Tax payers on the hook for up to $80,000 to cover murderer's sex change operation

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Smoblikat

Diamond Member
Nov 19, 2011
5,184
107
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Oh not at all. He violated no moral principle when he killed his wife. He was completely morally justified, but of course, only in his own mind, and acted out of the same moral certainty that she should die as you act toward him. This is why vengeance against those who practice rightful vengeance themselves, is just a different form of the same insanity. Nothing you can do to this guy will rectify a single thing he did. Nothing can be gained from this creature's life except the example you can set to differentiate yourself from how he treated his wife. You apparently do not know the virtue of mercy because you have none and feel no moral compulsion to set a good example.

The satisfaction that others suffer is the exact sickness that killers feel.

I understand you perfectly. You think you see the big picture because you don't see a larger one. I have no need for compassion for those who have to bear the cost that a virtuous life demands because I bear those costs willingly as the price of admission to the human race.

The difference between the morals in my mind and the morals in his mind, are that my mind has correct morals, while his are wrong. Out of the two of us ONE HAS TO BE RIGHT, there are two choices, either it was OK for him to murder his wife (his idea) or that it wasnt (my idea), one is right and one is wrong. mine is right.

Go ahead, tell me "Noone is right or wrong, who are you to say you are right" "Everyones opinion is right, its an opinion" thats not fucking true. His mind is broken if he thought he was doing anything correctly.
 
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werepossum

Elite Member
Jul 10, 2006
29,873
463
126
Not sure how this is progressive as this was a republican judge.

But if you want to go off topic then the Repub mantra is "You didn't earn that! You're CEO did!"
Judges, like politicians, tend to become liberal over time. Once one has power, one is hard-pressed to avoid thinking that power should be exercised - strictly for the greater good of mankind, of course.

And the Republican mantra is "Freeeedommm - until you choose to do something of which I disapprove."
 

michal1980

Diamond Member
Mar 7, 2003
8,019
43
91
The conservative mind has traveled so far from reality today they are no longer Americans and can't comprehend either the objectivity or compassion toward the human spirit the founders put into the Constitution. They have become the same moral filth that ran the Spanish Inquisition, full of the vial arrogance that THEY speak for God and the sickening joy they take in the justification of their vengeance. Morally, they have become worthless scum. They are the people of the Dark Ages and if the control the ring of power the world will go dark. God have mercy on their souls for they have no mercy for themselves.

The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.

what does this garbage of a post mean?

Why the F should any one pay for anyone else to change their sex? Theres no logic, no reasoning that anyone with a fully functioning brain could come to that conculsion.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
The difference between the morals in my mind and the morals in his mind, are that my mind has correct morals, while his are wrong. Out of the two of us ONE HAS TO BE RIGHT, there are two choices, either it was OK for him to murder his wife (his idea) or that it wasnt (my idea), one is right and one is wrong. mine is right.

Go ahead, tell me "Noone is right or wrong, who are you to say you are right" "Everyones opinion is right, its an opinion" thats not fucking true. His mind is broken if he thought he was doing anything correctly.

Both your minds are broken because they are identical in being self justified.

You either self justify killing somebody or you do not. I do not. The only thing to do is to demonstrate to all in every way that the only way to treat other people is humanly. An eye for an eye is sick. The responsibility of the sane is to keep the insane from hurting others. There is nothing to be gained by punishing people who are insane except your own insane need to return pain for pain. Do not tell the next mad man it's OK to kill people who deserve it. Otherwise you won't ever know who the insane really are and you can get a thread like this where they gather screaming for blood.

I know the appeal of revenge and the chemical nature of addiction to rage so it's going to be a struggle to get what I'm saying.

Really, it's a Biblical thingi too, the idea being that as you judge others so shall you be judged. There is a deep truth here that is invisible to most people and has nothing to do with God's existence as some imaginary being on a cloud, that your treatment of others is an unconscious expression of how you treat yourself, and in particular, the part of the real God within you.

You cannot love yourself if you hate others and you cannot love others if you hate yourself. It is all tied together in a paradox that can only be understood by conscious evolution. All I can tell you is that you can find a better place than where you are and I hope you do. Good luck to you.
 

werepossum

Elite Member
Jul 10, 2006
29,873
463
126
Both your minds are broken because they are identical in being self justified.

You either self justify killing somebody or you do not. I do not. The only thing to do is to demonstrate to all in every way that the only way to treat other people is humanly. An eye for an eye is sick. The responsibility of the sane is to keep the insane from hurting others. There is nothing to be gained by punishing people who are insane except your own insane need to return pain for pain. Do not tell the next mad man it's OK to kill people who deserve it. Otherwise you won't ever know who the insane really are and you can get a thread like this where they gather screaming for blood.

I know the appeal of revenge and the chemical nature of addiction to rage so it's going to be a struggle to get what I'm saying.

Really, it's a Biblical thingi too, the idea being that as you judge others so shall you be judged. There is a deep truth here that is invisible to most people and has nothing to do with God's existence as some imaginary being on a cloud, that your treatment of others is an unconscious expression of how you treat yourself, and in particular, the part of the real God within you.

You cannot love yourself if you hate others and you cannot love others if you hate yourself. It is all tied together in a paradox that can only be understood by conscious evolution. All I can tell you is that you can find a better place than where you are and I hope you do. Good luck to you.
Screaming to not fund an $80,00 sex change for a jailed murderer is NOT screaming for blood.

In this case we essentially are telling this person it's okay to kill someone, as he/she/it is being rewarded with $80,000 of someone else's hard-earned money to remake itself in its preferences as a direct consequence of being convicted of murder. Were it not imprisoned, we would tell it to pound sand.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
what does this garbage of a post mean?

Why the F should any one pay for anyone else to change their sex? Theres no logic, no reasoning that anyone with a fully functioning brain could come to that conculsion.

It means that anything outside the conservative bubble universe looks like garbage to you. You are short of the capacity to see anything else. In fact being told this will actually now make it look more like garbage than before because the conservative bubble is strengthened with it rubs up on reality.
 
Feb 10, 2000
30,029
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Screaming to not fund an $80,00 sex change for a jailed murderer is NOT screaming for blood.

In this case we essentially are telling this person it's okay to kill someone, as he/she/it is being rewarded with $80,000 of someone else's hard-earned money to remake itself in its preferences as a direct consequence of being convicted of murder. Were it not imprisoned, we would tell it to pound sand.

While I don't agree with the proposition that the public should foot the bill for this, I hardly see it as a "reward" to send someone to prison for life without parole. I think that penalty was deserved in this instance, but it's not as though this person got himself sentenced to life so he could get a free gender reassignment decades later.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
Screaming to not fund an $80,00 sex change for a jailed murderer is NOT screaming for blood.

In this case we essentially are telling this person it's okay to kill someone, as he/she/it is being rewarded with $80,000 of someone else's hard-earned money to remake itself in its preferences as a direct consequence of being convicted of murder. Were it not imprisoned, we would tell it to pound sand.

Yeah, I know. Look at what fundamentalists Christians did with Christ's forgiveness, turned it right in to devil worship in a short number of years.

What you are telling the person is that you will act toward him with the recognition that he was created in the image of God, with the same love that God has for every being and that only He will judge. It is no reward at all to tell that person that you are not him.

Read it again:

The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.

Blame God if you see forgiveness as a reward. He seems to think along those lines, no?
 

werepossum

Elite Member
Jul 10, 2006
29,873
463
126
While I don't agree with the proposition that the public should foot the bill for this, I hardly see it as a "reward" to send someone to prison for life without parole. I think that penalty was deserved in this instance, but it's not as though this person got himself sentenced to life so he could get a free gender reassignment decades later.
No, but because he got himself convicted and sentenced to life in prison, he's being given something law abiding persons would have to labor years if not decades to afford.

Yeah, I know. Look at what fundamentalists Christians did with Christ's forgiveness, turned it right in to devil worship in a short number of years.

What you are telling the person is that you will act toward him with the recognition that he was created in the image of God, with the same love that God has for every being and that only He will judge. It is no reward at all to tell that person that you are not him.

Read it again:

The quality of mercy is not strain'd,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.

Blame God if you see forgiveness as a reward. He seems to think along those lines, no?
I have no problem forgiving him. I have a big problem saying "G-d fucked up, here's $80,000 in taxpayer money to see if you can do better."
 

Smoblikat

Diamond Member
Nov 19, 2011
5,184
107
106
Both your minds are broken because they are identical in being self justified.

You either self justify killing somebody or you do not. I do not. The only thing to do is to demonstrate to all in every way that the only way to treat other people is humanly. An eye for an eye is sick. The responsibility of the sane is to keep the insane from hurting others. There is nothing to be gained by punishing people who are insane except your own insane need to return pain for pain. Do not tell the next mad man it's OK to kill people who deserve it. Otherwise you won't ever know who the insane really are and you can get a thread like this where they gather screaming for blood.

I know the appeal of revenge and the chemical nature of addiction to rage so it's going to be a struggle to get what I'm saying.

Really, it's a Biblical thingi too, the idea being that as you judge others so shall you be judged. There is a deep truth here that is invisible to most people and has nothing to do with God's existence as some imaginary being on a cloud, that your treatment of others is an unconscious expression of how you treat yourself, and in particular, the part of the real God within you.

You cannot love yourself if you hate others and you cannot love others if you hate yourself. It is all tied together in a paradox that can only be understood by conscious evolution. All I can tell you is that you can find a better place than where you are and I hope you do. Good luck to you.

I do not hate this man nor do I want to kill him, I dont think he deserves to have a sex change operation.
 
Feb 10, 2000
30,029
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No, but because he got himself convicted and sentenced to life in prison, he's being given something law abiding persons would have to labor years if not decades to afford.

Oh, I totally agree. My own feeling is that if he could afford to pay for it, had a demonstrated medical need, and the prison could permit it without compromising the facility's security, fine, but to me this is not an appropriate use of tax dollars.

This afternoon I skimmed the court's opinion on this. I am paraphrasing from memory something I read hours ago, on an area of law in which I have no expertise, but as I read it the holding was essentially that under the 8th Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, a prison cannot withhold needed medical care for a life-threatening condition, and accordingly is obligated to provide this operation.

The court essentially held that a) the applicable medical authorities consider his transgender medical condition a legitimate, treatable psychiatric diagnosis; b) it is a life-threatening condition, as demonstrated by his suicide and self-castration attempts; and c) the gender reassignment surgery is the only medically indicated treatment for it, because lesser treatments, including hormone therapy, have failed to correct it. Accordingly, the opinion holds, the prison is obligated to provide it. As I said I don't have a background in this area of law so I have no way of knowing whether there is clear case-law support for the position the court has taken.
 
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Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
I do not hate this man nor do I want to kill him, I dont think he deserves to have a sex change operation.

I don't think he 'deserves' one either. But I am rather impressed that a Republican judge deemed that granting him one is worth the 80,000 to bring better justice to the system, that he doesn't deserve it, but we deserve the improvement to the circumstance the operation will bring. We pay dearly for justice in our system.
 

sactoking

Diamond Member
Sep 24, 2007
7,507
2,703
136
So what if the operation turns her/him/it into a model prisoner allowing her to be paroled earlier saving the taxpayers more money than it costs to keep her incarcerated?

Would that change anyones mind - if it ended up saving the taxpayers money?

This is all hypothetical.

Serving life in prison without possibility of parole, per article in OP.
 

Smoblikat

Diamond Member
Nov 19, 2011
5,184
107
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I dont understand, if this man wants to die, why would we stop him? He is entitled to have a life yet not take it if he wants? That seems unfair.
 

werepossum

Elite Member
Jul 10, 2006
29,873
463
126
Oh, I totally agree. My own feeling is that if he could afford to pay for it, had a demonstrated medical need, and the prison could permit it without compromising the facility's security, fine, but to me this is not an appropriate use of tax dollars.

This afternoon I skimmed the court's opinion on this. I am paraphrasing from memory something I read hours ago, on an area of law in which I have no expertise, but as I read it the holding was essentially that under the 8th Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, a prison cannot withhold needed medical care for a life-threatening condition, and accordingly is obligated to provide this operation.

The court essentially held that a) the applicable medical authorities consider his transgender medical condition a legitimate, treatable psychiatric diagnosis; b) it is a life-threatening condition, as demonstrated by his suicide and self-castration attempts; and c) the gender reassignment surgery is the only medically indicated treatment for it, because lesser treatments, including hormone therapy, have failed to correct it. Accordingly, the opinion holds, the prison is obligated to provide it. As I said I don't have a background in this area of law so I have no way of knowing whether there is clear case-law support for the position the court has taken.
This may well be a case where there simply isn't a good answer or a clear right and wrong, except from a legal standpoint. Just goes to remind us that we have a legal system, not a justice system.
 

michal1980

Diamond Member
Mar 7, 2003
8,019
43
91
It means that anything outside the conservative bubble universe looks like garbage to you. You are short of the capacity to see anything else. In fact being told this will actually now make it look more like garbage than before because the conservative bubble is strengthened with it rubs up on reality.

ahh look typical liberal elitism. 'we are smarter then you' same old bullshit from you guys

The only one lacking in capacity to see garbage here is you.
 
Feb 10, 2000
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This may well be a case where there simply isn't a good answer or a clear right and wrong, except from a legal standpoint. Just goes to remind us that we have a legal system, not a justice system.

I know I am speaking as a lawyer (some people will discount everything I have to say on this subject for that reason), but I am a lawyer who has worked as a prosecutor and a defense attorney on cases of the greatest magnitude, so I don't think it's fair to paint me as naive or biased toward one side or the other. I think we as Americans have worked hard to create a system that is as fair and just as possible. I don't love the idea of the taxpayers buying this guy a sex change, but I do love the idea of a system which protects the civil rights of even the worst people.
 

ShawnD1

Lifer
May 24, 2003
15,987
2
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Why should we care if a mentally ill murderer kills themselves?

I said the same thing and people thought I was crazy.

Shawn: we should give unlimited free heroin to prisoners
ATOT: but what if they OD and die?
Shawn: if? more like when.
 

Moonbeam

Elite Member
Nov 24, 1999
72,329
6,040
126
This may well be a case where there simply isn't a good answer or a clear right and wrong, except from a legal standpoint. Just goes to remind us that we have a legal system, not a justice system.

We can never have and never have had anything else. Law is an attempt to codify justice. It is called a justice system because it is driven by that aim. The law is the tool we use to strive for the aim. It is the aim that is sacred. The love of justice is innate. The love of law, not so much as we see here.
 
Feb 10, 2000
30,029
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We can never have and never have had anything else. Law is an attempt to codify justice. It is called a justice system because it is driven by that aim. The law is the tool we use to strive for the aim. It is the aim that is sacred. The love of justice is innate. The love of law, not so much as we see here.

Very well put.
 

ModerateRepZero

Golden Member
Jan 12, 2006
1,573
5
81
This notion that a sex change operation is "medically necessary" is absurd. Society doesn't owe this piece of human garbage an $80,000 elective operation. If he can't deal with that then tough shit for him.

Seconded :thumbsup: If he cannot survive and will die without a medical procedure, that's one thing; but that is clearly not the case.
 

actuarial

Platinum Member
Jan 22, 2009
2,814
0
71
I took this to mean that you think some sort of special consideration in the case for $80,000 should be made because of the attempted suicide. My point is that we have limits to considerations surrounding suicide and that attempted suicide is not enough of a reason to make these special accommodations.

I'm not 100% positive, but I would gather suicide attempts would be considered when deciding to isolate a prisoner from general population (not as punishment, but at their request for protection). I imagine that over the life of a prisoner this special treatment would cost more than $80,000.

Not that I agree with taxpayers paying for gender re-assignment as I personally do not see it as a medically necessary procedure, but the costs involved may not be substantial compared to the alternatives (especially if the procedure is on the low end of the range given). It may actually cost the prison less in the end.

It was actually the prison's doctors (Department of Corrections) who decided it was medically necessary, but the prison disagreed with giving the treatment their own doctors recommended.
 

Mandres

Senior member
Jun 8, 2011
944
58
91
Oh, I totally agree. My own feeling is that if he could afford to pay for it, had a demonstrated medical need, and the prison could permit it without compromising the facility's security, fine, but to me this is not an appropriate use of tax dollars.

This afternoon I skimmed the court's opinion on this. I am paraphrasing from memory something I read hours ago, on an area of law in which I have no expertise, but as I read it the holding was essentially that under the 8th Amendment's prohibition on cruel and unusual punishment, a prison cannot withhold needed medical care for a life-threatening condition, and accordingly is obligated to provide this operation.

The court essentially held that a) the applicable medical authorities consider his transgender medical condition a legitimate, treatable psychiatric diagnosis; b) it is a life-threatening condition, as demonstrated by his suicide and self-castration attempts; and c) the gender reassignment surgery is the only medically indicated treatment for it, because lesser treatments, including hormone therapy, have failed to correct it. Accordingly, the opinion holds, the prison is obligated to provide it. As I said I don't have a background in this area of law so I have no way of knowing whether there is clear case-law support for the position the court has taken.

Thanks for looking it up and summarizing for us.

I have a real problem with the classification of this disorder as a "life-threatening condition". How can the threat of suicide possibly be interpreted that way? Can a suicide attempt now be the basis of classification for any condition to be life-threatening? What kind of precedent is this?

I think the boob-job example for female prisoners is a good one. Are we now legally required to provide this treatment? What if she's so upset about her tiny titties that she tries to hang herself with her own (training) bra?