The question is, do you want people who commit crimes to be punished, or so you want a safer society? Because people treated like “the animals [you believe] they are” are far more likely to go on to commit more crimes. There are many studies that show this to be the case. I would rather live in a society with less…

Oh, wow. Prison is almost like holidays?

Really? You think any position that is held by the majority of the country is thereby justified as moral? I’m all for moral relativism to an extent, but that seems a shaky proposition. I understand that there may be no such thing as “this is objectively right” but, to me, that requires one to grapple with the…

Oh, I agree on that. When someone dies as a result of your neglect it’s certainly manslaughter. But it’s the massive pile-on of privilege that gives me pause, that some people are considered to be more valuable because of who they hang around with.

Serious question, really?

That’s a pretty funny way of looking at morality, but hey, if you’re comfortable cloaking your sense of morality in what a majority of people in this particular society, with all of its longstanding prejuduces and inequality, think is okay, knock yourself out. Why think for yourself?

This picture is everything.

With all the people in death row...and those serving life sentences...you believe in “get tough on crime” is a good deterrent? Even in countries like Saudi Arabia and Iran, where punishment is extremely severe, crime still happens. You need to re-evaluate your position.

Having terrible veins and having dealt with some truly terrible nurses before, the idea of someone fumbling to put in an IV in for forty minutes is horrifying. I’d rather take the guillotine than lethal injection.

I mean both of these men were raped and tortured throughout their lives. Williams was raped in prison after years of sexual abuse at the hands of his mother. So realistically, they suffered from the kind of psychological horror you’re describing. Not that it absolves them, but the chain of suffering didn’t start with…

I don’t know where you’re getting your information, but I don’t know anyone who would describe US prisons as pleasant. Many aren’t even safe. Solitary confinement is used a lot, and if you’re not in solitary, you’re still spending your life in just a few rooms, with your freedom inside these spaces also very…

It’s simply not true that death is reserved for “the worst of the worst.” There is overwhelming evidence that death sentences are primarily reserved for indigent black defendants who killed white victims. It’s not minimizing rape and murder to acknowledge that.

But her maids could just sell lemonade to their maids to recoup that money, right?

And the fucked up part is that she said those words “maids...dug deep” with not one iota of insight or a clue as to what that might possibly indicate.

And I’m sure the maids weren’t at all concerned that they’d get fired if word got back to the boss that they refused to buy the kids’ lemonade.

“As good fortune would have it, we had a bodyguard that summer,” she writes. They persuaded their bodyguard to buy lemonade, and then their driver, and then the maids, who “dug deep for their spare change.”

The facts aren’t making me defensive. I am well aware of that people on death row have been convicted of horrific crimes. I have no sorrow at the death of people who have committed horrific crimes. The next time I shed a tear for one of these guys will be the first. In fact, my visceral reaction to these executions is…

“It’s beside the point, and it says a lot when, to make carrying out the death penalty seem civilized, you have to compare it to brutal criminal acts. Maybe we should analyze the death penalty on its own moral and practical merits instead of judging it by the standard of the worst people in our society.”

I live in a country riddled with horrible criminals.

Cold take: if you think that the possibility of your death drug expiring is a morally acceptable reason for executing more people faster—you don’t understand the words morally or acceptable.