To the editors:

I see that you point out that for "society" to kill a murderer makes society a murderer also ("Vicious Circle," Summer 1995). Clearly, capital punishment is barbaric. But I was disappointed to see you then say that the appropriate penalty for murder was life in prison. But if society locks someone up in prison, that makes society a kidnapper. (That's surely what it would be called if you or I locked someone up in a room and refused to let him out.) Clearly monetary fines are also immoral, as for society to take money from someone without his consent makes society a thief.

Clearly, then, for society to impose any penalty at all on a criminal makes society sink to the same level as the criminal. The only moral solution is to impose no punishments. No doubt some right-wing fanatics will claim that this will result in an increase in crime. But as you so aptly pointed out in your article, capital punishment brutalizes society and so causes more crime. Logically this should apply to every other form of punishment as well. So if society would just stop punishing crime, pretty soon the criminals would feel bad about being the nasty ones, and crime would disappear!

Jay Johansen
Via the Internet