One step at a time

Re: Capital punishment as macabre theatre (Editorial, Oct. 16)

Capital punishment as macabre theatre

Kudos to the Free Press for its incisive treatment of the issues raised by the recently publicized botched execution in the U.S.A.

The response of “Wow” to the quote by the U.S. secretary of defence about his appreciation of the “kind of mentality we had (then)” is spot on.

It suggests that humanity’s understanding and practice of justice is moving away from an “eye for an eye” towards recognition that the ultimate outcome of that view is widespread blindness. In fact, half of the world’s population lives in the 72 per cent of countries that have eliminated capital punishment.

The high number of botched executions does give one pause. However, those data do not deal with fundamental ethical and moral issues related to killing our fellow human beings. It’s a dynamic similar to the recognition that it’s “just not right” to put a man in jail for stealing a loaf of bread. (Read Victor Hugo’s Les Misérables.)

I have come to believe that humanity is evolving from what might be called tribal and egocentric notions of justice towards a stronger intuition that we all tend to project our own shadow selves onto others.

In other words, we are being challenged to become more compassionate and — yes — more forgiving. Such progress is often of the “three steps forward and two back” kind, yet that one step remains and the general forward movement continues.

Let she/he who is innocent cast the first stone.

EDWIN BUETTNER Winnipeg