, it makes a much better story on Law & Order and CSI if the raped are tragic victims. And I'm not stating that what they went through wasn't horrible, but it certainly does NOT require the death penalty as a punishment.

And before anyone gets their knickers tied in a knot, I was sexually abused as a kid, and have gotten over it. No tremors, no nightmares, no psychological disorders - just a sense of wonderment over those who just won't let themselves HEAL.

Life in prison versus the death sentence... The first argument that comes to mind is which one do you think is cruel and unusual?

A. You have wronged your fellows and are very to likely to continue down this path so; your life is forfeit.

or

B. You have wronged your fellows and are very likely to continue down this path so; you are to be locked away for the next 40-70 years in a cell with the worst society has to offer and allowed to live life every day without ever knowing freedom again.

I think the life sentence may be the cruelest punishment we institute. A life tortured or an end to it all? More importantly, the life sentence has made large strides towards destroying the heart of our prison systems. Prisons are SUPPOSED to be about reform. A criminal goes in, but a citizen with a better shot comes out. That is meant to be the plan. Without that, all the prisons have revolving doors and serve no real function except as free lodging for society’s worst. But when you put someone into a reform institution, who is never allowed to leave... It twists the nature of the institution into something it is not meant to be. A life sentence is the modern version of "exile"; we just ran out places to exile people to so we started locking them up.

As to the comment on rape victims just being 'too weak' and how they should 'just get over it'... This isn't a bad day at the office. There is a time and a place to call upon strength. You cannot ask a mother who's child has just been murdered to "suck it up and move on already" at the funeral. Her life has been violently altered from that point forward. There is no returning to normal; normal died and something else replaced it.

The same applies to rape Victims. Key word VICTIMS. It is not the responsibility of the victims to 'get over it' and move on. That attitude has been the problem for the last two centuries. It is the same attitude that perpetuates domestic abuse; 'it’s just a punch, I get punched all the time'. Why not justify genocide while you’re at it? With enough word play, you could make any crime sound less monstrous than it is. Thieves do it all the time.

It is wrong, it is a crime, and you can not put the blame on the victims with a writ of 'they just weren’t strong enough' without becoming one of their attackers.

Keep the blame on the criminals, and the societies that breed them, for that is where the blame belongs.