The Death Penalty As a Form of Justice - Essay Example

The Death Penalty as a Form of Justice Project Lecturer’s The death penalty as a form of justice: Introduction: In the present age, ethics is valued globally like never before. People have become increasingly careful about identifying and following the laws of ethics in the workplace, social customs, traditions, laws and punishments. In the recent years, there has been a general consent that it is unethical to sentence a prisoner to death as a punishment for his deeds. On the contrary, there are a lot of people who consider death as the only punishment for a certain class of criminals involved in acts that are against human rights. According to the rules of law, whether a criminal should be sentenced to death or not depends upon the level of crime the prisoner has been involved in. Although every country formulates her own laws, yet the punishment for a murderer is generally no less than hanging the murderer in a vast majority of countries. Various educationalists and psychologists are of the view that prisoners can be spared their death punishment for good. They argue that there are ways that can be adopted to convert the prisoners into responsible citizens and make them productive for the betterment of the society. Many prisoners are quite intelligent and brainy, only that they have been using their talent to achieve negative objectives. They can be turned into useful people merely by altering their psychological orientation and lifestyle. There has been a debate on the reliability and ethical considerations of the death penalty as a form of punishment in the recent years, that has managed to cause considerable change in the laws for criminals. “By 2006, 86 countries had abolished the death penalty for all offenses, and 11 for all offenses except under special circumstances (such as treason).” (Stearman, 2008). Yet, there is a growing community of people who can not tolerate the existence of negative talent in the society and demand immediate action to be taken by the law enforcing and protecting bodies against those found guilty of crime. Sometimes, it indeed becomes inevitable for a judge to decide any fortune for a prisoner other than death given the prisoner’s poor record of continued involvement in crime despite multiple lawful warnings. Many experts visualize the death penalty as the only punishment for the prisoner’s involvement in heinous crimes, yet various human rights agencies possess a conflicting view and raise their voice in favor of its extinction from the advanced society of the present age. Main argument: Human rights are meant to defend each and every individual irrespective of his race, cast or color. They fundamentally preserve human integrity and condemn all such actions, measures and agencies that violate the human rights in any way. Human rights value humanity and believe in equality among the humans. Hence, compliance with the human rights is necessary for the fundamental existence of humans on the mother Earth. Human rights organizations lay a universal approach towards respecting the humanity in general. It was 10 December, 1948 when the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the United States General Assembly resolution 217 A (III), after the World War II. (Foday-Musa, 2010). The fundamental purpose of the acceptance of this doctrine was to spread a message of respect and freedom for the humanity both on the national and the international level. Although the adoption of this declaration by the US General Assembly was a significant contribution towards the acceptance and promotion of the human rights on a large scale, yet this provided the human rights organizations with an opportunity to meddle with various laws that were thought to be too harsh for the criminals. The death penalties were considered as a deprivation of the freedom of life a man is naturally blessed with. However, an altogether elimination of such punishments from the law can be quite detrimental to the peace of the society as a whole in that murderers can cause threats to the life of others, if left alive. Freedom is the fundamental right of every individual on Earth. Leniency shown to one criminal can snatch the freedom of life and peace of mind of many other innocent people. In this context, death penalty is essential in order to protect an individual’s right to live. Sentencing a criminal to death upon consent of the victims is indeed, a decision of the society in general and most importantly, the criminal deserves that. Alternative theory – I: Death penalty for potential criminals is quite important because it is the biggest punishment that criminals fear from if they are held accountable for heinous acts. Lawful implementation of the death penalty tells the criminals that their act could cost them their life which is certainly every human being’s most valuable possession. Fear of the shameful death can keep the people from indulging into criminal acts. This can significantly increase a society’s peace as the victims feel safe in such a society. However, legalization of death penalty can not fundamentally eradicate crime from a society. This is so because a criminal often commits crime irrespective of the future consequences. A criminal is usually forgetful of the possible after effects of his crime both on the society and on himself. One commits crime because one is convinced to do it by one’s psychological disorders. A criminal may apparently seem perfectly normal but he is far from normal psychologically. Criminal acts are a result of the criminal’s bad experiences from the childhood. Most people turn into criminals because of the social exclusion they are pushed into by the society because of certain reasons that include but are not limited to low social and economic status, poverty, affiliation with potential criminals or in some cases, merely for belonging to a low cast. When an individual commits crime, he does so either to achieve his objectives or to satisfy his inner self by hurting others probably because he had been hurt by others in the past. In a vast majority of cases, crime is often a result of the criminal’s urge to take revenge from the whole society in general and from a certain class or community in particular. A criminal cultivates the urge to take revenge in his heart for years and ultimately lands in the world of crime ignorant of the consequences. As the criminal does crime not caring about the consequences of his act, he can not be frightened by such worst forms of punishment as death penalty. “But the aim is to bring about moral homeostasis, a social order where the good are rewarded and the bad are punished in proportion to their deeds.” (Pojman and Reiman, 1998, p. 19). Alternative theory – II: Murder of a family member puts the rest of the family into a state of trauma that might be as worse as unrecoverable for the whole life in extreme circumstances. It is a big loss to a family specially that the member did not die a natural death but was indeed brutally killed by the murderer. In such cases, it is not easy for the remaining family members to let go of the murderer, and see him become a responsible citizen even if that ever happens. The psychologically tortured and mentally upset family members of the deceased want revenge from the murderer. Many times, they make it a matter of their ego and believe that they owe their deceased relative the death of his/her murderer. Relatives go to any length to make sure they have the justice. They would not spare the murderer at any cost. However, this is an undeniable fact that killing the murderer might only bring some psychological relief to the relatives of the murdered individual. But it would potentially never relieve them fully of the pain since their revenge from the murderer would not bring the dead family member back to life. In fact, the act might deprive the nation of a possible genius. If not much, the murderer could at least be made to offer his services free of cost as a punishment of his act for the whole of his life that could be utilized for the betterment of the society in some way. He could be made to do work. Anything could be preferable to killing the murderer because it certainly in turn causes more killing and suffering. Death penalty is plainly a loss of life, talent and a non-productive way of eradicating crime from the society. Underlying issues: Given the widespread crime in the society in the present age, there is a lot that needs to be done on legal grounds. Despite the formulation of strict laws and their efficient implementation for long, crime still remains to be uprooted from many advanced countries in the world. Cases of crime fundamentally depriving humans of their fundamental right to live like murders and others abducting human freedom in the form of rape have been some of the most common forms of crime in the present age. Crime is often difficult to completely eradicate from the society because of the rapid advancement in the field of science and technology with every passing day. Criminals make use of new technologies to exploit others and attain their dreadful objectives. Today, with the discovery of mobiles and internet, social interaction has increased to such an extent that it is very easy for anybody to gain personal details about another person. In these circumstances, new forms of crime are emerging that have increased the challenges for the judiciary. Controlling crime in the today’s world is more difficult than it has ever been in the past. Still, the responsibility to formulate an efficient judicial system lies on the shoulders of the governments. Government together with the help of law enforcing bodies needs to take such measures that would ensure the complete eradication of crime from the society. Conclusion: Considering the various perspectives on the justification of a death penalty, I believe that punishments need to be as strict as to include death penalty for potential criminals in order to restore the peace in the society. Although there is no doubt in the fact that criminals are often quite genius and are capable of doing a lot of things that could be beneficial for the society, yet I believe there acts are often too heinous to let them survive on the Earth. There are a lot of people, who are more talented and are not criminals. Government should focus upon making them useful for the society instead. He who does something wrong should be made to pay for his act. There should be accountability and freedom of expression when it comes to law. Law should be supreme and no human rights agency should be superior to law. Besides, there is no doubt in the fact that victims of the crime are often too disturbed to accept any other fortune for the criminal than death. It is human nature. “Today the death penalty for murder is used in 38 states and by the federal government with the approval of about 75 percent of the population.” (Siegel, 2009, p. 534). Converting a serial murderer into a defender of humanity is a mythical concept and does not have much to be considered real. On the other hand, security should be particularly careful to have arrested only the right person for a certain crime. There is a growing body of literature that provides evidence of injustice in the form of sentencing an innocent person to death. One such book is authored by (Bedau et al., 1992), which has narrated several cases of false judicial practices deciding death penalties for innocent people. Critiques argue that the concept of capital punishment does not quite relate to a civilized modern society. But this fact should never be overlooked that civilization results from accountability. A society remains civilized as long as there is enforcement of law and order. Besides, the meaning of a civilized society needs to be redefined if the current society victim of corruption is considered as civilized. Had there been a civilized society, there would have been no crime and hence, no death penalty. References: Bedau, H. A., Putnam, C. E. and Radelet, M. L. (1992). In Spite of Innocence: Erroneous Convictions in Capital Cases. USA: Northeastern University Press. Print. Foday-Musa, T. (2010, Aug. 27). Is the universal declaration of human rights (UDHR) a mere expression of western values ? Cocorioko News. Retrieved from http://www.cocorioko.net/?p=1919 Pojman, L. P. and Reiman, J. H. (1998). The death penalty: for and against. USA: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc. Print. Siegel, L. J. (2009). Criminology. USA: Thomson Learning, Inc. Print. Stearman, K. (2008). The Debate about the Death Penalty. NY: The Rosen Publishing Group, Inc. Print. Read More