The Theory Around How Human Beings Experience Harm - Term Paper Example

Discuss the theory around how human beings experience harm and how this may help you work with people restoratively Humans will always have the choice to travel in a right path or in a wrong path. ‘Right path’ in the sense, if the individual concentrates on education, career, family, etc, their lives will be peaceful and successful. But, if they indulge in negative activities like violence, fraud, drugs, anti-national, antisocial activities, etc, then their lives will be full of difficulties and tortures. Even then individuals, who are traveling in the ‘right path’ could suddenly take ‘diversion’ and travel in a ‘wrong path’, bringing in dangerous repercussions. When the individuals travel in a wrong path and indulge in negative activities, they become a threat to fellow human lives. So, to punish the individuals for indulging in those negative activities, and importantly to prevent them from committing those activities or crimes again, they are put under trial and given punishments. The punishments include monetary fines, imprisonment for days, weeks or months, life imprisonments and finally the extreme of them all, the death penalty. Although, death penalty is mainly awarded in the ‘rarest of rare’ cases, there are many moral, social, even legal and importantly humane aspects, which need to be answered and taken care. Apart from the major issue of whether death penalty can totally prevent crimes from occurring, the basic issue is whether it is correct to ‘kill’ a human as a kind of sacrifice or compensation for another life. When a convict is given death penalty, he/ she are made to go through a painful experience. The main purpose of the government and the court controlled executions is to give the convicts rapid, clean and dignified death. But all the current execution methods have dangerous inbuilt faults, which put the convicts in a lot of pain and torture. Among the great range of execution methods employed over the centuries, for carrying out the death sentence on offenders in different parts of the world, none has been found which does justice to the person executed - in terms of providing the certainty of instantaneous, painless and dignified death. (Adams, 1998). The person has to undergo a lot of suffering throughout the execution and also if something goes wrong during the execution of the death penalty. Even if the execution is carried out in a planned manner, the death is an excruciating process for the convict. There are five principal methods of execution that are presently used globally. Hanging is one of the most common execution methods carried all over the world, particularly in developing and underdeveloped countries. If this method is handled properly, this would be considered as a ‘humane’ method, but still it can create a lot of agony and suffering. By tying the rope tightly around the neck and making the convict drop into a hollow space, the neck is broken causing suffocation and death. But, if the drop is insufficient or the rope is short, the convict will slowly and painfully choke to death. “If the rope is too short, then the effect on the neck of hanging will be diminished, and the prisoner may well writhe in agony for some time, slowly suffocating.” (Schabas 1996). So, although it is painful process, many countries are still following this grave method giving many convicts agony filled deaths. The convict is tied and shot mainly in the chest by a group of marksmen. Death is fast with the many bullets damaging the heart and lungs, causing heavy bleeding. This cruel method had its origins in the military particularly in times of war in the early part of 20th century. It is the most preferred mode of execution in majority of the Arabic or Islamic countries from Bahrain to Indonesia. It was scrapped in U.S. a long time back, except in Utah, where it was discontinued only in 2004. This method can also give the convict an agony filled death, if the firing squad misses the heart and hits other parts. Also, the practice of many countries or groups to conduct these firing squad executions in public makes it a gruesome practice. This method is regarded as the most “convenient” death penalty execution because there is, not much overt physical force to kill the individual. But, the fact is, this execution method also puts the individual in maximum but ‘invisible’ pain. The convict is injected with a cocktail of drugs starting with Sodium Pentothal and importantly Pancuronium Bromide. This drug stops breathing and paralyzes the convict. Then lastly, Potassium Chloride is injected to end the blood circulation in the heart. But, according to recent studies, it is stated that Pancuronium Bromide only paralyzes the physical body with the mind fully aware of the pain. “Recent medical discoveries show that Pancuronium Bromide, one of the drugs used in the deadly cocktail, paralyzes persons being killed, which makes it impossible for them to cry out if they are in pain.” (Prejean, 2006). The sole purpose of this drug based lethal injection method is to make executions easier for the convicts, but the drug does not fulfill that function and it only masks the distress. The convict is normally paraded in a public place like a ground and bombarded with rocks till the convict dies. Although, this execution method for death penalty is not practiced widely, it is still the common form of capital punishment in many Islamic countries. In those countries, this punishment is given to individuals who commit adultery, murder, blasphemy, etc. Pelting of heavy stones by a large crowd, even numbering into thousands, will be a very destructive experience for the victim. As the victim will not have anything to shield, he/she will have to stand helpless facing a barrage of stones, with death being the only ‘escape’. Apart from the heinous nature of this execution, the other disturbing aspect is, women are mainly executed through this method. “A woman in Somalia has been stoned to death after an Islamic Sharia law court found her guilty of adultery. The woman was buried up to her neck and then pelted to death with stones in front of a large crowd in Kismayo” (bbc) Execution by electrocution with an electric chair originated in U.S. and United States along with Philippines are the only two countries to use this execution method. This method is still used in some states in U.S. as the one of the options for the execution of death penalty. The convict is fully fastened to the chair, and then various cycles of electricity with differing voltage would be passed through the body, with the victim fully conscious. With the passing current affecting the brain, then the heart and the total body, whole body will suffer a lot of distortions and pain. “Death by electrical current is extremely violent and inflicts pain and indignities far beyond the mere ‘extinguishment of life’. Witnesses report...the prisoner’s limbs, fingers, toes, face are severely contorted. The force of the electric current is so powerful that the prisoners eyeballs sometimes pop out...The prisoner often defecates, urinates and vomits blood and drool...prisoner catches fire....and the sickly smell of frying human flesh spreads even to the neighborhood. (Justice Brennan cited Schabas, 1996) Cons of death penalty outweigh its pros Death penalty cannot prevent crimes from occurring again The main reason cited for death penalty is prevention of crimes. But to what extent this aim is achieved is still ambiguous. Death penalty can help in the prevention of crimes, for it creates fear in the minds of people. But, the fact is, most of the violent crimes are committed by the people on the spur of the moment. They are driven by intense feelings of anger, hatred, passion or revenge and in these situations their thinking is obstructed by the intensity of their feelings. The criminals normally would not consider the possible outcome of their crime before committing it, because many murders and rapes are crimes of passion, committed when feelings are running high. “Such events are generally crimes of passion, committed on the spur of the moment and presumably unlikely to be deterred by a cool analysis of consequences”. (Harries and Cheatwood, 1996).When secular and favorable conditions such as the state of the economy and unemployment levels are taken into account, trends in homicide or other violent crimes are seen to be complex indeed, defying any simplistic trend comparison and thus no relation to death penalty and prevention. (Harries and Cheatwood, 1996). Also, the murderers and criminals do not expect or intend that his/hers’ criminal activities will end up with a murder. So, such persons also do not think about the consequence of their actions. So how can death penalty prevent such persons from committing crimes? People committing crimes are not always hardcore criminals; many of them are normal people who have committed the crime in a fit of anger. Also, at the time of the crime, their state of mind is such that they do not care what they have become and also nothing seems as important as attacking their victim. So death penalty cannot help in the prevention of crimes, as there are other factors which overpower the fear of death penalty and incite people to commit crimes. “It is ironic that although capital punishment has virtually no effect on crime, the death penalty continues to be favored political bullet - a simplistic solution to the crime problem used by aspiring politicians and law enforcement officials. In sum, the global trend is toward abolishing the death” (Barak, 2007 ). Vengeance Mindset is inhumane and illogical The families of the victims will be psychologically upset, and they normally demand death penalty to satisfy their thirst for vengeance. They just want to see the offender dead, to justify what he/she has done. But, this vengeance mindset is not good for our society. Because, broadly speaking, we as a civilized society have to shift away from the "eye for an eye" revenge mentality. Although the victims’ families may feel happy and justified, if the offender or murderers, who took their loved ones from their lives, gets death penalty, they need to accept that killing that individual cannot bring back their loved ones. So, if they plead for death penalty for the offender, they are indirectly planning their murder, without any worthwhile result. Their actions could be equated to that of the offender. So, it would be better if the victims’ family sheds their vengeance and instead ask for next stricter punishment like life imprisonment, etc. So, one can feel for all victims and families, but killing people would not bring back loved ones and so a more fitting punishment would be life in jail. “We should not confuse vengeance or hatred or contempt with justice." (Packham and Johnston, 2008). It would be also better, if the society (who may show interest in certain cases and think very strongly to give death penalty to the offender), thinks logically and support the next stricter option to death penalty. There are people in the society, who think that death is the only way to get rid of criminals to make sure they do not victimize others again. But, the fact is, this can be optimally done by putting those criminals behind bars until their life time. Also, if these criminals are put under very secure prisons, they will have no chance of committing the crimes again. The other important issue is, allowing the offender to live in prisons, as part of life imprisonment, will make him/her realize and feel apologetic to the crimes he/she committed. Life imprisonment is favored over the death penalty because death would be the easy way out. The convicted individuals need to suffer for what they did. Spending the rest of their life in prison at hard labor gives them a plenty of time to think. Executing them would be letting them off too easy (Stamnes, 1995). So, if an offender is executed as part of death penalty, it decreases the time and also the likelihood for him/her to feel repentant and repair any damage from the crime. There are many offenders who after spending many years in the prison became a reformed individual, fully remorseful for the offenses they have done. Some of them, where able to contact the victims’ families, conveyed their true apologies and even elicited pardon from them. Possibility of Wrong Decisions If a person who has been executed is proved to be innocent, his/her life cannot be brought back. Death penalty provides no second chance for the convict. Many times when cases are investigated the second time, it has been found that the person convicted with charge of the crime is innocent. But if a person is awarded a death penalty and he/she is executed before the second investigation, then there is no chance to reverse the decision. So, the chances of innocent persons being punished are more. “Opponents of the death penalty also argue that the possibility of killing an innocent human is a weakness of capital punishment. According to them, the chance that an innocent person may be wrongly killed is enough of a reason to ban the death penalty altogether.” (Carlson and Garrett, 1999) An example was the case of Ruben Cantu of Texas. He was convicted in 1985 and executed in 1993. The accused Ruben Cantu determinedly and insistently claimed that he was innocent from the crime. He was accused of killing a man from San Antonio and also of robbery. After the execution, the jury and the prosecutor have shown their doubts regarding the case. Cantu was 17 when he was charged with murder and executed, and now his guilt has been called into question by statements by a key eyewitness and Cantus codefendant, who both say Cantu was innocent. (Baumgartner and Boef, 2008). So, it is clear that capital punishment is a destructive action which needs a special justification. Otherwise, it could only lead to destruction of innocent lives and also lives of individuals who could have committed ‘not so major crime’. Conclusion Human lives are precious and sacred. From its conception in the womb, human lives are raised, cared, educated and tuned, with many other lives doing a lot of hard work and sacrifices. Although, the victims’ lives are also precious and sacred, what the pro-death penalty countries and groups do not understand is that by killing criminals who committed crimes, they descend as low as the criminals or murderers themselves. Many countries have abolished the practice of death penalty for punishing convicted criminals. But there are still some countries who believe in death penalty as a solution to the problem of rising number of crimes. People are divided on the issue of support for death penalty, but overall majority of them is against it because of the above discussed cruel execution methods and other cons of death penalties. Read More