Death be not proud

Various commentators have expressed their view about the forthcoming hanging of 25 year old Van Nguyen in Singapore for heroin trafficking.(see here for the latest confusion on this issue). We would be foolish to think that he is going to be granted clemency, and I am sure that the big-mouthed shock-jocks in the eastern states, and probably Adelaide's own, Mr Bib and Bob Francis, have shouted in their self-righteous indignation that it serves him right.
More measured commentators like The Bulletin's Tony Wright say such things..Most Australians are opposed to the death sentence... The usually accurate Wright is dead wrong here!
Most research shows that we hover aroound the 50-50 mark. These issues can be easily swayed by the shock jocks like the Lawes and the Joneses of this world (I think most people see through the blustering of a bully boy like Francis---see for example the saga outlined on Media Watch in recent weeks)
To my mind the most telling comments are not that anyone thinks the Nguyens or the Bali 9 should get off for what loooks like the sheer stupidity of trafficking drugs in or through Asia, but those who say "What if it was your own son or daughter?"
Indeed we asked ourselves that question last night. The absolute cruelty of Nguyen's mother receiving the news by letter unwarned, uannounced beggars our sense of fair play.
My opposition to the death penalty is much stronger than this. It is just plain wrong. It may assuage the unresolved psyche's of the media-hungry bully boys, but it is of no social use what so ever.
Quite the contrary.
We want to believe, I think, that humanity is more human than all this....but we are frighteningly shocked when it lands on our own doorstep. Particularly when we see the death penalty not as an application of justice (however deluded) but a crude appeal to a base political sense more designed to keep ambitious men in office than to address problems. That this analysis can be laid particularly at the feet of the rulers of the most powerful nations of the world shoudl scare the pants off us.