473

Alabama wants to be the 1st state to execute a prisoner by making him breathe only nitrogen (abcnews.go.com)

submitted 2 years ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

230 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Alabama is seeking to become the first state to execute a prisoner by making him breathe pure nitrogen.

The Alabama attorney general’s office on Friday asked the state Supreme Court to set an execution date for death row inmate Kenneth Eugene Smith, 58. The court filing indicated Alabama plans to put him to death by nitrogen hypoxia, an execution method that is authorized in three states but has never been used.

Nitrogen hypoxia is caused by forcing the inmate to breathe only nitrogen, depriving them of oxygen and causing them to die. Nitrogen makes up 78% of the air inhaled by humans and is harmless when inhaled with oxygen. While proponents of the new method have theorized it would be painless, opponents have likened it to human experimentation.

(page 2) 50 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[-] PlanetOfOrd@lemmy.world 13 points 2 years ago

While proponents of the new method have theorized it would be painless, opponents have likened it to human experimentation.

Isn't that how we're doing the death penalty anyway? We're trying to find a "painless" way to kill someone, but is there ever really a painless way to do this? I'd imagine even if I'm sitting in a massage chair with classical music playing it wouldn't matter if I knew that half an hour from now I wouldn't be leaving the room.

And we can't really ask doctors because doctors have taken an oath to "do no harm."

The death penalty is just a punishment no one wants to do (well, okay, I'm sure there are plenty of people that have no problem with it), but we've told ourselves that we have to do it.

[-] PoliticalAgitator@lemm.ee 9 points 2 years ago

Not only are there plenty of people who have no problem with it, there's plenty of people who will be upset the killing wasn't more barbaric.

And it's pure blood-lust. They know the criminal can never reoffend. They know the death won't bring back the victims or bring peace to their family. They know it won't stop other people committing the same crime. They weren't impacted by the crime in the slightest and don't seem to have any real compassion for those who were.

But they want to see the criminals fry anyway.

Threads like this make it extremely clear the the reason the western world isn't executing women in soccer stadiums is because the people who make those decisions said "no", not because it wouldn't draw a crowd.

load more comments (1 replies)

[-] Franzia 6 points 2 years ago

This isn't experimentation and it isn't new. I fucking hate this talking point. It's a well-established, safe, and potentially harmless method, unlike the shit we were doing before.

Still doesn't make it right.

load more comments (8 replies)

[-] captainlezbian@lemmy.world 12 points 2 years ago

It’s one of the more humane methods of assisted suicide. But also it’s the death penalty so not a good thing

[-] Chickenstalker@lemmy.world 11 points 2 years ago

If you really want to execute someone and NOT botch it, nothing beats the guillotine.

load more comments (1 replies)

[-] Sharpiemarker@feddit.de 6 points 2 years ago

Is it a moral alternative to provide the inmate with a choice of execution method?

load more comments (2 replies)

load more comments

this post was submitted on 26 Aug 2023

473 points (100.0% liked)

News

28729 readers

4223 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil

Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban. Do not respond to rule-breaking content; report it and move on.

2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.

Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.

3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.

Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.

4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.

Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.

5. Only recent news is allowed.

Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.

6. All posts must be news articles.

No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.

7. No duplicate posts.

If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.

8. Misinformation is prohibited.

Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.

9. No link shorteners.

The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.

10. Don't copy entire article in your post body

For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 2 years ago

MODERATORS

rjc@lemmy.world

Thekingoflorda@lemmy.world

Tenthrow@lemmy.world

JonsJava@lemmy.world

gedaliyah@lemmy.world

little_cow@lemmy.world

jeffw@lemmy.world

enu@lemmy.world

WrenFeathers@lemmy.world