Moral dilemma

The men are also the victims. They have grown up in a society where women are second class and are there to be used. Their crime was to not realise how wrong this is. I am not going to loose any sleep over their punishment, but we should not let it distract us from the real criminal which is a society that thinks this sort of thing is OK.

Iam64 I agree with you. And I also think about the person who has to do the actual legal killing of another human being. 'The hangman' is the phrase I remember from growing up. How do you live with yourself having to kill other people for a living, one on one?

I was at school with a boy who was profoundly deaf and, there was also something else wrong with him, he wasn't 'right in the head' we used to say back then. He was not in my class or immediate circle, but everyone in the school year knew of him. I knew his whole family, his mum, brothers, sisters. I can picture him now still. Years later, after I had left school, I read in the newspaper that he has been convicted of a rape. Should he have been put to death?

Do we kill off people who are mentally ill and commit terrible crimes too? I recently caught the last 45 mins of "We Need to Talk About Kevin" - I hadn't read the book but had an inkling of what the story was about - with the excellent Tilda Swinton as the mother. Who could not feel for her?

... that should be "had been convicted ..."

I am with those who have posted without too much vindictiveness and who have managed to look at the wider picture.

One of the six accused has already committed suicide and another, who was only 17 at the time of the crime, has been sentenced to a mere 3 years in a youth detention centre.

As I have said previously, I am against the death penalty but these men didn't show any mercy towards this poor woman, or her male companion who seems to have been forgotten in all this.

I remember reading some years ago that the Chinese (I think) would not tell a condemned man when he was going to die. They would be taken out of their cells every morning, not knowing if it was going to be their last, so they had to endure the fear every day

I heard that one of the boys wept when the death sentence was passed. Was the weeping because he had been caught or did it finally dawn on him the enormity of his actions? It was not "just" the rape that I found so abhorrent, it was what they did with an iron bar afterwards.

As others have said, life is cheap in India and women are second class citizens.

I never used to be part of the "flog 'em and hang 'em" brigade but I do think that the country has to waken up and realise the enormity of the actions of these young boys and a precedent set. If they are hanged, others may think again.

I am vindictive about rape and child abuse. I can't help it....product of life experiences.

You say the men are victims of their upbringing and societies attitude to women but not all Indian men are potential rapists and sexual abusers so these men chose to commit their crime. Also they didn't simply commit rape they tortured the girl with a metal bar in such a way that she was fatally damaged inside. Even if society taught them that rape was ok it didn't teach them that torture and murder was.

Like many posters here I'm against the death penalty and often find this stance sorely tested at times. Right now I feel that I could personally throttle those men.

But I suspect in a short time we will revert to our original belief that judicial killing is wrong.

I could not love a son who behaved like that. And unless I never saw him and didn't know what he got up to, I think I have disowned him long before he could be such a monster. If not, I'd certainly disown him after I found out about such foulness. I'd probably hate/kill myself as well for failing to bring him up as a decent human being.

I cannot separate such appalling behaviour from the person doing it. Behaviour doesn't exist until it is done. Love for grown up people is not unconditional with me. I loved my offspring initially because they were helpless and completely dependent, and because I wanted them. I loved them now because they are decent human beings. I could not love a foul human being.

I'd have disowned...

Bags I really struggled with this when I read about the death sentence handed out because my gut feeling is that I don't feel the state has the right to take life. Having read about the utter brutality that this poor girl suffered at the hands of these men it's hard to argue their case so part of me wants to see them obliterated, not only for her, but for her family. Another horrible example of extreme violence in a country where barbaric acts towards girls and women seem to happen too often.

I'm still struggling, bananas!

My civilised mind is convinced that death penalties are not a good idea, if only because of miscarriages of justice. But my civilised emotions cannot cope with the utterly revolting nature of this attack. I cannot comprehend how any human being, or group of human beings, could be so cruel.

And another part of me, which is still only a social ape when all's said and done, thinks that keeping such dregs of society alive but locked up at society's expense for the rest of their lives is quite simply a waste of global resources. Other social animal groups reject obnoxious and damaging members, either by killing them or by isolating them from the group.

The nature of this crime makes me feel that isolation is not good enough justice for the parents of the girl who died. The criminals simply don't deserve to be alive. Being alive is what we value most. The social and civilised animal in me thinks this lot have forfeited their right to any life.

And that bring me back to the first point about miscarriages of justice. There must be absolutely no doubt at all that these are the perpetrators of the crime of which they have been convicted.

To my mind the best justice would have been for them to have been caught in the act and shot on the spot.

All the delayed death penalty does is delay what seems the most natural thing to do – get rid of the poison.

There have been, and probably will be again, instances of terrible gang rapes. Not to mention children horribly damaged, even killed, by paedophiles.

If the death penalty is appropriate for this crime, why not for others?

I'm sure I read that passers-by did nothing. Did anybody else see this?
The attack went on for so long, surely somebody noticed.

I find this apparent appetite for meeting cruelty with cruelty - castration, mental torture, etc. - very depressing. It's as if people have to demonstrate how appalled and disgusted they are at the sheer sadism of the crime by being equally sadistic.

My feeling is that violence and killing - even when lawful - means that we take on the values and behaviour of the killer, leading to further brutalisation of society.

I agree entirely Eloethan.

When this thread started my heart sank to my boots in expectation of what some of the posts would be like.

Yes, I know I could have just buggered off but somehow I didn't. Hope triumphing over experience.

I am appalled, shocked and angered by violence and particularly so when the victim is a child or a gang is involved in an assault/murder.

Any violent death is unnecessary and for the family of the victim the loss is just as great no matter how the victim died. I can understand the anger and fury of these people and why they may call for death and violent retribution but do find the vitriol of those not directly connected to the crime difficult to understand. Reminds me of voyeuristic gallows crowds.

There are many imprisoned men in the UK who have committed the same sort of atrocious sexual murders and woundings. The nature of the torture they have inflicted, using weapons and implements, is so horrendous that you wouldn't describe it to another person. These crimes are committed after death, too. Once you know, you can't unknow. If these offenders can be kept in prison for life in the UK, I believe we shouldn't call for the death sentence in another country. The parents and relatives of those women who are sexually tortured in this country have no public outcry to support their need for vengeance - these unimaginable offences have been dealt with by our justice system and many of these offenders are now in the 3 special hospitals - Rampton, Ashworth and Broadmoor - or the regional secure units, NHS forensic services.

The dilemma of feeling murderous ourselves, as a reaction to these abhorrent crimes, is what the people who have to control, treat and care for these offenders feel, too. They have to take an objective stance in order to learn more about such criminal behaviour, treat and re-assess their dangerousness, and report to the home secretary and regular tribunals in order to keep the public safe. It would be rare for someone who has sexually tortured and/or murdered to be released when their crimes have been so horrendous.

Excellent post when

Thank you for informed post when

I don't want to see anyone killed in my name. I don't want to be part of a society that kills anyone in the name of justice. If I don't want it here I don't want to see it anywhere in the world. I agree with Eloethan that we cannot meet violence with violence in the name of the law. We need to be better than those who commit such vile acts. That is what makes a compassionate human being and a civilised society.

Of course, if it were my daughter I would want to tear these men limb from limb. But thank goodness I live in a society where I would not be allowed to do that. It wouldn't bring my daughter back and ultimately I don't think it would make my loss any easier to bear. But I would want them to be locked up for the rest of their lives.

I agree with nightowl.

I agree with when and nightowl too. That's why I called the thread and a moral dilemma and why I'm expressing what I feel as an ape but holding that up for inspection in a civilised mind.

And on gransnet.

Cross out the second 'and'

I am torn here, no I don't believe in hanging..... But as Bags said had it been her Dd she would having willingly taken his life.......... I had these feelings when my DD was raped I felt that if I met this person in the street I would not have been responsible for my actions, I haven't come across him but I would imagine these feelings would surface again if ever I did.... And yesI would know him as he was a supposed friend.