'Astonishingly cruel': Alabama seeks to test execution method on death row 'guinea pig' (www.theguardian.com)

submitted 10 months ago by DougHolland@lemmy.world to c/thepoliceproblem@lemmy.world

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[-] Staccato@lemmy.world 21 points 10 months ago

Rodents might not be a great model. We know from a variety of sources that humans can't really sense excess nitrogen or hypoxic air: industrial accidents, diving experiments, even astronauts.

However, rodents may be able to sense hypoxia a bit better than we do: experiments found that rodents presented a choice would avoid a hypoxic chamber. Guinea pigs may not be the humane animal model here.

A hypoxic chamber does sound like one of the less painful ways to go. I'm not in favor of governments killing people, but a relatively quick loss of consciousness seems far better than getting poked with needles, electrocuted in the brain, shot with bullets, or hanged on a rope. Although I'm still expecting Alabama to screw this up somehow.

[-] quicksand@lemm.ee 15 points 10 months ago

It's not a literal guinea pig. The human is the guinea pig

[-] Rawdogthatexe@sh.itjust.works 3 points 10 months ago

The article mentioned that veterinarians don't consider nitrogen to be humane for euthanizing animals.

[-] wintermute_oregon@lemm.ee 11 points 10 months ago

I’m against the death penalty. I wish we didn’t use it since it’s vengeance and not justice.

That said, this is supposed to be much more humane.

this post was submitted on 02 Sep 2023

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THE POLICE PROBLEM

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99.9999% of police brutality, corruption, and misconduct is never investigated, never punished, never makes the news, so it's not on this page.

When cops are caught breaking the law, they're investigated by other cops. Details are kept quiet, the officers' names are withheld from public knowledge, and what info is eventually released is only what police choose to release — often nothing at all.

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When police testify under oath, they lie so frequently that cops themselves have a joking term for it: "testilying." Yet it's almost unheard of for police to be punished or prosecuted for perjury.

Cops can and do get away with lawlessness, because cops protect other cops. If they don't, they aren't cops for long.

The legal doctrine of "qualified immunity" renders police officers invulnerable to lawsuits for almost anything they do. In practice, getting past 'qualified immunity' is so unlikely, it makes headlines when it happens.

All this is a path to a police state.

In a free society, police must always be under serious and skeptical public oversight, with non-cops and non-cronies in charge, issuing genuine punishment when warranted.

Police who break the law must be prosecuted like anyone else, promptly fired if guilty, and barred from ever working in law-enforcement again.

That's the solution.

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