Can You Forgive Someone and Still Execute Them? Malcolm Gladwell Isn't Sure

Added: 2026-05-03

[00:00:02]There's a concept in Christian [music] theology, especially Augustinian tradition, of sin and corruption is not just something individuals do, but that moves through structures and communities and institutions.

[00:00:14]Through this Alabama murder series, I kept thinking this is kind of portraying a doctrine of original sin without using the vocabulary. Am I misreading you on that? No, I don't think you are. I I do think it to tell a story like this without putting it in some kind of broader moral and theological context because so much of the language of the people who are in Alabama, who are enacting this kind of system is moral.

[00:00:47]Right? They are claiming that um that there is a kind of moral gravity to the crimes that are committed that requires the state to deliver the ultimate penalty.

[00:00:58]They are also throwing words like forgiveness around that I found really kind of problematic as someone who thinks of takes that word in a very different context, but they have a concept of forgiveness that says I can forgive you for a crime and still uh want to execute you. Still hold you to this kind of ultimate judgment. And my notion is if forgiveness does not does not mean that I spare your life then it has no meaning at all.

[00:01:27]Right? Is it possible to have forgiveness while also having someone in prison for life? Even that is problematic for me, but I I I do think that yes, that's more consistent with the notion of forgiveness. If if the alternative is I mean, I think of this in stages.

[00:01:44]If we're saying you committed a crime and so we're going to take your life. The first step in forgiveness is saying, I forgive you for this crime and as a result, I do no longer believe that I have any justification for taking your life.

[00:02:00]It is not up to me to make that decision about ending your life. Um the second stage then is to say if I forgive you, then um I have an obligation to make you whole.

[00:02:13]To at least work towards making you whole.

[00:02:15]And you know, the other thing that's interesting about Alabama is that Alabama, I think, has the lowest uh parole rates in the United States. They simply don't let anyone out of prison once they put them there. That's the next thing I would address that you know, it is if you have if you have a notion that someone can be forgiven, then you you believe as a human being there uh they can be they they're capable of of of some form of transformation.

[00:02:43]Right? If and if you think someone is capable to of being transformed, then you then I think you're open to say, I do think they can be welcomed back into the community. The whole point of something like Kairos is to bring you know, the the the Christian ministry into a prison with the uh with the aim of of uh bringing God's love to those on death row. If you believe you can do that then why wouldn't you want to grant parole to somebody?

[00:03:15]Right? If If you think that God's love can transform the heart of a convicted murderer, then why wouldn't you be opening open to letting that person back into the community? Especially when probably the scriptures you're sharing in that prison are from the Apostle Paul, a a former accessory to murder. Exactly.

[00:03:34][laughter] Exactly. Yeah.

[00:03:36]Exactly.

[00:03:38]I listened to you on the Hasan Minhaj podcast >> Mhm.

[00:03:42]talking about uh changing your mind about the broken windows uh theory of of crime, uh which is to say you deal with these little uh issues very consistently and that will keep bigger uh problems from from happening in its most simplistic way. And this later, of course, was used for stop and frisk and all kinds of other policies like that.

[00:04:11]Uh and so you said, I saw the results of this and it the information changed. I changed my I changed my mind. I wonder when you looked through this case and you looked at the more general uh situation of Alabama. Of course, we we have coming into our uh echoing out of Alabama, Montgomery's where Jefferson Davis was sworn in as president of the Confederate States. Montgomery's where uh George Wallace said, segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever. How much does does race factor into this conversation? It's a very very interesting question. Um it both does a lot and not at all.

[00:04:57]So, I would say that one of the things that I don't think we adequately did in this series um but needs to be done and I may return to this issue at some point is try why how do we understand the attitudes and policies of a state like Alabama?

[00:05:20]Because Alabama is not like most states in the union.

[00:05:25]Um there's only a small number of states that even practice the death penalty um anymore and very few with the enthusiasm of state of Alabama. There's something distinctive about it and there are you know um all kinds of other ways in which Alabama's approach to criminal justice makes it an outlier among American states. I don't think you can tell the story of why Alabama is so distinctive without referencing Alabama's peculiar history, right? As a state in the deep south that was deeply marked by the moral sin of slavery. Um and is still in many ways struggling with the legacy of that. Um at the same time um you know, the case I was talking about, it's all white people. Yeah.

[00:06:13]Right? The two convicted murderers are white guys from Florence, Alabama. Not By the way, the all this takes place in all my story takes place in northwestern Alabama, which is a a overwhelmingly white part of the state. It's not So, it's not like this is a you know one one of the reasons I wanted to tell the story is I wanted to say I wanted to say this in some ways transcends race.

[00:06:36]It would be one thing if the state of Alabama was particularly cruel towards black defendants and lenient towards white defendants. Um that's not the case. They're They will also bring the hammer down on on, you know, they're equal opportunity their vengefulness is blind to the color of people's skin. Um so, I I do think that there is we you know, this is both all about race and also well beyond race.