troy davis and my anti death penalty diatribe

i came home from work today totally bummed out. i had been pretty much thinking about the troy davis case for most of the day... but it got more serious and heavy to me as the day wore on. his execution was scheduled for 7pm. i came home from work, got in about 7:15pm and before i checked the news i did a quick workout and after i completed that work out i found myself hitting my bed and knocking out for what turned out to be a cat nap.

so now it's 10:15pm. i woke up and the first thing i thought was.. shit, troy davis is probably dead now. so i went to the computer only to find out that stuff has been delayed and their waiting on the supreme court to say something... not exactly sure what they'll say or how optimistic anyone should be about this... but it was semi relieving to hear.

i have no emotional connection with troy davis. i signed a petition to try and stop his execution and that was about it. i wasn't willing to go outside and protest out loud about it. and anyways, apparently a ton of people are already doing that. the grassroots movement on the street to try and keep troy davis alive is strong, healthy, and hard to ignore.

i'm not willing to say troy davis is an innocent man. but what i am willing to say is how this is turning into a loud example of what is flawed about the concept of capital punishment in this country. i don't even like to call it capital punishment. that gives it dignity. let's call it U.S. sanctioned revenge killin'.

for all i know troy davis is guilty and did kill someone and if that is so, then he probably does deserve to die. i wouldn't wanna stick the needle in him, but there's people out there who'd probably do it for free... victim's family, friends, etc, etc.

but U.S. sanctioned revenge killin' is all wrong. we have to realize our justice system isn't 100% fool proof. and we're starting to hear more and more about cases where people were put to death in the past that could've been turned around now thanks to new technology and whatnot.

just the idea that we could possibly be wrong... how are we to know all 12 jurors ever get it right? isn't that enough to end this whole charade?

this isn't just about troy davis. this is about the whole damn system. but the troy davis situation is a bit of an opportunity for the anti-capital punishment movement. there's doubt. and it's on our tv's and computers. there's witnesses who are stepping up giving conflicting info and jurors saying they think they might've been wrong.

if troy davis is an innocent man, then what? how do we let ourselves sleep with that idea floating around in our head that maybe, by some slight possibility, he's not the killer?

i know it's awful that people kill other people. it's an atrocious act that shouldn't go unpunished. i guess my suggestion for an alternative is life in jail. isn't it enough to spend a whole lifetime stuck in a sucky place to think about what you did? prison blows. no one wants to be there. but at least some people get to think about leaving one day. not murderers. there's no going home, they are home.

i just don't think we as people have the right to take someone else's life... even if it's cuz they took someone else's life. murder is murder. it doesn't matter what court or set of state laws supports it. you can't make the act of taking a life anything but the act of taking a life.

it's times like this that i wish i could believe in a place called hell. sometimes i wanna believe in a hell more than a heaven only so i could know for sure that bad people get their punishment, that there's a place that all the evildoers can never escape from.

and for all the killers who end up in jail, end up executed, or end up never being caught... they'd all end up in the same place... a fiery pit of eternal damnation.

and then i would know there's a place for all the people who are responsible for the killing of the innocent through capital punishment... if there was a hell, i'm sure these people would end up there as well, standing shoulder to shoulder with all the other killers.

cuz in hell, murder is murder.