Capital Punishment is Wrong
Uploaded by nero on Jan 17, 2006
Imagine a loved one was tortured and brutally murdered. Imagine them screaming out for help and no one coming for them. Imagine, their last moments on Earth as the most horrific and terrible anyone has ever known. What should the punishment be for the murderer? After seriously weighing my initial feelings that capital punishment is murder against what I would feel if this happened in my family, I still believe that taking another life is wrong. There is no action that can ever justify the murder of another person. Capital punishment is wrong because the taking of another person’s life against their will is murder.
Imagine again that a murderer has taken the life of a family member. The first feelings would be intense emotions driven by revenge and retribution. Yet these emotions are what fuel the need for violence. And capital punishment is the most violent response to the crime. This is an emotional response, not a rational one.
Violence begets more violence. Statistics show that in the thirty-eight states that have the death penalty, violent crime punishable by the death penalty is not lower then in the states that do not have the death penalty. Nor has it reduced the amount of violent crime in that state. In the world, eighty-six other countries have abolished the death penalty for all crimes. Countries who have not executed a single person in the last ten years are abolitionist-in-practice countries. Twenty-five countries are abolitionist-in-practice. Of the seventy-four countries that retain the death penalty, China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, and the United States account for over 80% of the executions in the world. In the United Kingdom, there is no death penalty, no armed police, and yet, the crime rates are five times lower then they are in the United States. Is this a coincidence? Parallels can be drawn that the use of force and violent begets more force and violence.
One explanation of the lack of crime in the UK without violent punishment, and the huge amount of crime in the US with the promise of violent punishment is “rising to meet expectations”. Imagine a child in a school that sets high expectations for learning, behavior and social interaction. Instead of being reinforced by punishment if not met, the child was rewarded when the expectations are met. ...