Be Wary of Men in Fishing Hats

Ok, so I'm on lunch, eating my tasty Safeway sandwich and decided to read this news article http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6662260/.

I know, I know. More Peterson opinion. Who cares right? Haven't we been inundated to death with this? Still, I read this and I am saddened and conflicted on so many different levels that I just have to say SOMETHING.

Number one, am I the only one who was holding out hope that he DIDN'T do it? Call me a romantic, call me naive, but if a husband can kill his pregnant wife when by all accounts theirs was a happy marriage, what in the world do we have left to believe in?

I hoped and prayed that he didn't do it, but when the news reported that he had sold her vehicle I knew he was as guilty as my sister in stealing all my childhood toys.

So now the sentencing begins and everyone wants for him to die. What a horrible decision for twelve people to have to make. Do you remember when that movie Dead Man Walking came out? I do. And I hated it. I hated it so much that I refused to watch it. What a disgusting concept. That I should be forced to feel pity for a man who raped and murdered innocent people? I don't CARE! I don't feel pity, and I could give a damn whether or not this man says he's F*n sorry. So then they made it into an opera. Did you know this? My friend calls me up and invites me to the opera that she has to attend for a school assignment. I accept and too late she tells me that it is the opera to Dead Man Walking. Caught! So I attend and I writhe with disgust for this man until halfway through it becomes unbearable. I can't get up and leave. There's some kind of weird in and out privileges and so I am forced to stay the whole entire thing. When it ends I am forced to listen to people say how sad it is that this man was put to death. I have to restrain myself from slapping nameless strangers.

Whatever.

I think the whole thing is behind me, until I have to read it for school. AUGH. Then I have to sit and participate in group discussions about this stupid horrible book. At the end the teacher asks us what touched us the most in the story. Some say that Sister Helen Prejean's ability to forgive and love blindly touched them. One classmate, Scott, says that he cried when the killer said he was sorry for his crimes. I restrain the urge to throw something at him. When it's my turn I say how at the end of the book it tells the story of Lloyd, one of the victims fathers. Lloyd says how he forgave the killer from the very beginning, from the moment he identified his son's body he was forgiving, praying "forgive them father for they know not what they do". He says that forgiveness is a hard thing, and it's especially hard every year on his sons’ birthday when in essence he has to bury him all over again. His son never attends college, never gets married, never has children, never gets older. Every year Lloyd loses his son again and again. He says how he feels bad for the killers’ mother, who will now lose her son as well. He doesn't wish that on anyone. It is so sad and so beautifully magnificent that it made me cry. I am crying writing this. I don't say anymore in the classroom. I don't want to have an argument when it is so clear that everyone has such a different view point than my own. So I'll say here what I couldn't say there.

I don't care how or when they die. Do you think that Scott Peterson walked up to Laci and said, Hey, right before Christmas I'm going to kill you and the baby and throw you in the bay? Perhaps you should get a lawyer and prepare a defense. There will be twelve people there that you need to convince that you shouldn't die. If you lose, which you probably will, you can at least file a bunch of motions and delay for a couple of years. No. Victims don't die humanely. They don't get to say good-bye to friends and family. They die terrified, confused and praying that somehow, anyhow, they'll make it through this. So screw you Scott and everyone else like you. Why in the hell should I give a flying fig about your life when you so callously rubbed someone else’s out? How hard are you crying now? How hard are you hurting now? Because I guarantee you it's not as bad as her parents feel.

However Sister Helen Prejean did bring up some valid arguments against execution. For example, the crime rate actually raises when executions occur. Studies have shown that the death penalty in no way deters crime. Executing someone costs around (sorry can't remember the exact figure) three times what it would cost to imprison someone for life. So not only are there financial repercussions, there are social as well. Not to mention the fact that an execution doesn't bring the victims back, nor erase the pain of their loss.

So, in light of this, I don't believe that we should kill Scott. My opinion is two fold. Number one, I don't want to pay such a high price for his crime. I don't want to pay out more tax money to kill his worthless butt, I don't want someone breaking into my car or house in the weeks surrounding his execution, and I don't want his murder on our society's collective karmic soul. Number two; I think execution may be too good for these people. I'd rather have them trapped in a tiny cell watching their backs against violent inmates for the rest of their lives. Plus, when they're not on death row I think they're allowed to intermingle with other prisoners instead of being in solitary. I like this idea because they now have to worry about dropping the soap... for the rest of their lives. Mwah ha ha. That seems to be a much better punishment if you ask me. Still if the jury voted for death, which I think they did, you won't catch me in any protest lines. Maybe I'll be at the Safeway deli line, but that's about it.

The prosecution has stated that if Scott doesn't receive the death penalty it will be up to Laci's mother whether they retry him or just settle for life. I keep thinking about how unfair that is to ask of her. By the way, you lost your daughter and grandson. Would you now like to kill your son-n-law?