I'm not keen on the death penalty myself but if a society is going to have it I'll respect them a lot more for using it on powerful and privileged people who deliberately hurt large amounts of people than for using it on mentally ill members of the underclass.

Idk, I think the death penalty is a much more appropriate penalty for white collar criminals than most other things. The amount of misery people can cause for nothing more than a number on a bank account, usually by people who never lacked for anything and knew in advance what would happen? That's the sort of shit that can only be prevented when death to oneself is the penalty.

A pederast, a murderer, a rapist won't be deterred by the death penalty and there's no meaningful redress from their deaths. A banker who sees another banker get fucking fried? Bet you he starts behaving a little better for a good while.

Edit: and you better believe rule compliance becomes a priority if the head of your department can get in deep shit for any corruption done under their watch.

It depends on the consequences of the corruption. If it was just typical graft and favoritism then prison and permanent blacklisting from political life is probably more appropriate. If it was looking the other way on safety regulations or the graft measurably caused death and considerable suffering through diverting resources from where they were needed to save lives, then it's murder or manslaughter and there's a point where that is appropriate to punish with the death penalty.

Especially since every decision would be formally on the record, as would its consequences. It's not like the shitshow that is trying to determine guilt at the level of a private individual where there's only circumstantial evidence. Most of the problem with the death penalty is that the legal system is a depraved, fundamentally illegitimate shitshow in the US (and most places) that cannot be permitted to have the authority to murder people based on whatever nightmare logic a christofascist judge decides to allow in court.

i think stable states should be able to not do the death penalty, but on the other hand i really don't care if it's white-collar criminals who had to premeditate and repeatedly double and triple down on what they were doing.

I think it's fine to object to this use of the death penalty as unnecessary while still acknowledging that it's vastly superior to the American system of no penalty for the rich.

Edit: I completely reject the idea that it's inherently "appropriate" to punish anyone with death on some kind of moral basis, even if circumstances (by which I mean instability) makes it pragmatically necessary in some cases for getting rid of people who represent excessive liabilities if the opposition releases them again (which is not China's situation. Still better this than letting him get away with it, I'm not saying it's a profound humanitarian issue or anything.