Morality question: Are superheroes mass-murderers?

This thread's been done before:
http://www.killermovies.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=468429&pagenumber=1
You even posted in it:

Originally posted by Starscream M
had batman killed joker or Spiderman killed carnage....thousands of innocents would have lived

i guess to me, innocent lives are worth more than the rehabilitation of a serial murderer...but that's just me

Originally posted by Bardock42
That's kinda that Batman/Joker thing Batman ponders in every second issue. I'd say no though. Now, the government for not executing psychotic mass murderers, that's another question.

No GDFers allowed! durhulk

Originally posted by Phantom Zone
No GDFers allowed! durhulk

Originally posted by Bardock42
Not really. Judges [b]have to operate by the laws of a country, Superheroes already chose to disregard at least parts of it. [/B]

Unless they register with SHIELD.

"Pity? It was pity that stayed Bilbo's hand. Many that live deserve death. Some that die deserve life. Can you give it to them, Frodo? Do not be too eager to deal out death in judgment. Even the very wise cannot see all ends. My heart tells me that Gollum has some part to play yet, for good or ill before this is over. The pity of Bilbo may rule the fate of many."

No heroes aren't responsible for the villains they let live. 95 percent of heroes are doing there thing voluntarily, so they're not obligated to do anything other than watch out for civilians.

Originally posted by Starscream M
You know the drill:

Villain hurts innocents...superheroes comes in to save the day...they fight...both give longwinded speeches throughout their fight...villain loses and is sent to some prison where he is undoutdely able to escape and wreak havoc another day

superheroes (exceptions exist such as Frank Castle) generally have misgivings about killing, so in effect, they 'allow' villains to commit further crimes.

So, my question is, should they be held responsible for much of the killing committed by villains who otherwise could've been terminated previously?

Some villains like Carnage and the Joker should be executed by the government, or find a better jail, in question to Carnage, you could always kill the symbiote, there are no laws on killing alien life....but villains not on a such a high scale should be allowed to live.

Heroes do a job without them the Villains would never be stopped (temporally of course) and would kill far more people etc.

in the case of carnage the smart-ass reed can seperate them launch the damned symbiot into the sun and put that skinny bastard into a jail cell with someone like Hyde. he deserves death only after a decent amount of time as a prison B*tch.

heroes shouldnt be held responsible unless its some sort of superfight like doomsday VS superman where a whole city comes down. and even then it would have to be a issue of excessive force. but most times excessive force is either something done by rookies or those who dont give a damn in the first place and fall into the gray-ish area and arnt considered heroes so i guess this convo dont apply to them.

seriously the system just needs a update. hell if just going over the basics.. something.. ya know not over the top like prison planets and negative zone jails.

Originally posted by darthgoober
they're not obligated to do anything other than watch out for civilians.

Originally posted by SevenShackles
heroes shouldnt be held responsible unless its some sort of superfight like doomsday VS superman where a whole city comes down.

Originally posted by Doctor-Alvis
Are they even obligated to that?

Okay, let's say Badguy breaks into your house at night. He wakes you up, and you immediately go for your Sig Sauer. You catch him from behind, have your gun trained on him and have two options; shoot him in the head, or try to get him to surrender.

Let's say you go for the latter, have him surrender, call the cops, testify in trial.

But...what?! He gets off! The police forgot to read him his Miranda rights, and he goes off scott free to break into another house, rob, rape and/or murder another family.

Is it your fault for not shooting him in the head? 😬.

Originally posted by Soljer
Okay, let's say Badguy breaks into your house at night. He wakes you up, and you immediately go for your Sig Sauer. You catch him from behind, have your gun trained on him and have two options; shoot him in the head, or try to get him to surrender.

Let's say you go for the latter, have him surrender, call the cops, testify in trial.

But...what?! He gets off! The police forgot to read him his Miranda rights, and he goes off scott free to break into another house, rob, rape and/or murder another family.

Is it your fault for not shooting him in the head? 😬.

No it's all his fault 😕

...

No. They did their job, they transfer any responsibility for the criminal's actions, legally and literally, to the justice system when they turn them in.

Now, if they punish them and then let them go, that's their fault.

Me, I say kill 'em all, the world's overpopulated anyways.

Originally posted by Soljer
Okay, let's say Badguy breaks into your house at night. He wakes you up, and you immediately go for your Sig Sauer. You catch him from behind, have your gun trained on him and have two options; shoot him in the head, or try to get him to surrender.

Let's say you go for the latter, have him surrender, call the cops, testify in trial.

But...what?! He gets off! The police forgot to read him his Miranda rights, and he goes off scott free to break into another house, rob, rape and/or murder another family.

Is it your fault for not shooting him in the head? 😬.

that's because 1) he's a first time offender, at least as far as you know
2) all he did so far was breaking into your house

I don't think that applies to mass murderers like Carnage

The Punisher is the man yes...his method solves this problem. Villians are put through a revolving door system, there is usually only one door when u face Frank, and ur not coming back.

Originally posted by Bardock42
Not really. Judges [b]have to operate by the laws of a country, Superheroes already chose to disregard at least parts of it. [/B]

Because a person chooses to apprehend a criminal is no reason to assume he should decide the criminal's life.

Is every cop that's ever arrested a criminal, or retired from crime fighting, a potential mass murderer?

Especially those cops that aren't being paid and sworn to the line of duty, and are only volunteering to put on a spandex outfit because they can lift a semi.

Realistically, if you remove the inevitability of a villain's escape, this question is ridiculous, because applying real world logic (which is the mindset our heroes are supposed to adopt), there's no reason to assume their escape.

And, if you're going to say kill them because they're obviously just going to escape.... if they're popular enough to be written out of jail, they'll easily be popular enough to be written out of death. Making the superheroes nigh useless.

We can't judge Superman because comics need recurring villains.

They don't need recurring villains.

I'm pretty sure that it wouldn't be too hard to get a law passed to have super villains executed in the Marvel or DC universe. I mean, given the huge body counts they have, public opinion would have to be for it. So no, heroes are not responsible for other deaths.