The US regime just executed another innocent black man.
Marcellus Williams faces execution on Sept. 24, for a crime he did not commit. Read key facts about the case and act to stop this injustice.
Pick one.
- Be an advanced, developed nation
The south is not remotely an advanced, developed nation.
It's like if you took Brussels, then glued the worst bits of Somalia to it.
We had to fight a war to get them to stop keeping black people as pets, and they just kept doing it anyway.
Hitler wrote of the south specifically as an inspiration for German genetic policies (Jim Crow) in Mein Kampf. Black GIs came home from killing nazis to be lynched from trees.
Edit: I accidentally became so sleep-deprived that I forgot a constitutional amendment has a separate proposal and ratification process. The SCOTUS method would 100% work, though, and it hasn't yet been banned at the federal level which is a simple majority of Congress and a presidential signature, so they do overall endorse it.
No.
Death > imprisonment
You can't suffer while dead, and you certainly can't be a prison pimped slave worker while dead. There's also no way to profit from an execution so far as I can tell.
Some people need to be gotten rid of instead of being made to suffer on my dime. This is especially true depending on your views on free will. It's triple true when you consider how much crime is just a result of unnatural financial pressures that none of us evolved to deal with.
That is frankly a disgusting point of view. Death and non-rehabilitory imprisonment are both wrong but not because it "costs money".
This is clearly from an incredibly privileged person, because if you understood how minoritized people are treated by the legal system you wouldn't be arguing for more executions.
There’s also no way to profit from an execution so far as I can tell.
there absolutely is, with legal injections whoever sells them makes money, you save money as a prison by not having to house these people, and while you can't exploit them for labor, there is never really a guarantee that you can. It's a little more nuanced than this, for example solitary confinement generally makes it pretty hard to make money off of people. Death row is often a multi year process, taking many many thousands of dollars of human upkeep to keep it going.
technically you could go a step futher and say there's a broader economic benefit to killing them as you can use it as some sort of social driving pressure. Stalinist USSR for example.
Call me radical, but I don't think any government should be killing people.
There are a lot of governments in the world that agree with you. Not the US government, not at all.
However, it is true that America is particularly brutal with regards to executing civilians. Something that stands out is that, compared to other countries that regularly execute their citizens, there's a pretty obvious skew in terms of who's getting the death penalty. Compared to China, for example, the US hasn't executed anyone for white collar crime in a long time (hopefully someone can find a reference to the last time it happened, I'm not sure where to check) but appears to be killing Black and Muslim awfully often. Really makes you think, right?
Reading about it I am not completly convinced that he is innocent, but I think that there is 100% plausible reason to doubt that he is guilty. This should defintly be enough to stop an execution.
Edit: Maybe read the whole statement before getting a rage fit? I said he shouldn't have been killed. I am also not moderate and (according to US standards) I am apparently not white as a muslim turkish person.
I think there's an interesting phenomenon where even white normies understand how demonically racist the American institutions are. Ideologically committed racists don't, but everyone else sees at least part of it. However, because this only gives you a negative assertion (don't trust what the courts say) and the isn't really a normative, absolute system we can trust in the absence of any reliable rulings from the hegemonic institutions, we're just left with a wide space of viable interpretations of reality, which lets people get off the hook for assuming reality must be close-ish to what said racist institutions uphold. That closeness between imagined reality and the reality white supremacy wishes to impose is what allows for people who aren't ideologically committed racists to passively accept the brutalization and murder of marginalized people. "Oh, I can't support those cruel acts, but the sad reality is they probably didn't happen for no reason either" is the refrain of the embarrassed white moderate.
carceral slavery
legal prison slavery* (for those of you who don't know that word)
I'm convinced he is innocent. If he was not they would have evidence instead of paid testimonies against him.
That's fine with a sentence of a couple years. But for how hard we've seen it become to commute a sentence, we need to be 100% sure for the death penalty.
Is "almost" anywhere in your definition of conviction? If so, you lack conviction.
Marcellus Williams was charged with the murder of Felicia Gayle. Prosecutors based evidence mainly on alleged confessions Williams had made, including one alleged by a jailhouse snitch.
In August 2001, Williams was sentenced to death. On appeal, he raised several issues, including claims of errors in evidentiary rulings, jury instructions, and victim impact testimony. He also challenged the use of his prior criminal history and alleged improper prosecutorial comments during closing arguments.
The death sentence was controversial, as DNA evidence had been claimed to prove his innocence, and the family of Gayle repeatedly stating they did not want Williams executed.
Despite pleas from the public and the family of Gayle stating they were opposed to the execution, on September 24, 2024, 55-year-old Williams was executed by lethal injection at 6 p.m. CT.
So, even the family of the victim was against it. An innocent man died while the real criminal is out there.
Shit like this is why we cannot be trusted with death penalty. The day we execute an innocent person, we all get blood on our hands.
This kind of thing makes me go into denial. I hate my country, but this absolutely cannot be real. It's horrible clickbait, or propaganda supporting my existing beliefs about how inhumane it is here.
I struggle to imagine someone administering a needle for an innocent man to die, rather than quitting on the spot. I struggle to imagine someone certifying paperwork to appove this to happen. But I am entirely incapable of imagining the number of human cogs that would need to be similarly compliant for this to be followed through to completion. I am not interested in trying to imagine. This story is fiction because admitting otherwise will break what's left of my sanity.
You can show me horrors and get me to admit and speak of them as reality, but you can't get me to believe them.
A stunning number of people in the links of that chain could've stopped it, and none of them cared to risk their employment over it.
I've seen it said that if you live in the US, you can ask yourself a question: "If you lived in Nazi Germany, what would you have done to oppose that state?"
The answer: You're doing it right now. Nazi Germany's leaders explicitly stated that its model of colonialism and expansionism in eastern europe, eugenics practices, and its racial state, were all based on the US model, which nearly successfully carried out everything Nazi Germany failed to do: eviction and genocide of its indigenous inhabitants, stealing a continent, and erecting a white-supremacist state on top of it.
The Innocence project is real and they do incredible work. They rarely take cases that don't have new DNA evidence due to the difficulty in overturning a conviction. They could probably use your financial support.
–The site which we don't speak of had a mainstream news article to this story monday night explaining that the state was already refusing to grant a stay of execution even with prosecuting attornies new doubts.
Arendt is one of the more overrated authors in America short of the founders, but she has a point about how, when you are removed from the brutal nature of the violence, you can just sort of shuffle it into your day-to-day activities. Sure, you can certify the paperwork, it's just letters on a screen. Hell, you can even administer the needle, as it's not your job to concern yourself with his innocence or guilt, it's your job to use this specific set of injections to kill him in a visually benign way. Separating arbiters from brutalizing and brutalizers from arbitration makes the flagrant injustice much more palatable to both parties.
Separating arbiters from brutalizing and brutalizers from arbitration makes the flagrant injustice much more palatable to both parties.
Fantastic one-line explanation, I don't think I've thought about this before but now that you've said it it feels like something obvious that I really should have understood already.
it happens fairly often here. the u.s. is the most evil entity in the known universe
I've come to realize that a significant portion of people just think other people should die and that's fair and they're OK with being the ones to do it.
I saw an Instagram reel the other day of someone in the military describing the best way to decide who to kill and who not to as you storm a civilian building, plus the latest Behind the Bastards about Yarvin's affect on JD Vance and their belief that violence / killing and enforced poverty / slavery is not only a necessary but desirable method of governmental change - not as a reaction to oppression but as administrative.
someone in the military describing the best way to decide who to kill
Read a book by a Navy SEAL who was in Afghanistan. He said if they were wearing black Reeboks they were fighters, shoot to kill on sight.
I'm betting he was right! But Jesus, using that as a hard criteria to execute someone?!
I’ve come to realize that a significant portion of people just think other people should die and that’s fair and they’re OK with being the ones to do it.
It has always been this way. Particularly because there are people and groups who actively materially benefit from the enforced poverty/slavery and oppression of other people and groups within the social organization of our societies. The enforced poverty/slavery will never stop without sufficient and sufficiently organized, centralized, disciplined violence to overcome those who actively benefit from the enforced poverty/slavery by means of the same; and then maintaining that authority over the exploiters until their interest and strength are no more.
It's the same reason why there's never been a "peaceful bloodless decolonization." Why would the colonizer ever willingly permit that? They would be, from a standpoint of their own material interest as a societal class, complete morons to do so and make such a willing choice. Which is why (and this is historically borne out) they must be not given a choice by an organized militant anti-colonial resistance. This is also why the "authoritarianism" criticism of the doctrine and practice of revolutionary groups like Castro's revolutionaries or Lenin's Bolsheviks is laughable; the liberal peanut gallery can only have that criticism because they succeeded and survived to be criticized; having overcome the oppressors who, in the event of the revolutionaries' failure (historically borne out in how every failed revolution played out including the previous ones in those countries); would show the truth of themselves as 1000x more vicious, having honed that capability for 100x longer.
Look up any countries' "Red Terror" in history, then look up their corresponding "White Terror." You will see [wiki:NSFW images if you click on them]. Or read about any decolonization struggle. Like in Algeria, where every uprising that killed 10 Frenchmen resulted in a colonial reprisal with hundreds of butchered Algerians.
We live in a material reality with material interests which are enforced by people who will use your pacifism as a means to exploit you easier, and kill you easier if you even are seen as inconvenient or 'in the way' of those interests, let alone if you resist and struggle against them. And that argument has been happening since Marx and Engels' time in the framework of materialism; and was exactly the realm of rationale behind the policy of terror with the Jacobins before that in the French Revolution; from which many later revolutionaries took lessons and learned from the mistakes and refined within their contemporary material conditions and circumstances.
For the record, the super majority of pro-life Christian, patriotic judges in SCOTUS voted against stopping this on a 6-3 ruling.
Southern Christian.
Pro-life, but love guns and executing people while hating access to Healthcare for the poor.
Southern Christian love is the darkest kind of hate.
The US government is horrible to people living within it and outside of it
This is not justice
Misleading title, this was a Missouri State case, not a federal one.
That being said, there are way too many innocent people getting killed for crimes they did not commit.
The only purpose of the death penalty is revenge. It has no place in a modern society.
Both the death penalty, and a system of slave labor camps, are allowed at the federal level:
How is this a misleading title? On the one hand, yes, the fed can carry out state-sanctioned murder too (and it's something Trump resumed), but 1) it's absolutely the case that the "death penalty" should and could be banned nation-wide but isn't, and 2) this went before the SCOTUS for an emergency block, but it was voted 6–3 not to block (I'm guessing you know that all of the six were the treasonous fuckwits nominated by Republicans and all three were sensible jurists nominated by Democrats).
What happened here is absolutely still the fault of the federal government. Of course I still agree with the rest of your comment. I just mean to say that even if you somehow totally divorce a US state from the US itself, it's still the US' fault.
But officer, I didn't punch him! My fist did!
I did not hit her I did Naaaaaht! Ohimark!
Freedom!! He is free of the prison industrial complex and had to pay withhold life...
So the Missouri regime.
Remind me of a one-off line from a kids show, involving Tom Sawyer; "I ain't going back, it's Missouri in there!"
The last thing I will say on this topic is that the US is divided on abortion rights. Only 14 states have total abortion bans since Roe vs Wade was overturned and I doubt anyone here would be foolish enough to claim that those states speak for the entire population of the US. Yet when it comes to the execution by the state of Missouri of a black man, suddenly, that lone state speaks for an entire population of 330 million people.
suddenly, that lone state speaks for an entire population of 330 million people.
When someone calls a government a "regime" they're usually implying that the government doesn't accurately reflect the will of the people.
Self-removed comment given that the comment from DemocratPostingSucks@lemm.ee was moderated out.
That's not evidence beyond a reasonable doubt. It's suspicion at best.
Missouri speaks for the entire US now?
The fact that the US federal government has the power to outlaw this but doesn't, that this specific execution was brought before the Supreme Court and they voted against blocking it 6–3, and the fact that the majority of US states (27) and the federal government have this on the books speak for the US now, yes.
Taken to an absurd extreme, let's imagine that the US federal government and 27 of its states explicitly had statutes on the books stating "you can legally rape puppies", and you stepping in and saying "Well that doesn't speak for the entire US! Stop trying to make it sound like everyone condones puppy rape just because Missouri allows it!" Would you say that then? Because I feel like any rational person would be asking "Why does the US allow this to happen?" If not, why would you say it here? The US is simply backwards in this regard.
Sure, we'll pretend that this hasn't been happening here for hundreds of years across all 50 states.
ok so technically, this wouldn't be the US regime, this wouldn't even be a regime at all judging by modern contemporary definitions.
The dude was executed under state law. In the united states.
Can we stop referring to the US like this? I get that we have problems but jesus christ it feels loaded calling us a "regime" we're not all that oppressive, and we're not all that anti-democratic. Calling it a regime probably makes it more of a regime than it is by itself.
we could've had a productive discussion on the problems with capital punishment, but nope. here we are, not even talking about it at all (aside from the comment threads)
this wouldn’t even be a regime at all judging by modern contemporary definitions.
I'd like to see the definition you're talking about. The dictionary definitions definitely fit. Sometimes the definition doesn't even have negative connotations. You're just offended because someone used a word reserved for enemies of the US to describe the US.
ok so technically, regime is just a sort of generic term more often than not used to talk about a "government leadership" for ex. "stalins regime" or a "dictators regime" beyond that it's use is usually specifically with reference to how the government operates.
An "anti rights regime" for ex. The problem that i have, is that not only does this, just not really apply, because we're talking about a specific state, exercising independent rights over capital punishment, arguably illegally and immorally, considering the evidence we have doesn't demonstrate him to be the murderer in this case.
The title frames it as if the "US" "regime" whatever that means, idk if it's implying the president, the federal government, or the federal government and the state government, or that specific state government, there are so many levels of government in the US it's really not appropriate to call it a "regime" you could call the trump admin or biden admin specifically a regime i guess. Though i'm not really sure what the point of that would be.
The title reads as if the "US government" (an entity, which is not an appropriate description) solely and single handedly murdered a guy who was not actually a criminal (which to be fair, did happen) and then it says "another" like it happens extremely regularly or something. Which while it happens more often than not, there aren't that many to begin with? There have only been 18 so far as of this year. Even in the last like 50 years, only 200 people have been "exonerated" for their crimes. (only about 1600 people executed in that time as well) Most of those have been black, a majority even, the next highest is white and Hispanic, which make sense. So that seems to follow the populous of the jails at least from what i would expect. It looks like there have been about 20 "very likely innocent" people that have been executed in the same period.
https://deathpenaltyinfo.org/ most of my info has been from here and memory, don't take it as gospel.
Like with all due respect, i just think this is an incredibly irresponsible and flagrant way to phrase the title specifically. Data doesn't support it, the sheer numbers don't support it either. Like the actual number is 0.000004% percent of the US population have been sentenced to death, and executed in the US since 1976. The VAST majority of that coming from the south.
Again, i don't support capital punishment, i think it should be illegal, although i think if we're going to keep it legal we should make them public, that way people actually have to deal with the consequences of the law. But It's so miniscule to other problems like healthcare access, and obesity, that i really don't think it warrants the title that implies the government is literally executing people on a whim as it pleases with no regard for anything at all.
TL;DR the title is extremely generous and i think rather inflammatory for something that simply doesn't warrant it given the stats and figures, as well as the political structure of the government, and the clear public sentiment on the problem at hand.
not all that oppressive
not all that anti-democratic
under a post about an innocent person being executed despite mountains of exonerative evidence
you are not a serious person
not all that oppressive
so far the worst thing that's happened is an abortion ban, which is highly unpopular. As far as oppression goes, that's pretty good, not great obviously, but it's not killing people for protesting levels of oppression either so.
not all that anti-democratic
we literally live in a country with a democratic republic system, and multiple levels of government with independence. The worst thing to happen in the last 10 years was trump trying to over throw democracy, which i will remind you, didn't work. Some people might point to kamala harris being on the ticket but that's stupid, you can't expect a primary party vote this close to locking in politicians, kamala was also the VP of the previous admin, so it's not that different, and she also has her name on the super PAC funding as well. There just aren't many options there. And even then, that doesn't prevent you from voting, somehow. You can still vote for kill stein if you like supporting russian agents i guess. Or trump, if you hate democracy i guess. Or just some other dude.
under a post about an innocent person being executed despite mountains of exonerative evidence
i was complaining about the title and the wording of the title?
It's not a productive discussion that's needed though. The death penalty has been going on for four centuries in the US. That's an awful lot of time for an awful lot of productive discussions, and yet innocent people are still being put to death by the machinery of the state. At this point we're just tired of it.
For the innocent victims of the death penalty, I imagine it feels like a regime. Like an inscrutable, bureaucratic behemoth, unable to change course even in the face of logic. It's inhumane, it's unreasonable. It's a regime - an immovable set of arbitrary rules where no single individual has to take responsibility, and no individual human being's decision can save you, even if you're innocent. It's a regime.
well yeah the productive discussion is "stop doing the death penalty, it's stupid"
For the innocent victims of the death penalty, I imagine it feels like a regime.
well i mean yeah, that would be the second definition of regime, even doing shit like renewing your license feels like dealing with a regime. Dealing with any government is technically "regime" like if you think about it for long enough.