(CNN) — Singapore’s government hanged an Australian man for drug trafficking early Friday, hours after making an exception to prison policy by letting the condemned man’s mother hold her son’s hand one last time.

Van Nguyen was hanged at 6 a.m. (10 p.m. Thursday GMT) as a dozen friends and supporters, dressed in black, kept an overnight vigil outside the maximum-security prison. His twin brother, Nguyen Khoa, was dressed in white.

“The sentence was carried out this morning at Changi Prison,” Singapore’s Home Affairs Ministry said in a statement. The statement said Nguyen had failed in his appeals to the Court of Appeal, and to President S.R. Nathan for clemency.

As much as I dislike how politics work in Singapore, I am 100% supportive of its criminal laws. Our lack of democracy has nothing to do with our efficient justice system. Having capital and corporal punishments does not make us barbarians, it just keeps our streets safe. And how are we supposed to prevent drug traffickers from taking over this international port city if any random foreign criminal can escape justice just by requesting for extradition?

Please don’t give me that “but capital punishment solves nothing!” shit. The most important purpose of capital punishment is, despite its name, neither punishment nor deterrance, but to remove a dangerous element from society. Arguably, life sentence does the same thing, but life sentence isn’t exactly more “humane”. So you lock the person up for the rest of his life and he’s going to die anyway? Thinking that it’s somehow more humane than capital punishment is just pure idealistic fluff. Not to mention that from a practical viewpoint the government spends our tax money feeding those life sentence convicts.

Don’t give me that “what if it was your son?” shit either. Yeah well, what if it was your son who died of drug overdose? What if it was your son who was murdered? If criminals don’t want to die, they can feel free to take their life-ruining drugs and move to a more “civilized” country. I heard that most parts of America will gladly accept them. There is a reason why planes flying into Singapore warn the passengers about our death sentence for drug trafficking. Some people just can’t take the hint.

Pragmatism over idealism. I will gladly be a “barbarian” than worry about getting mugged in some backalley. I will gladly be a “barbarian” than worry about someone breaking into my house and murdering my family. I will gladly be a “barbarian” than live in a place where I cannot feel safe.

Hang the bastards I say!