> Would I want to? No. Even if the condemned
> was being executed for the murder of
> someone I loved? I don't know. If that
> circumstance ever arose (God forbid!), I don't
> think I would want to witness it out of a desire
> for revenge.

I'm curious why you might want to witness an execution under those circumstances, then. You say you don't know if you would; what about the condemned having killed somebody you loved changes the circumstances?

> The thing that niggles in the back of my mind
> is this: death should not become a public
> event. I think that even a condemned murderer
> should be allowed a certain amount of privacy.

Why? I think that once you've lost your right to life (the single most fundamental human right), you have pretty much lost your right to privacy. That's a decision you make when you make the choice to murder another. I have very little sympathy for the rights of convicted murderers. Commiting first-degree murder shows that you have very little regard for the basic rights of others, and at that point you've violated the social contract and need to be removed from society.


> With the way the American public is so
> gung-ho over "reality" lately, how long might it
> be before grisly war imagery and public
> executions become popular TV? That's not a
> threshold I'd like to see us as a nation cross.

I don't know if that would happen, but it seems possible. At the same time, it seems we're a little sheltered from our actions. It's much easier to support a war when it seems distant; harder to support it when you see the bodies of innocent civilians killed by your military's actions. Likewise the death penalty (which does manage to take the lives of people who are innocent, as the justice system is not and cannot be perfect). We bear responsibility for the actions of our government, and I feel like we get off a little easy by just allowing the faceless system to take care of our dirty work without having to inspect or really deal with the ramifications of those actions.

Stephen