Nitrogen is a quick and painless way to do it if done properly. That’s the gas used in those suicide capsules in the Netherlands as well. My understanding is that the two main issues with it (besides the fact of death penalty itself) are loose fitting masks and the inmate prolonging the inevitable by holding their breath.
If I recall correctly, the main problem with nitrogen execution (apart from the death penalty itself) is that they do it very badly, as in they don’t vent the CO2 gas, and the inmate painfully suffocates
I don’t know what kind of mask they’re using, but a standard oxygen mask at a hospital doesn’t exactly vent the exhale either. It provides a constant flow of gas into the mask, maintaining positive pressure so every inhalation comes through the mask and every exhalation escapes around it.
It doesn’t take many breaths of nitrogen to pass out - likely not enough time for CO₂ levels to rise significantly anyway. The issue with CO₂ isn’t that it’s painful but that it triggers panic, since that buildup is what causes the sensation of suffocation, not the lack of oxygen itself. In either case, the cause of death is still suffocation - they’re simply not getting oxygen.
There’s also a risk in the fact that it’s scalable, cheap, and stomachable. Lethal injection (current method is very bad) has to be a pain in the ass, as does hanging, and most other forms of execution. Nitrogen? You can pack a bunch of criminals in a room and press a button and tell yourself you’re just “putting them to sleep”, you don’t even have to tell them that they’re being executed now. Which is not a hypothetical in the realm of gas based execution by a far right government.
Like, it’s really easy to get hung up on the pain aspect and not talk about the fact that this is a small step from gas mask execution to gas chamber execution.
Nitrogen is a quick and painless way to do it if done properly. That’s the gas used in those suicide capsules in the Netherlands as well. My understanding is that the two main issues with it (besides the fact of death penalty itself) are loose fitting masks and the inmate prolonging the inevitable by holding their breath.
If I recall correctly, the main problem with nitrogen execution (apart from the death penalty itself) is that they do it very badly, as in they don’t vent the CO2 gas, and the inmate painfully suffocates
I don’t know what kind of mask they’re using, but a standard oxygen mask at a hospital doesn’t exactly vent the exhale either. It provides a constant flow of gas into the mask, maintaining positive pressure so every inhalation comes through the mask and every exhalation escapes around it.
It doesn’t take many breaths of nitrogen to pass out - likely not enough time for CO₂ levels to rise significantly anyway. The issue with CO₂ isn’t that it’s painful but that it triggers panic, since that buildup is what causes the sensation of suffocation, not the lack of oxygen itself. In either case, the cause of death is still suffocation - they’re simply not getting oxygen.
There’s also a risk in the fact that it’s scalable, cheap, and stomachable. Lethal injection (current method is very bad) has to be a pain in the ass, as does hanging, and most other forms of execution. Nitrogen? You can pack a bunch of criminals in a room and press a button and tell yourself you’re just “putting them to sleep”, you don’t even have to tell them that they’re being executed now. Which is not a hypothetical in the realm of gas based execution by a far right government.
Like, it’s really easy to get hung up on the pain aspect and not talk about the fact that this is a small step from gas mask execution to gas chamber execution.