Okay, this is a morbid question, but if you were a death row prisoner what would you request as your last meal?
I only ask this because I just found a strangely interesting blog called ‘Dead man eating‘ that chronicles the last meal orders of American death row prisoners. Here you can learn, for example, that Darrel Grayson who was executed in Alabama on July 26th, had a final meal request of an egg and cheese omelette and fresh sliced tomatoes.
Maybe the last meal choice of a condemned person gives you a tiny snapshot into who that person was. Frank Welch, who was executed on August 21st in Oklahoma, requested a large super supreme pizza and a two-liter bottle of Coke.
On July 11th, Elijah Page became South Dakota’s first execution in 60 years. Page was convicted of a quite horrific murder. According to ‘Dead man eating‘ Page had a final meal request of steak with A-1 sauce, jalapeno poppers with cream sauce, onion rings, and a salad with cherry tomatoes, ham chunks, shredded cheese, bacon bits, and blue cheese and ranch dressing. He wanted lemon iced tea and coffee to drink and ice cream for dessert. Curiously enough though, for a man who had plenty to say when he was asked what he wanted for his final meal, he had nothing to say when he was asked if he had any last words. “No.” He answered. Asked if he understood the question Page responded, “Yes, no last words.”
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Wrote the following comment on Sep 5, 2007 at 11:27 am
Mine would be Sauerbraten – the way how my Mum makes it.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 5, 2007 at 1:13 pm
I’d have sushi, loads and loads of sushi and some Naked green superfood to wash it all down.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 5, 2007 at 3:08 pm
Elijah Page actually had two last meals since they stayed his execution because of a technicality.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 5, 2007 at 5:04 pm
Well I would have to have, like Elijah a lovely Fillet Steak with a cream and mushroom sauce. Served with fried mushrooms and tomatoes, onion rings and a crisp dressed green salad. Dessert would have to be Banoffee Pie, with biscuit base and fresh cream.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 5, 2007 at 6:59 pm
Make mine a single malt scotch on the rocks; and since it takes the place of a meal, make it a double.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 5, 2007 at 11:11 pm
Funny I was just reading about Serial Killers on this link from MSN about “Peculiar Crimes” A lady who killed her husband and like 3 other fam members who claimed to be abused by them had requested: Cheetos and a Pepsi. I would think most people would be too nervous to eat if they knew they were going to die in a few hours.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 5, 2007 at 11:16 pm
I scanned the list of last meals to see if anyone had ordered a diet Pepsi/Coke. I mean heck, it’s not like drinking a regular Pepsi/Coke is gonna kill you at that stage is it!
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 1:01 am
Vodka on the rocks, neat, with a slice of lime. Carpaccio of beef with a small green salad, drizzled in Virgin Olive oil and balsamic syrup, maybe with a touch of soy sauce.
Then, a small Dominoes Meat Feast and then for desertm a dark chocolate mousse.
After the vodka, I’d have Blueberry and Pomegranate juice in a tall slender glass. Then after dinner an espresso and then, after a short break, some Jack Daniels.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 2:00 am
southern fried chicken, mashed real potatoes, gravy, green beans with bacon grease, fresh buttermilk biscuits… and i wanna tell you … i would have no room for desert!!!!!!!
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 2:17 am
How could you eat? I don’t know if I could.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 3:08 am
hhmmm….what to have, what to have? So many choices, so little time…
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 3:14 am
i’m with karen… but if i could eat, I’d probably want to try something new and exotic… like blowfish.
you know, without the death penalty there’d be no last meals. IF there were no last meals, your daily internet surfing would be less interesting.gasp! (and that was the day Simon Jones had a change of heart and thanked God for the death penalty he used to hate so so much).
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 5:29 am
I don’t hate the death penalty. I just don’t think it can be considered anything other than “cruel and unusual” in it’s seemingly random and haphazard application. With that in mind not only is the punishment unjust it is surely unconstitutional also.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 7:00 am
Will: It’s a hell of a thing, killin’ a man. You take away all he’s got an’ all he’s ever gonna have.
The Kid: Yeah. Well, I guess they had it comin’.
Will: We all have it comin’, Kid.
-excerpt from “Unforgiven”
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 3:14 pm
Hmmm so if it wasnt dispensed randomly and haphazardly you would support it?
and all along i though you disliked it in principle; the inhumanity of taking someone else’s life.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 10:29 pm
I don’t like the death penalty, I’m of the opinion that justice should be held to a higher standard. Though yes, the haphazard and utterly random nature of the death penalty is of concern to me. Do some people deserve to die? Well yes I think they do. Would I want to kill them? Absolutely not.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 6, 2007 at 10:32 pm
You see Simon…if you wanted to have a real debate about the death penalty you needed to make it about food…now people are talking!
Wrote the following comment on Sep 7, 2007 at 4:06 pm
You think some people ‘deserve’ to die, but at the same time dont like the death penalty. I’m guessing you mean you dont like the death penalty as practiced… but in principle you’d be a supporter of it? is that what you’re saying?
Wrote the following comment on Sep 7, 2007 at 4:13 pm
Someone who tortures a person to death deserves to die. However, that does not mean we should kill them, it just means that they deserve to die. I still believe though that the application of the death penalty is so seemingly random that it fails to be even handed under the law, which therefore renders it unjust and unfit for a modern society.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 7, 2007 at 11:30 pm
I live in TX where we execute like 2 or 3 people a year. Although I dont feel like killing people justifies their crimes….I feel like if a person is condemned to die and committed murder w/o a reasonable doubt, why should we feed them,cloth them and give them medical care? In other words….why should we suppport unreformable criminals? It makes more sense to execute a person than to support thm until they die. Did the victim have a choice to live or die? Should we find better ways of killing criminals….so its not so inhumane?
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 1:33 am
I throw my lot in with Simon and particularly the point he makes that though someone may genuinely deserve to die doesn’t mean that we should kill them. Moreover, I am not sure that I would want to stand in the position of making judgments regarding who is reformable and who isn’t. Some pretty hardened badasses have had a genuine change of heart that resulted in a change of lifestyle, and up to the point that it happened no one would have seen it coming. Taking some liberty with Scriptural interpretation, it seems to me that when the prophets state that God desires mercy and not sacrifice, it could be very well understood that God doesn’t want the sacrifices of human life in an attempt to appease justice. In saying this I don’t mean to undermine God’s holiness, but the message of the Cross is that God wants redemption, not retribution.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 3:51 pm
Not that this will be of any concern to you Barbie, but your estimation of how many people your great State kills a year (2 or 3 a year) is way way off. In this month alone the state of Texas will put to death 5 people.
Statistically speaking Texas executes on average one prison inmate a month. However the average hides a truth that the number that Texas execute has risen dramatically in recent years.
For example, this year the State of Texas has executed, or plans to execute, the following;
As Anthony says, it’s almost impossible to know who is “unreformable”, and while I understand the financial motive behind killing off costly prisoners that seems like a very dangerous road to go down with jails filling up. Lets not forget America jails more of its citizens than any other country. Justice needs to be held to a better moral standard than the crime it seeks to punish surely?
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 4:02 pm
Oh why do I bother. You always “research” every statement I make anyways. Ok, I was off on the amount of criminals we execute. And yes, we do have overcrowded prisons. We also have alot of crime. Does that mean we should lower standards for punishment? Or should we live in fear that someone who is a repeat offender should be let loose due to overcrowding? I dont know what the solution is, nor does my state or my country obviously! But I do know that where we absolutely FAIL is crimes against children!!!! This is a debate that I cannot defend although I dont see the logic in keeping criminals locked up until they die or letting them loose to do it again. I must say I am neutral on this subject and the only one who seems to always get into an argument with you. :)
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 4:16 pm
I didn’t especially go away and research that to prove you wrong Barbie, I actually researched all this when I wrote Two Wrongs, so the stats were in my head. I point them out not to make you look silly (if I did that then my sincere apologies), rather to show that perception is often not as close to the truth as we would like to think.
Locking people up doesn’t really work in the kind of way we wish it would, I think we can all agree on that. The prison system doesn’t work but aside of patching it here and there I don’t think there is much we can do to ‘fix’ the problem at that level. I think society needs to look harder at what causes someone to end up in jail in the first place. If a concerted effort could be made to address that issue wouldn’t the prison problem fix itself?
I suppose though the question of the rights and wrongs of the death penalty will always remain a hotly debated subject. My contention will remain though, that there can be little justice in a punishment that is applied in such a seemingly random and haphazard manner.
I wonder how many (abortion issue) pro-life campaigners support the death penalty? That would be something I wouldn’t mind seeing statistics on.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 6:27 pm
Anthony, surely you dont believe a justice system should be run on the principles of ‘God desires mercy not sacrifice?’ help me understand what you mean.
ANyways, I guess my biggest issue with all this is the statement that someone deserves to die for something they’ve done. IF someone is truly deserving of death, then taking their life would be the JUST thing to do. And IF a country or state wants to do that in a fair manner, who has the right to say anything against that?
You can believe that not taking someone’s life is the ‘higher road’… but if you also believe someone is deserving of something, you cannot criticize those who follow through with it. That’s inconsistent. IF we dont have the right to take something away from someone, then we do not have the right to make the judgement that they deserve to lose it.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 6:43 pm
So Rachel, when is it right to kill someone, I’m curious as to where you think that line lies.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 11:02 pm
Except in a case of war… i think we never have the right to say someone deserves to die. It’s not our job to judge someone’s right to life.
Granted someone may think someone else deserves to die on an emotional level, but emotions are not a place to start building a system of justice.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 8, 2007 at 11:30 pm
I don’t think I explained myself at all well. By understanding that someone deserves to die I meant that I can understand that on an emotional level. However, my point is that justice has to be just, and in its current form the death penalty is applied in an absolutely haphazard and random manner which in effect renders it a cruel and unusual punishment that would therefore be unconstitutional under in the United States.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 9, 2007 at 12:48 am
Rachel, Actually my thinking on this needs some development and honestly I was reacting in part against a kind of political conservatism that tends to dominate evangelical Xian reflection upon this issue. I know that in Romans 13 it states that there is no authority but what God has established and within that context Paul further states, “For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you want to be free from fear of the one in authority? Then do what is right and he will commend you. For he is God’s servant to do you good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for he does not bear the sword for nothing. He is God’s servant, an agent of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer.” So, from this it seems that there is biblical warrant for capital punishment and if this was all there was in scripture about good and evil, punishment and redemption, then I suppose there would be no debate from a Xian perspective. However, one thing that Paul did not address in this passage is what the Xian response should be when there is an authority that has been established that clearly is immoral and is prompting people either directly or systemically to disobey God. In relation to this, I think of Peter’s response to the religious authorities (also established by God) who were trying to suppress his preaching of the Gospel. He said that he must obey God rather then men. Both Paul and Peter were apostles, both of them were inspired to communicate God’s word and yet there appears to be a contradiction between them.
Add to this the fact that traditional reflection upon the Scriptures marks a distinction between God’s expectations for the Church and his expectations for governments of the world. The Church is the locus of God’s renewing grace, meaning that it is the sphere where people have access to deliverance from the power of sin and death. By contrast, in the world, there is only preserving grace, which is the work that God does to keep his creation from the utter destruction that would come as a natural result of the fall. In this sphere, the sword (a metaphor for any kind of punitive action whether it be fines or death) can only hold bad men and women in check (and on some level all of us are bad). No threat ever brings about a genuine heart change, just a restraint of our worse impulses. An implication of this distinction between the Church and civil government is that the Church should not try to thrust its moral norms upon society through legislation. However, in possible contradiction to this, it could be said that the Scriptures contains God’s vision for true humanity and that society can thereby benefit when it consults the Scriptures to formulate policies and laws, and if not in doing this, at least in letting this vision influence public discourse.
How does all of this relate to my previous comment? First, I am just trying to demonstrate some complexity here even from within a Xian perspective. Beyond this, as I said in my initial post, that some people do deserve to die, and to develop this even further, I do think the state has a right to mete out justice through the death penalty. However, I do think that maybe we should consider moving beyond punitive justice and work toward a restorative model. I realize that there will be those who remain hardened to the end, but as I said, we never know who that will be. And so, in the hope that one might change, I think it might be worth it to keep them alive and try to work redemptively in their lives. I know that ultimately it is God’s Spirit that bring true redemption, but I also think that there are levels of restoration, and that society can benefit from thinking about the whole issue of punishment from a redemptive perspective. Along with all this, I don’t think that capital punishment in America is practiced fairly as I am quite sure that socio-economic and ethnic factors influence the likelihood that a person who commits murder will actually be put to death for it. So, for this reason, I think that Xians and all people for that matter should call for moratorium on capital punishment and push for a review and evaluation of the whole justice system.
Wrote the following comment on Sep 10, 2007 at 4:05 am
Very well said Anthony… and i do agree that the death penalty is unfair. Expanding on your first paragraph, I think for Christians we are obviously obligated to God first. LIke Christ and Paul and Peter and all the disciples, they help true to their message but did not fight back when the government ruled against them. SO, they held true to God’s law first but didnt physically resist the consequence of their actions from the government they were under. I think this is an excellent model for us today. Anyways, thanks for the well thought out response. I’ll have to go check out your blog…