Do you agree or disagree with the death penalty? If you agree, why? If you disagree, what do you propose we do instead?
I disagree with the death penalty. There is no situation in which one man should have the power to end another man's life. By killing someone who killed someone else, the criminal doesn't learn anything. While some families may feel "closure" when the murderer who took their loved one is put to death, there are also families who believe that killing another person solves nothing. I believe this "closure" is short-lived, as well. Unintentionally, families are using "closure" as a logical definition to the relief felt at having no one to blame after the passing of a loved one.
As a second defense, killing a person who has committed a crime is impossible to define. In fact, it is this impossibility that makes the United States the only western country to support the death penalty. How does one define which crimes are applicable to the death penalty? And who gives the power of defining these crimes to a certain person or committee? By the above definition, "killing a person who has committed a crime," holocausts and genocides are acceptable. In places where mass killings have occurred, there was some sort of reasoning behind it. It is illogical reasoning, but in that place they have defined the worthy crimes as applicable to the death penalty. During the German Holocaust, the Jewish citizens who were killed committed the crime of "not being German enough."
As an alternative to the death penalty, the United States could follow the examples of other western countries and grant punishments such as life in prison coupled with a life of supervised community service including such tasks as road building, train track laying, or community clean up. If a criminal is deemed as too dangerous to society to be completing community service, they can spend their days in prison doing tasks that do not require personal contact, like cleaning the prison bathrooms. These may not be clearly defined alternatives, but until we remove the death penalty as an option in our society, any alternative is a better one.
This blog post is an official entry for the Law Blogger’s Scholarship, sponsored by The Law Office of Joshua Pond, http://www.joshuapondlaw.com
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VERY WELL WRITTEN AMANDA. I totally agree with you.
ReplyDeleteI would like to agree but the problem we are encountering is the financial cost of keeping prisoners in jail. How do you propose the jails be financed? And what about the social cost to the prisoners? Yes they are criminals but sometimes I think it would be more humane just euthanize them, as one would an aggressive dog that really has no hope for rehabilitation. Yes the criminals could try to learn a different life style but sadly the statistics are not hopeful. It requires choice on their part; many choose to continue their lifestyle not because they do not believe they could change or do not know the difference, but because their genetics may dictate otherwise. There are lots of circumstances for why the death penalty should not be utlized but there are also circumstancces where it really is the only option, regardless of who might "benefit" or will find "closure". Stephanie L.
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