Death Penalty: Fair Solution or Moral Failure?
Introduction
Death penalty or capital punishment is the judicial process of executing an individual or a convict as the act or an instance of punishment for the offence either committed or not.
Although, it is mostly know that such crimes as capital crime or capital offences are the ones that lead to death penalty. Hence, cut through or off (severing) of the head or hanging are categorised as a capital crime.
If we are to look at the issues related to the death penalty’s way of proceeding, one will be acquainted to and understand that the only reason it doles out is all about vengeance or punishment.
Main body
However, it is badly and essentially flawed in the preceding process or formal request and it’s a grievous process and continuing risk in the manner of judgement and executing innocent people thereby costing much more than life imprisonment on the culprit.
On the other hand, the death penalty should only be an alternative in situations where an assurance of guilt can be made through DNA and other actual and undeniable proofs (Elshtain and Owens 1).
In line with this, the most worrying aspect of this process is that several guiltless people have been sentenced to death or life imprisonment. Moreover, most of them were wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death, but fortunately or luckily were exonerated, discharged and acquitted.
Many people do not have a clear decision on the death penalty. Some support the death penalty, while others wish for the death penalty to be abolished, and those who support it do so only in certain cases. Interestingly, Homo sapiens are the only species in which it is common for one member to kill another. In most other species, when there is a conflict between individuals, the weaker party submits to the stronger and they depart in peace. Perhaps it is not that we are more aggressive than other species but that our drives have been made more lethal by the use of weapons.
A weapon such as gun or bomb, allows us to harm or kill without actually making physical contact with our victim. One who sends a letter bomb through the mail may never have even laid eyes on the victim.
The inhibition against killing is undermined by the trigger’s power, same applies to airplane bomber, and pilots need not even see their victims as they press the button unleashing destruction. We are a violent race whose power of destruction has increased in proportion to our technology (Reiman & Pojman 2).
The death penalty has been imposed throughout history for many crimes, ranging from blasphemy and treason to picking pockets and piracy. For the most part contemporary debate centres on the death penalty as a form of punishment for murder.
In my argument on this debate I believe that the primary way to show respect for life is to avoid killing just as noted by Stephen Nathanson in his book an eye for an eye: the immorality of punishing by death.
However one does not commit murder in order to show that murder itself is a wrongful act (Nathanson 1). Consequently, the act of killing for killing is like defacing a beautiful building to show that defacing beautiful buildings is wrong.
The practice of death penalty is an obsolete and inhuman form of judgement in that the human existence has a dignity of unchallengeable abstract idea of that which is due to a person and means whereby one lives regardless of whether the authoritative rules and regulations stipulates it or not.
In lieu of this, all human beings are equal and no one has the sole authority of taking the life of the other irrespective of the purpose or reason, consequently, the effect of taking one’s life is a wrongful and barbaric act which is against the normal and biblical ethics (Guernsey 9).
However, the act of death penalty is a cruel ideology. The form of punishment does not impact any form of knowledge on the value of life, rather it creates a wrong impression that such punishment which is imposed on criminals are adhering to ethical and moral principles.
With this barbaric practice, one is left with the question on where the antagonism and lack of knowledge come to an end once it commences? However, putting to death is an unacceptable practice in the extended social group having a distinctive cultural and economic organization; hitherto the populace give the impression to cause to be more favourably inclined by the assassination of criminals.
Nonetheless, the death penalty imposed on criminals does not solve the situation of crimes or things it rather soils the society and passes on a confusing message across to the youth who have been taught the moral ethics of life.
In line with this, death penalty should be abrogated, reasons being that such acts are inhuman which in turn can never be shown to be right by providing justification or proof.
Although, death penalty is infuriating in that illegal justice is being carried out not just on the guilty but inclusive of the innocent just like the case of Joe Spaziano who was innocently assassinated for a crime he didn’t commit (Mello 5).
The death penalty can be viewed as an archaic way of reasoning to substantiate some steps. These are some of the reasons many countries are eliminating the act of death penalty. It is argued that most people who have found themselves in such situations always have honest regret for their deeds.
Consequently, some of the culprits of the death penalty are not all grave and toughened by habitual exposure. They may have found themselves in the a certain environment and at the wrong times and may not sincerely want to be killed and still ready for reformation, but just do not have the but just do not have the chance because they have never experienced any true forgiveness and love in their lives. Rehabilitating the culprits rather than condemning them and locking them up would make help in making the world a conducive habitat.
Conclusion
In conclusion, after considering all the mentioned facts, it shows that the death penalty it seems clear that death as a penalty did not pass every possible trial of reasonable community course of action. However, even though one point may tend to disagree with the other, the most irresistible proof that is not reliable as a reasonable reaction.
For that reason, unless intellectual options are established that are satisfactory to the populace, one option, which is acquiring substantial public approval, is to inflict life detention exclusive of any a conditional release from imprisonment that entitles the person to serve the remainder of the sentence outside the prison as long as the terms of release are complied with. However culprits will have room for restoration of their mentality and characters in order to help other culprits as they have the intention with some possibility of fulfilment that their lives can still be advantageous to the society (Reiman & Pojman 132).
Works cited
Elshtain, Eric, P. and Owens, Erik, C. Religion and the death penalty: a call for reckoning. Michigan: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2004. Print.
Guernsey, Joann Bren. Death Penalty: Fair Solution or Moral Failure? Minneapolis, MN: Twenty-First Century Books, 2009. Print.
Mello, Michael. Dead wrong: a death row lawyer speaks out against capital punishment. Wisconsin: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1997. Print.
Nathanson, Stephen. An eye for an eye: the immorality of punishing by death. Maryland: Rowman & Littlefield, 2001. Print.
Reiman, Jeffrey, H. and Pojman, Louis, P. The death penalty: for and against. Maryland. Rowman & Littlefield, 1998. Print.