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Ben
Lecturing
About Me
- prisonerben
- United Kingdom
- Previously known as "one of Britain's best known prisoners...he constantly questions authority and exposes the futility of the system" The Times, Ben was finally released from prison after 32 years in August 2012. Pleading guilty to the murder of a friend when he was 14 years old, he renounced violence and fought for the recognition of the inherent dignity of all human beings. As a result of speaking truth to power, he served far longer than the recommended 10 years, leading Education Secretary Michael Gove to argue that he had "been punished excessively for a crime committed as a child". One of the more intellectual of prisoner-campaigners, Ben chose to educate himself from schoolboy level to having both undergraduate and post graduate degrees. He is currently one of very few prisoners in Britain ever to attempt a Doctorate. Ben's speciality is non-violent action and the Human Needs Theory. Now on Life Licence, He is forging a career as a CJ policy consultant, writer and - as ever - campaigner.
http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/1090
ReplyDeletePetition to retain the ban got 7000 more votes. Definitely some faith in humanity restored.
The supposed public support for capital punishment has been vastly overblown. The apparent pro-hanging nature of the British public tends to be claimed whenever there has been a high profile crime. The tabloids then usually have a 'vote' - do you believe in hanging or not? Hardly representative.
ReplyDeleteThe Telegraph did the most recent in-depth and more nuanced survey (in 2006) which, in fact, showed that less than half the British public would favour a return to capital punishment - and the younger the responder, the more anti capital punishment they were. Support for the death penalty has been declining for years. Given the Telegraph is hardly a vehicle for hand wringing liberals, I'd say its findings are likely to be spot on. Moreover, I believe if anything, support for capital punishment has likely dropped further since 2006.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1506834/Less-than-50pc-back-death-penalty.html
It is amazing! So, more people are against capital punishment, than once thought? But, where it comes to "death by hanging", more take their own lives by this method, than ever were hung by law, per year! So, this hanging idea, never went away because it is a personal thing, and always was! Leaders of all kinds, can find the noose around their necks also, for many reasons? =D
ReplyDelete