What's your opinion on the death penalty?

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I have to admit, for a long time I supported the idea of capital punishment. I think my reason for that was basically anger and outrage from a case in my neighborhood where a little boy was kidnapped, raped and murdered...I wanted to see that animal who commited the crime put to death...That was an emotionally charged feeling... Over the last few years I began to change my views for a few reasons... I think the first misconception people have when you tell them you are against capital punishment is that you take an "easy on crime" attitude or even worse..you have compassion for the offender..Neither is true for me personally...Lock them up forever, take away thier freedom and thier ability to ever offend again... I look at the bigger picture on this issue and feel the death penalty hurts society the most, what we as a society will find acceptable..If we believe murder is wrong, than it must be wrong for all of us, including our goverments... I think of two quotes that fit my feeling on the subject well... "An eye for an eye, leaves the whole world blind" as well as "Barbarians, that is what we've become..We kill each other instead of mourning the tragedy, we want the state to satisfy our bloodlust by killing the offender..we must learn to deal with these people in our midst..PUNISH THEM..but DO NOT become them" Another aspect to this all that really bothers me is that although rare, there have been a couple of cases where someone executed was later cleared of the crime..And even if this is something that in all of the history of capital punishment has only happened ONCE..it's too much for me to feel good about... Shary