Doesn’t support eye-for-an-eye

Dear editor: I formed my opinion on capital punishment listening to my father’s memories of witnessing the hanging of war criminals (German U-boat officers) for the Royal Canadian Navy in the Second World War.

I confirmed it reading the opinions of men whose intelligence and humanity I admired, such as Leo Tolstoy, Victor Hugo, Mahatma Gandhi and Bertrand Russell. None of them could accept it.

We know that countries with no death penalty generally have low murder rates, and those with it mostly have higher ones, but as Piet Hein wrote, “There was an old lady who lived in a shoe, who had so many children she didn’t know what to do, but which was the cause and which the effect, try as she would she could never detect.”

We also know that there are quite frequent false convictions, and that’s really hard to get around. I also try to follow the example of Jesus. He did not express an opinion on the subject that I know of, but he did hint pretty frequently that his belief in human justice was not absolute.

I do admit that I see no obvious social advantage to the continuing existence of people such as Paul Bernardo, but I would not be willing to kill them myself, so I feel it would be a cop-out to hire someone else to do it.

Despite my strong personal opinion, I would not want to make this decision for everyone. Neither do I want any other John, Jane, Jill or Joe to decide it. I think our elected representatives, backed by our Supreme Court, have to decide this, based on serious study, deliberation and experience, and I don’t envy them the job.

The wisdom of crowds is great for deciding questions like the use of Skaha Lake Park, or whether we want a performing arts centre, or more transit, or to raise money for individuals in trouble, or for aspiring athletes or musicians. It is not the way to decide who lives and who dies. John Greene

Penticton