A Defense of the Death Penalty Louis P. Pojman The death penalty serves as both a deterrent for would be murderers and a fitting punishment for those who intentionally and out of malice take the life of another human being. Retribution: It is sometimes argued that the death penalty serves as a form of revenge for the victims of heinous crimes. For those who argue from this stance, revenge is never the proper method for assigning punishment because it is done out of anger and with the intent of inflicting harm upon another human being. Vengeance itself is not the basis for designating the death penalty. Instead retribution is justification enough, although it may be accompanied by feelings of anger and hatred.
2. Capital punishment are imposed in criminal justice system that treats you better if you are rich and famous than if you are poor and innocent. 3. It is against the God and the ten commandments to put someone to death penalty 4. To kill people who have killed someone close to simply to continue the cycle of violence, it destroys the avenger as well as the defender.
Some crimes are so culpable that death is the only suitable penalty. I believe that the death penalty should be put into effect and if a human kills another human being, they should pay the crime. If someone has enough nerve to take the lives of others, then they too should have their life taken from them. Those are the people that simply do not deserve to live. Life is our most precious possession.
Death Penalty is a Crime To use a lethal injection, electrocution, or gas to murder someone is a crime. This is what law enforcer’s use for the death penalty, also called capital punishment. Death penalty is wrong, and making someone suffer by causing them pain is not a good way for a punishment. The death penalty is racist; also some people that received the penalty were innocent. Our country’s money is being wasted on death penalties.
The Homicide Act 1957 has been criticised mainly under these following premises. The Mandatory life sentence for committing murder has been criticised for being too rigid in the cases of mercy killing, for example, a man may have helped to kill his terminally ill wife because she begged him to put an end to her pain. The court may feel considerable sympathy for the husband who carried out the act of a mercy killing, but would still be obliged to impose a life sentence. The mandatory life sentence for murder means that once convicted of the offence, the defendants face the same penalty whether they are serial killers, terrorists or mercy killers. This inflexibility prevents the court from taking into account motive or circumstances, both of which can make a significant difference to the way in which society would view the individual offence.
By reserving the ultimate penalty of death for those who wantonly kill, we are clearly proclaiming our special reverence for life. It is society’s ultimate means of selfdefense. The death of a criminal can certainly be justified if it prevents the future deaths of innocent victims. Since death is the greatest punishment a society can impose, it stands to reason that it is the most powerful way to deter those who would commit a crime. Economist Isaac Ehrlich compared the murder rate in the United States with the rate of executions between 1933 and 1967.
This results in poor representation of convicted people in courts and unfair verdicts. Another issue associated with the penalty is that the value of life is lessened. Government should be concerned with the damage inflicted on society when a person is sentenced to be killed by juries. Being put to death by a people does not seem to be that different from a heinous murder committed by a murderer. With all of the media reporting executions like movies, societies become desensitized and accept death penalty as the right way to take care of criminals.
He explains that the death penalty is just an act of torture and is too horrible to be used by our civilized society, stating that it is “torture until death” (220). He goes on to argue that the death penalty is unjust in its practice because it is applied in arbitrary and also in discriminatory ways. Quoting, “Remain grants that the death penalty is a just punishment for some murderers, but he thinks that justice does not require the death penalty for murderers” (221). He goes on to say that life imprisonment can be an alternative decision that stratifies the requirements of the justice
The Author supports their position by stating, “What we refuse to accept is the severity of the crimes the individuals on death row have committed. They were handed capital punishment for a legitimate reason, they are a threat to society.”(Paragraph 12)
Capital punishment is defined as the execution of a person by the state as punishment for a crime. It is said that capital punishment is inhumane as it involves the killing of people. It concerns a life created by God and raises the question on the value of life and human rights. That is why several countries have started to abolish the aforementioned rule and have used the life sentence for the same cases as that of capital punishment. Countries that still wish to use the death penalty use it for very severe crimes/offences and are likely to be less economically developed countries such that of Ethiopia, Nigeria and Malaysia.Compared to the previous times, the death penalty is now reserved as a punishment for severe crimes such as murder, espionage, treason, or as part of military justice.