An eye for an eye is not justice. Not in Indonesia, and not in the US
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Version 0 of 1. When I was at university one of my family members was violently assaulted and injured. One of my first responses was a desire for revenge. Briefly I thought about getting hold of a gun (well, I was living in the US) and tracking down the assailants to inflict fear and … what then? It wasn’t a real plan: I was in my early 20s, I didn’t know who the attackers were, and living in the US notwithstanding, I had no idea how to get my hands on a firearm or what I would do with it when I did. But I had an overwhelming feeling that the people who had hurt someone I love should experience fear and terror. Had this assault on my family member ended in death, I have to admit that there would have been part of me that would have wanted an eye for an eye. Related: Bali Nine families visit: 'We want to see him to let him know that we love him' Last week federal prosecutors in the US opened the case against the surviving Boston bomber, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev. As Tsarnaev’s lawyer told the jury, this is not a case about guilt or innocence. It was him, she said. The purpose of the trial is to determine whether he deserves the death penalty. Tsarnaev is an accused terrorist facing 17 federal charges that each carry the death penalty as the maximum punishment. Many Americans will say “hanging is too good for him”. Leftwingers, like Democratic party senators Dianne Feinstein and Chuck Schumer, support the death penalty for Tsarnaev. Schumer helped write the federal death penalty statute in 1994. Even way-out-there leftwingers, like Massachusetts senator Elizabeth Warren, haven’t opposed the death penalty in this case. These senators are answerable to the public and they know that an overwhelming majority aren’t interested in whether Tsarnaev can be rehabilitated: they are happy to see him killed upon conviction. I don’t support the death penalty in any circumstance, including for Tsarnaev. But we can’t ignore the real human desire for ultimate retribution, the common thread between Tsarnaev and the public who now want him dead. In what he likely presumed would be his dying words, Tsarnaev wrote on the side of the boat in which he was found: “Stop killing our innocent people and we will stop.” An eye for an eye, he may well have said. Like many Australians, I view the death sentences of Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran as pointless. They are rehabilitated and will likely never re-offend. Evidence suggests their deaths will serve as no deterrent to future drug smugglers. In a country where 18,000 people die annually from narcotics use, perhaps Indonesians view drug smugglers the way the US views terrorists: retribution always trumps rehabilitation. An eye for many eyes, perhaps. In Australia, we do not share this same view. We don’t deny the human desire for revenge exists – I’ve no doubt that had Man Monis survived the Martin Place siege there would have been calls in this country for his execution – but the majority of Australians, as well as our political leaders and judicial system, would not have accommodated retribution. We believe that revenge is a poor servant of justice. This is, in part, why we plead for mercy for Chan and Sukumaran. Their rehabilitation is evidence of how well justice is served when punishment affords those convicted the right to atone. This is also why Australia should not remain silent if our good friend and close ally, the USA, sentences Tsarnaev to death. Related: Indonesians should be too familiar with death to support executions | Laksmi Pamuntjak Yes, he is not an Australian citizen and therefore not our problem. Yes, the USA is a sovereign nation that abides by the rule of law and procedural fairness. I imagine some will say that Tsarnaev is a terrorist, self-radicalised, inspired by a death cult, and unrepentant, so why would we bother? “Australia opposes the death penalty at home and abroad,” Tony Abbott said, as he petitioned the Indonesian government to spare the lives of Chan and Sukumaran. “We abhor the death penalty. We regard it as barbaric,” he later added. If this is true, we must be willing to demonstrate it. Do we really oppose the death penalty in all circumstances, no matter which nation is imposing it, no matter the crime, and no matter who committed it? If we dare to speak the truth to power on the death penalty in Indonesia, let’s also speak it to one of the world’s superpowers. I don’t doubt that our Indonesian neighbours would overhear and take notice if we had such a conversation with our friends in the US. |