That’s just a superficial reading of the news.
But there’s another level. Why did the dentist kill his wife? Was it some chemical dentists use that needs to be forbidden or at least regulated? Was it a mental health issue that points to failings in the healthcare system? Was it a problem with how he was a raised as a child that can be used to inform education policies? Can the dentist be redeemed or should he just be punished?
And on an even deeper level, should we as a society even care and intervene or should we move to a sociopathic mindset of embracing full individual responsibility and no collective responsibility at all?
should he just be punished?
How sad that people would want to punish someone who doesn’t even know what they’ve done wrong. I like to believe we have prisons to safely keep people who cannot live around others without significantly hurting them, not to punish them.
Punishment really doesn’t work, it’s literally a coin toss as to whether someone will reoffend.
Norway had high rates of recidivism decades ago and pivoted to a rehabilitation approach and has one of the lowest recidivism rates.
I find that people that can’t let go of punishment don’t care about victims and the aim of a justice system should be to limit the number of victims of crime, by whatever means.
People in Norwegian prisons have access to knives and have less stabbings than the USA where you can’t have knives in prison.
Punishment is about virtue signalling. The point is to be socially seen to oppose immoral behaviour through violence. It’s about affirming your social status as a good person.
