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Sun 6 Jun, 2004 07:50 am
I came across this collection of photographs in a publication this weekend.
It's a series of re-created final meals of prisoners who were executed in the US, taken by photographer, Celia A. Shapiro. I found the images quite haunting. What's your response?
http://www.motherjones.com/news/exhibit/2004/01/12_900.html
By killing people "legally" - for revenge - I think it sick and disgusting - and terribly bad for a society.
The meals are sad.
I've been thinking about my own reaction - wondering why the images have stayed in my mind long after first seeing them yesterday. I think it's something about the mundane "normality" of the meals, combined with the name & age of each person who was executed. I find it quite shocking that the person who ate that meal died at the hands of the state. That they are no longer here. Also the choice of food tells me something about the preferences of the person & makes them seem very vulnerable & human.
dlowan wrote:The meals are sad.
Yes, they make me feel very sad, too.
Man I'd go for better than that......
says a lot about their background, no?
Yes, I'd agree with you Deb. The photograph of the 12 hot dogs with the can of coke speaks volumes. "John William Rook, age 27 - executed by Nth Carolina"
Msolga, as I looked at each picture the contrast between the 'typical' favorite meals was stark considering that shortly afterward, they were dead at the hands of the state (mostly Texas--Bush country).
Just thinking of actually eating anything at all, knowing I was soon going to be put to death, is beyond me.
Junk food, soda pop, all depictions of happy Americana. It is sickening.
Essentially, poor folks fun food. Very revealing. F*ck Texas.
Never understood WHY they feed someone who's gonna be dead in a hour or two. It's not like they'll be writing to the prison meals director to complain.
It's weird. Aknowledge that someone is a living, breathing person with ordinary needs and then snuff them out. On a related note, think those poor bastards in A-G Prison, Iraq ever got a meal that some soldier didn't spit in first?
JLNobody wrote:Essentially, poor folks fun food. Very revealing. F*ck Texas.
Yes, very revealing. Awful.
Diane
I guess people hang onto life/normality for as long as they can? Maybe to block out the terrible reality? I don't know ...
Mr Stillwater wrote:Never understood WHY they feed someone who's gonna be dead in a hour or two. It's not like they'll be writing to the prison meals director to complain.
It's weird. Aknowledge that someone is a living, breathing person with ordinary needs and then snuff them out.
I occurred to me that maybe it's as much for the prison guards doing the job for the state? Maybe it's to make THEM feel better, normal, nothing wrong with what's happening here! ... A last act of "kindness" & consideration of the prisoner's preferences, the last semblance of decency ...
Yeah - and I suspect rituals make it easier for everyone.
From the article
When Arkansas executed Rickey Ray Rector back when Bill Clinton was governor, the mentally impaired inmate famously set aside half of his last meala pecan piefor after the execution
What could possibly be said to this?
All of the pictures were...disturbing...but this rendered me speechless.
I would choose some huge amount of a bad mixture of food so that I made sure I shit myself in a big way and left an unpleasant mess to be cleaned....getting in the last word....... :wink:
I find the whole concept very disturbing. The idea of people still being kill by the state, makes me feel as if we are still stock in the past - we are quiet sophisticated and advance in almost everything, specially in how we
Kill others.
Some people move through time and learn nothing from past mistakes, and some are very easily influenced by the ideas of sick minded people - not going to mention "Bush and his group" - but we all know who they are.
Here is another link, there are no pictures but they have listed the last meal requests:
http://www.adc.state.az.us/DeathRow/DeathPenaltyHistory.htm#LAST%20MEAL
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