If you buy Playboy magazine for the boobs say so, be honest. It doesn't make you a bad person to admit the truth; quite the opposite, dissembling, lying, hiding the truth makes you a bad person.

Sure there are men who actually buy it for the interviews and stories, but tell me, aren't there less expensive magazines that have similar, interesting articles sans boobs?

Don't get me wrong - I like boobies. But I don't dissemble, lie, or hide the fact; I admit it, indeed I celebrate it. Sure, you can find in my blog articles about the threat of Islam, advice on how to make that perfect hard-boiled egg, the proper way to apply perfume, and numerous other topics; but in addition, you will find photos of women with boobs. One of the more popular articles my readers enjoy is Most Beautiful Bosoms in Hollywood.

Also I don't like Islam; in fact, I boldly admit on my pages that I am an Islamophobe. I do not hide the fact. I'd prefer to be respected for my honesty than for some bogus political correctness.

The same should apply to those in favor of the death penalty. If you like the idea of government-sanctioned vigilantism, just admit it, for God's sake. Don't try to justify it with the oft-repeated lie that "The death penalty is a deterrent." The evidence says otherwise.

If you don't care that one out of seven people on death row could be innocent, that you want them executed anyway on the principle that "it's better to kill one innocent than let six guilty get life in prison instead", then just admit it - you are an uncaring, callous, son of a bitch, just say it, for God's sake, what are you afraid of? Be honest.

The Death Penalty Might Cause More Murders

Every single non-death-penalty state in this country has a lower murder rate than Texas [US Census PDF 466k]. If the death penalty is such a deterrent, shouldn't the state with the highest number of executions have a murder rate lower than at least one friggin' state without the death penalty? If you live in a death-penalty state you are 50 to 100 percent more likely to be murdered than if you lived in a non-death penalty state. Where's the deterrence?

Some of you will want to dispute the scientific evidence regarding state murder rates. You will argue that we cannot compare non-death penalty states with death-penalty states, that each state has its own mix of rural, urban, immigrant, ethnic and racial groups. That we should not, for example, compare mostly rural Iowa (non DP) with mostly urban Virginia (pro DP). I'm glad you brought that up.

The truth is that non-death-penalty states that border death-penalty states, that have basically the same mix of populations, that are in the exact same geographic area of the country, have lower murder rates (1).

Then there are those who say, "Think about the victims." As if empathy for the victim requires that someone else must also die, anyone.

OK, let's think about the victims: When Canada had the death penalty the homicide rate peaked at 3.03 per 100,000 in 1975. In 1976 they dropped the death penalty altogether and the murder rate has been dropping ever since. From 1998 to 2004 it was 1.82 per 100,000 population [Wiki Crime In Canada]. Seems as if the death penalty is not only NOT a deterrent, it actually encourages murders. Do you understand? Getting rid of the death penalty did not result in more victims, it made fewer victims. Who is thinking about the victims now?

Want fewer murder victims? Want to be a moral person who wishes less harm to come to his fellow man? Then get rid of the death penalty, as much as it goes against your desire and thirst for blood. As I have written before: if the punishment for many crimes such as kidnapping or rape is death, then the criminal has nothing to lose and everything to gain by killing his victims rather than taking a chance they might be witnesses against him.

If you still defend the death penalty then at least admit that you don't care that more victims are murdered because of it; admit that you just enjoy the idea of people being killed by the state. You know in your heart that hundreds of innocent men have been executed and you still don't care, as long as someone, anyone, innocent or guilty it doesn't matter, as long as someone is killed.

Now it is clear to me why ancient Rome had gladiators fighting to the death. The government needed a spectacle to entertain the death penalty proponents of their day.

Post Script:

Readers wondering what the Scarlett Johansson photo has to do with the death penalty: admit it, those are killer boobs. Get it, killer - death penalty, boobs -Scarlett Johansson, eh?

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ENDNOTES

(1):

Death Penalty Information Center, Deterrence: States Without the Death Penalty Have Had Consistently Lower Murder Rates

When comparisons are made between states with the death penalty and states without, the majority of death penalty states show murder rates higher than non-death penalty states. The average of murder rates per 100,000 population in 1999 among death penalty states was 5.5, whereas the average of murder rates among non-death penalty states was only 3.6.

A look at neighboring death penalty and non-death penalty states show similar trends. Death penalty states usually have a higher murder rate than their neighboring non-death penalty states.