Cynic: I am well aware that inherent in our justice system is a large degree of bias, resulting in more persons of color, etc. being convicted for crimes than whites. But the model I propose assumes that such defects can be fixed. I believe a rational public (can we hoipe for one?) could do so. I cannot allow present circumstances to discredit a potentially progressive solution. Especially when animal testing is such a hot topic. DDN: So your system of human medical experimentation assumes some enlightened state of humanity where irrational belief systems (like racism) are impossible. That’s a pretty big “WHAT IF”, isn’t it? Would animal/human testing even be an issue in such a pristine world? Would we still need health care? Would we even have to eat food? Maybe we would become breatharians. WHAT IF we were all perfect, god-like immortal beings? Would we need to conduct tests of any kind on anything? I’m not saying we can’t be better as a species or even that we can’t reach some utopian state of perfection and unity with a divine creator, but what’s the point of discussing medical research in such a bloated context? We might as well change the subject completely and talk about what we might do to make ourselves immune from irrational thinking in general – Now THAT would be amusing.
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: Cynic: "All murderers and rapists are just animals in their own right, anyway."
Kevin: Firstly, I assume you are implying some sort of negative connotation to being an animal. Why exactly is this?
Kevin: Secondly, who are you to make such a judgement (assuming here your choice of comparisons is a fair use of the term animal)?
Cynic: I don't murder, rape, and thieve. That's grounds enough for me…..
DDN: But murdering, raping, and thieving are activities that are confined almost exclusively to humans. The animal kingdom, left unadulterated by humanity, is ruled by a symbiosis. Its propagation depends heavily on extensive systems of cooperation between and within species. If macaque monkeys got up on the wrong side of the bed one morning and started killing and raping each other, macaque monkeys would move rapidly toward extinction. Aside from carnivores killing for food, most animals are generally very gentle with one another. Your comparison of violent criminals to animals is severely flawed at its very core. It would be far more accurate to accuse a deranged, homicidal thieving water buffalo of being a HUMAN. Pandas don’t beat their newborns to death; Fish don’t gang rape other fish; Pigeons don’t build atom bombs and drop them on population centers (although they do eject a kind of air to ground missile, but it is not lethal nor is it intended to be).
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Cynic: ……By your standard who is anyone to judge? Anyway, I proposed that the criminal be allowed to voluntarily undergo testing for reduced sentences, not that it should be enforced on them. Prison is a loss of the right to autonomy, not bodily integrity. That has to be given up willfully.
DDN: Apparently you’ve never been to prison. How did Eddie Murphy put it? “They don’t sodomize you because you LIKE IT. They just do it to see that look on your face.”
Kevin: Have you ever had a conversation with a murderer or a rapist?
Cynic: No. I don't think I could bear their company to hear their vain conversation.
Kevin: Are you aware of how any of these PEOPLE came to do what they did?
Cynic: In Boulder, CO, a young female colelge student was abducted and raped by 6 males in a van for 2 hours, while they threatened to shoot her if she didn't comply. They then dumped her in a dark canyon to walk to the nearest neighborhood and phone for help.
In a confession, one of them said they did it becuase one of them "had never had sex with a white woman before." The men who raped the girl were all asian.
DDN: Yes, this is atrocious and disgusting. I wonder what kind of sick society this psycho COMES from. It must be a horrible place. Oh shit…..wait a minute….He’s from planet EARTH!!! ……..But seriously Cynic…..My point here is that individual human behavior is, to some significant degree, a product of environmental factors over which the individual often has very little or no control: parents, schools, governments, socio-economic factors, television, books, food, water, air, religion, etc. A dysfunctional idiot like this doesn’t know WHY he did it. He’s obviously mentally disturbed. How can we expect someone this unstable and out of touch to accurately account for his behavior? Why is your decision on this man’s fate based only on one piece of junk data regurgitated from his twisted and degenerate mind?
Also, why are you willing to rehabilitate humanity with regards to its racism but not with regards to its other evils such as murder? If murder is really the unforgivable, uncorrectable, meaningless behavior you denote it to be then why not conduct medical experiments on RACISTS who’s racism has caused millions of murders worldwide?
Also, why would we extend the offer of “medical testing in exchange for your freedom” only to murderers? Why should murderers be given an opportunity for freedom but not arsonists, drug dealers, traffic violators, or political prisoners? If murderers are the worst among us then should they have LESS privileges than other prisoners and not MORE?
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Cynic: ….Reasons like THESE serve as the motives to these wastes of sperm and eggs. People who behave in this fashion simply do not behave like people, and I refuse to allow them the same benefits the rest of us enjoy, when we have the self-restraint and common decency to get along peacfully. Are they animals?
Yes. They don't behave like people; their attitude towards other human beings separates them from being enough like us to qualify under strict speciesism. So, they might as well be dismembered and eaten, for all I care.
I am very untolerant of the untolerable, Kevin. I believe human willpower can overcome poverty, abuse, paranoia, etc. There is NEVER any grounds for inflicting unsolicited harm on another human being. No reason one could have can qualify as an excuse.
DDN: Can human willpower come up with a better way of handling crime than just imprisonment, gas chambers, and electric chairs? Can your willpower come up with a more evolved solution than dismemberment and canibalism? Can human willpower find a way to live a healthy life without inflicting agonizing and unspeakable pain on animals and other people?
If we expect the poorest street kid from the black inner city ghetto with no father, a mother hooked on crack, and no hope for the future to grow up without ever acting out his rage on society then shouldn’t we expect ourselves to overcome our disdain for his violent behavior, perhaps to the degree that we not inflict, nor allow any harm to be inflicted, on him? Sounds like you’ve got a double standard going on here otherwise?
Kevin: I am not suggesting you weep for them and make excuses for their behavior, but they are PEOPLE and they DO come from circumstances.
Cynic: Anything is nothing they can't overcome. The circumstances be damned. I don't pity the condition of any being, no matter how deplorable, if they can't demonstrate strength of will to overcome…..
DDN: That’s just plain sad, Cynic. We’ve reached an impasse here; one that I think can only be traversed with some probing psychoanalysis. I’ll forego such analysis for now and note only that you sound like a seriously unhappy person and that I’m sorry for whatever happened to you that got you in this bad headspace.
Cynic:……..This goes for the wife beaten by her husband who won't for a moment think about leaving him. It goes for beaten children who tell their schoolteachers "I fell down the stairs" instead of making it known that Daddy is a monster. The same applies to children of alcoholics that become alcoholics, and cite "learning by example" as the reason they can't deny themselves the drink. Nevermind all the sober examples these people could have seen were their eyes open, of course. But that isn't my situation, right, so I have no power to judge?
Bullshit. I see people suffering needlessly every day in the newspapers, on television, and on streetcorners because they won't exert effort to do anything about it. Victims of constant trauma bring it upon themselves for not escaping their situation. Having undergone trauma is not grounds for perpetuating it.
DDN: Actually, Cynic, yes it is. We’ve been closely observing victims of trauma very closely for several decades and it became abundantly clear quite some time ago that the minds of trauma victims unconsciously work (and work OVERTIME) to recreate past traumatic experiences in the present. Theories vary as to WHY this occurs but I don’t think any respectable mental health expert would refute that it DOES. It may very well be the mind’s attempt to heal itself – reliving the trauma again and again in an attempt to “make the story come out right”, rescue parts of the mind that were shut down in response to the trauma, regain perceived lost control of one’s physical safety.
I know a thing or two about phenomena like this having been diagnosed and treated by several highly respected health professionals from various corners of the mental health profession as suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Basically it means that I am stuck in a hyper alert mode – a residue from a time in my life when I needed to be hyper alert in order to survive. I found a counselor that specialized in treating this disorder and he was able to help me a great deal, but I’ll probably always be at least a little fucked up the rest of my life.
The point is that being inappropriately alert in certain situations is not something I consciously chose to do. It doesn’t require my consciousness AT ALL – it happens ALL BY ITSELF. For all intents and purposes, there is another person running around inside of my head with his own separate agenda, making decisions and doing and saying things that I don’t approve of at all. I have established a line of communication with the little fucker but we still have our differences and we’re trying our best to resolve them. In the meantime, I make “mistakes”: say the wrong thing, overreact, make incorrect assumptions about people and situations – things that we all do but with a little more intensity behind it. So, you see, I AM exerting a tremendous amount of will over the situation, but I still do things that are wrong, so where does that leave us, Cynic? Do I “deserve” additional suffering? Am “I” 100% responsible for my actions? Did I cause my own original trauma? Maybe I DID – through karma perhaps. But the bottom line is that YOU simply do not and CANNOT know the answers to these questions well enough to make a final, once and for all judgement about how my bad behavior should be viewed. So get off your high horse. You’d suffocate to death in seconds if you were judged by your own standards.
Cynic:……..Our legal and moral stance must agree if their aim is justice.
DDN: Then there should be a law against your “blame the victim” mentally because I find it morally reprehensible.
Kevin: It is a little simplistic to dismiss them as animals worthy only of execution (perhaps preceded by torture.)
DDN: He’s just having a bad life.
