The Death Penalty (DP from here on in) is a barbaric, archaic, cruel and unnecessary form of punishment. It is morally abhorrent and, what is more, largely useless as a deterrent of crime.
Let's start with the moral argument. The state says to us 'don't kill'. There is no 'unless' or 'however' involved. They just say it to us and expect us to obey. In almost all countries Euthanasia is illegal. In a large number abortion too is still outlawed. What ever you may believe about the rightness or justness of those two forms death (murder?), they are pretty obvious examples of how the state demands that we respect human life, whatever the circumstances.
So from where does the state then take the authority to kill its own citizens? The DP is, to strip away the euphemism, murder. It is taking the life of a defenceless individual (death by combat has been all but eliminated worldwide), however tainted his or her soul might be.
Now many might argue that an army should then not be allowed to keep an army. That is something completely different, however. It would be nice if our neighbours wouldn't want to invade, but sometimes they do and there is no deterrent, other than force, that will keep them away.
Not so for the death penalty.
There are equally useful deterrents, such as prison sentences or (and I'm not for this) corporal punishment, which are equally effective and don't require the ending of human life. So why do we have the DP?
There are four perceived reasons why we have incarceration and the DP. These are:
Deterrent (i.e. 'if I do that, I'll die!')
Punishment (i.e. 'if he doesn't suffer he won't understand it was a crime')
Prevention (if he's dead he can't do it again)
Revenge (i.e. 'if we kill him, I'll feel better')
Many people have long contested whether the DP works as a deterrent. If we look at states in America where there is a DP (such as Texas) we find that many of those states also have very high murder rates. What is more, many people have argued that most people do not think deeply before they perform a crime. Only a criminal that calculates and considers very carefully would be deterred by the DP. Criminals who act on impulse wouldn't consider the consequences and would therefore not be deterred. Some people even argue that subconsciously people might reason 'if the state kills, then why can't I?'.
In terms of punishment I really wonder if the DP is really that effective of a punishment. If you believe in the afterlife, well then a few more years on this planet won't matter all that much, considering that the person is facing an eternity of damnation. If you don't believe in the afterlife, on the other hand, then the DP is better than life in jail. After the DP that person won't care one whit about what happened (after all, he doesn't feel anything), while he'll have a whole life to regret his actions in jail.
In terms of prevention, a lifetime in jail is just as effective in stopping somebody from committing further crimes as their death.
As for revenge, that is a base emotion that shouldn't be encouraged in any form, especially not by the state.
The DP is, in most cases, more expensive than life long incarceration; so that too is no argument in support of the DP.
The strongest argument against the DP hasn't even been mentioned, however. That argument is: what if the state is wrong? It has happened on numerous occasions that later evidence proves an executed person innocent. When that happens the state has murdered an innocent person. Let me say that again, they have murdered a perfectly innocent individual. How would you feel if you knew you were innocent and were still being executed, regardless? If that man was in jail he will have lost a number of years of his life and that's bad enough, but if he's been executed the best the state can do is say 'oops, we made an error there, sorry about that dear fellow.'
The state, too, is made up of normal people. They make mistakes. Those mistakes shouldn't cost lives. The arguments against the DP are numerous and convincing. Fortunately, slowly the world's politicians are being convinced and the DP is being phases out in most places. Hopefully the DP will disappear completely in my lifetime. When it has, we will have taken a large step forward in our development as a species.
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There is actually a lot of evidence that suggests the DP lowers the rate of violent and/or premeditated crime. Read " Freedomnomics..." by John Lott (he touches on it) or "More Guns, Less Crime" by the same.
ReplyDeleteIn the USA it is less expensive to execute than incarcerate for life.
The state (at least our state) does not say do not kill, it says do not murder. (for your moral arguement the Bible also says do not murder).
In the USA individual states vote to determine if the DP is legal or not (and for what crimes, etc), so it is not the state choosing to kill its ppl, it is the ppl choosing to kill their violent criminals. A state execution is not murder, it is justice, the will of the people carried out by the government.
I feel goaded into responding to this, and I know no amount of discussion will change our views. The DP is like politics, religion, abortion, etc, it is one of those topics that ppl develop an opinin on and generally stick to.
I'm not trying to cause offense here, but you're not seriously quoting at me from a book called 'more guns, less crime' are you? I'm sorry, I realise this is fallacious, but it is very hard for me to take anything serious that comes from a book which supposes that more weapons on the streets helps make a country safer.
ReplyDeleteAnd I'm pretty sure the bible says 'thou shalt not kill' not 'thou shalt not murder'. If you choose to reinterpret that, thats fine, but the exact line is 'thou shalt not kill'. (it also talks about turning the other cheek, and all that, but lets not get into that.)
The state, as far as I know, is supposed to be the people in most democratic countries (something that can be argued ad infinitum, I'm sure). And just because the majority is for a certain law, doesn't necessarily make it a good idea. The majority was for slavery for the longest time, right?
One man's justice is another man's revenge.
Your right, as along with many other things, we will not agree on this, though I don't understand why. It is so difficult for me to understand why anybody could ethically support putting others to death, what ever their crime. That is one of the few things in which i am extreme.
I don't want to start a back and forth or anything but the actual hebrew translation is murder. there are several words in hebrew for "acts which cause death" and the Commandment specifically uses the one for murder. King James mistranslates it.
ReplyDeleteI know the title is inflamatory but if you want to be fair look into the statistics in other more neutral sources. In the USA, any city/state with legal liscense to carry permits has lower violent crime stats. The reason is simple, criminals prefer unarmed victims. YOu can look at Washing D.C. as an example. D.C. does not permit any firearms to be carried. In the late 90's they had one of the highests concentrations of armed robbery in their subway system in the USA. Until a private citizen from out of town shot his assailant in the subway with a liscensed firearm (from another state). For the next 6 months armed robbery in the subway droped 80% (the man was charged and eventually let off with fines).
To me there seems to be 2 camps on how to deal with crime. There are those that want to end poverty bc they think it the root of all crime, and there are those who want to make punishments so fierce that they deter crime. The former cannot be achieved imo anytime in our lifetime (and has no promise of success as it is mere theory), the latter has a proven track record of about 5000 years (despite how soft on crime we in the West have become in the last 100).
I understand you references to majority tyranny but such is the price we pay in a republican form of rule.
As for ethically support putting others to death: I am surprised that you can honestly say that there is NO CAUSE to EVER do so. At one extreme there is Nuremberg and at the other there is the child molesting serial rapist. Are you honestly telling me that is some piece of shit degenerate raped your 7 yr old daughter you would find justice in:
- 3 squares a day
- temperature regulated housing
- access to entertainment media such as books, cable TV, and the occasional movie.
Because that is what happens here to lifers. Personally I would want the sucker to fry, baring that to suffer, baring that to die by lethal injection (this is all assuming I don't tear him apart first).
It is very nice to dream that humanity is this enlightened being that can end war, pain, suffering, hunger, poverty, etc. But the reality is that those things will always be with us, regardless of our technology or capability. I don't mean to attack you, this is just my opinion, however dismal. But 5000 yrs of civilisation cannot be wrong (or changed in a few 100).
What are you talking about? Backs and forths are good things!
ReplyDeleteI have no idea about the original translation of the bible (for good reason) so I'm not going to get into that.
As for gun crimes, if you really want to make comparisons, you should make comparisons between places where there are no guns and guns, not different states (where it's incredibly easy to smuggle guns across borders). In that case, you might not find a significant drop in crime, but certainly a huge drop in violent crime. (It's just much harder to do violence without a gun).
The only reason that everybody wants a gun to fight crime in the states is because everybody else already has one. If the criminals had no guns, the civilians wouldn't need them either.
As for draconian law systems, i've seen a draconian law system in action for the last five years (Singapore's law system is far more draconian than any system in the western world, with one year's jail for a joint, for example, or ten strokes of the cane for graffiti).
It certainly does make the streets more safe. The question is, at what expense?
The Singaporeans are completely risk averse, don't want to stand out and are generally seen as poor leaders and decision makers.
The western world might have more crime, but it also has more liberty, independent thought and creativity.
I'm okay with having my wallet nicked every so often, if in exchange I get constantly inspired and provoked by people and ideas.
Violent crime is something else entirely, I realise, and that should be controlled.
But I don't believe that control needs the death penalty. I am fine with somebody killing somebody in self defence (it was him or me, your honour). But once they are already in jail, it serves no purpose except revenge.
I am against the death penalty, period. Even in the cases you mentioned. Death is an escape. A short period of possibly incredible fear (and pain, if it's done badly) followed by what was coming anyway, be it hell, heaven or oblivion.
Anyway, what if these people do their crimes not because they are evil, but because they are sick? What if they have a genetic disposition towards a type of crime? Is it then really their fault? Should they die for having a genetic anomaly, that's been there since birth?
Though I'm not sure about all crime, some crime, I believe, is not a matter of good and evil, but a matter of health and sickness.
We must dream of something better, mate, that's what keeps our society together in the first place, a dream of something even better just around the corner.