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Lab Assistant
Original Poster
#1 Old 18th Sep 2014 at 12:44 AM
Default If you take a life, should you give a life? (drinking and driving)
Have you ever been watching a music video on youtube, then all of a sudden be watching something on elephants? Weird how we seem to drift off like that.
Today I found myself looking at a lot of drinking and driving videos after drifting off into youtube land. Mostly just reenactments for educational purposes, but I soon was looking up REAL drinking and driving incidences where people have gotten behind the wheel, drunk, and have killed innocent people. A lot of them seemed to kind of get away with it in my eyes. Some got 8-10 years at the most, just from my little research. I just can't help but think that if you DECIDE to drink and drive knowing what the concequences can be, and you take a life, shouldn't you spend the rest of your life in jail? Sure, I doubt many people driving under the influence don't intend to kill, but the fact is that they do and they know they can. You took someones life, and in my opinion you should give a life.
The past few nights this subject has just gotten my blood boiling. I'd really like to hear some other opinions, as everyone sees things in their own p.o.v.
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Theorist
#2 Old 18th Sep 2014 at 4:56 AM
Incarceration and punishment should never be about an eye for an eye. That's not how the law is set up. The law is about the crime, intent, and responsibility. A drunk driver is by definition incompetent. They can't "intend" to murder someone behind the wheel of a vehicle. That's enough to bump it down from 1st degree murder almost automatically. There's more wiggle room between manslaughter and 2nd degree murder, but that's still not sending anyone to the electric chair or putting them in prison for the rest of their lives.

And what exactly do you gain by that? People get drunk, or get tired, or take prescription medication, or they've got a mental disorder, or whatever. Shit happens, and sometimes yes people make shit happen by not being responsible enough but really, what you're describing is putting them away the same way you put away serial killers and folks who cut up the neighbors and hide them in their freezers. Those are not equal crimes. Sometimes I think the drunks behind the wheel are just as much victims as anyone else, people in the deep recesses of an addiction shattering their motor control and decision making skills. I mean, not enough to not put them in jail, but enough that I believe that their sentencing should be less about someone's idea of revenge and more about treating their addictions.

Other people? It could just be a terrible singular decision. Terrible singular decisions deserve punishment, they don't deserve the literal or figurative execution of the rest of their life.
Scholar
#3 Old 19th Sep 2014 at 4:04 AM
I recently heard a news story about some dumb drunk bastard who got behind the wheel and he hit and killed two little boys. The father found the piece of shit and shot him, he got off on all charges. Anyone who is contemplating driving after a night of getting shit-faced needs to remember that story. There is no excuse or reason for drinking and driving.

"It's said war - war never changes. Men do, through the roads they walk. And this road - has reached its end" - Ulysses, Fallout New Vegas
If you love Fallout and literacy, you'll ABSOLUTELY love my roleplay group. https://www.facebook.com/groups/127063690973781/
Theorist
#4 Old 19th Sep 2014 at 5:41 AM
Quote: Originally posted by ChinchillaJesus
I recently heard a news story about some dumb drunk bastard who got behind the wheel and he hit and killed two little boys. The father found the piece of shit and shot him, he got off on all charges. Anyone who is contemplating driving after a night of getting shit-faced needs to remember that story. There is no excuse or reason for drinking and driving.


Except that's really nullification. By all rights the man should have gone to jail too, because just because you're angry doesn't give you the right to take another life. I could probably dig up a dozen or more less than heartwarming stories where folks are killing each other because they just thought the other person committed a crime, or they misidentified someone. When you take the law into your own hands and murder someone, you're a piece of shit too. Worse, you don't even have the excuse that you were literally not in command of your entire faculties. You're not someone who's made a fatal mistake. You're just a piece of shit murdering asshole like all the other murderers rationalizing your crime.
Mad Poster
#5 Old 19th Sep 2014 at 9:37 AM
I'm fairly sure that the majority of those who have done drunk driving, and either killed someone or hurt them very bad, often struggles with the guilt for the rest of their lives. That in itself is (for most drunk drivers, anyway) a lengthening of that initial punishment of prison.

The "an eye for an eye" thing makes the other person almost equally guilty. Imagine if everyone were to kill someone for killing their loved ones. There would be an endless chain, startig with the murderer and probably never end, because after a while everyone would seek revenge. There wouldn't be a lot of people left on Earth by now. That's why we've got all those laws.

And think about it. If someone does not intend to kill someone, but does it anyway, and then another comes by and kills that person for what they did, who has the biggest blame? The one who didn't intend the murder and killed by accident (even if influenced by alcohol), or the other one who did it willfully (if perhaps in a rage)? But if the first murder was intended, and perhaps even done with cruelty in mind, then that would turn the whole situation around - but is it still right for the second person to kill the first one? Shouldn't also the second one get punished? After all, they also took a life. If, however, the first person kills someone, and then moves for the second person in the same rage, then the second one has the right to defend themselves. If that defence is to kill the first person - what then? The first person is equally dead in all 3 scenarios, but the intent of the second person isn't the same.

And that, I suppose, is why we've got laws, lawyers and judges, to differenciate between what's right and what's wrong, and what's in the shady, grey zone between right and wrong.
Scholar
#6 Old 19th Sep 2014 at 3:38 PM
No, my moms heroin-jamming, asshole, abusive, alcoholic, ex-boyfriend almost killed his best friend when he went drinking and driving. He didn't give a shit, he left his friend to die after they crashed. He had absolutly no fucking remorse about it and just got off with a fucking DUI.

"It's said war - war never changes. Men do, through the roads they walk. And this road - has reached its end" - Ulysses, Fallout New Vegas
If you love Fallout and literacy, you'll ABSOLUTELY love my roleplay group. https://www.facebook.com/groups/127063690973781/
Theorist
#7 Old 19th Sep 2014 at 3:55 PM Last edited by Mistermook : 19th Sep 2014 at 4:22 PM.
Quote: Originally posted by ChinchillaJesus
No, my moms heroin-jamming, asshole, abusive, alcoholic, ex-boyfriend almost killed his best friend when he went drinking and driving. He didn't give a shit, he left his friend to die after they crashed. He had absolutly no fucking remorse about it and just got off with a fucking DUI.

If your mom's heroin-jamming, asshole, abusive, alcoholic, ex-boyfriend was each and every person who ever did anything wrong then possibly you'd have a point.

The law can't be mad at people. Justice is supposed to be blind. Revenge killing isn't justice. It's murder.
 
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