Capital Punishment Is A Necessary Deterence In Society Essay, Research Paper
Capital punishment , two words feared by many. Two words which are considered an eye-opener for the hardcore criminals. Words that are controversially embedded in the society s mind. So what is capital punishment? Capital punishment means death sentence. That is, anyone found guilty of murder or some heinious crime is punished with death. But is there really a need for capital punishment? Will capital punishment deter the society from commiting suicidal crimes?
Every human being has the right to live, has the right to choose his path of life. He has the right to make decision on what he wants to do. No one has the authority to make decisions whether he or she should die. The ideology of having capital punishment is pratically inhuman. The thought of taking a person live just because he had created a controversial crime, is just uncivilised. One has the right to live even he or she had did something unacceptable to his or her society. The debate here is that capital punishment exist as to scare society to commit crimes. It exist to put fear in the society from doing any heinious crimes. But does these still prevent society from committing crimes? All around the world people still commit murder, rape and drug tafficking which are considered capital crimes in certain countries. And most of these people are not being forced to do so. They have choices. They don t care about the death sentence for their crimes. These are people only care about money, wealth and pleasure. Capital punishment does not deter these people in anyway, away from crimes. Another issue that is a threat to capital punishment is that it has not acted as a deterent, and crimes like murder and rape are on an increase. So why should we still have capital punishment?
Capital punishment is a form of retributive justice. It is not meant to deter the society from committing crimes. Its a measure taken by society to give retribution to the so-called outlaws. The criminal is regarded as a person who willingly chose to commit a crime like murder. Therefore he should gladly forfeit his life. The criminal is considered a misfit in society. In the Philippines, the outraged father who rape his own stepdaughter mercilessly was given the death sentence. He had outraged the modesty of the girl. The public had summoned the Fillipino government to give the rapist the death sentence. A verdict made by the public. Isn t this a form of retributive justice? Society feel that killing convicted murderers will satisfy their needs for justice and vengeance. Society feels that certain crimes are so heinious that executing the criminal is the only reasonable response. But still is this the correct thing to do?
There are many factors that make capital punishment unjustifiable. A criminal condemned to death could have committed the crime unintentionally such as insanity or self-defence. A person who is insane is not guilty of his actions. How can death penalty be imposed on a person who does not know his own mind? In the United States and some other countries allows mentally ill person to be sentenced to death. Sentencing a mentally disturb person to death naturally would not deter society from committing crimes. It will make society more outraged of the law, motivating them to do more crimes. Riots will occur in protest. The community will be in chaos. Also, some people believes that the individual criminal is not to blame entirely for the crime he commits. Society which has not provided the right type of environment and education to cultivate him should also be blame. From recent polls, most of the hard-core criminals come from backgrounds and has a tendency to come from a broken families which naturally reflects negatively on the criminals. Therefore society has a duty to try to reform these criminals rather than eliminating them. Society should try to accept the difference nature of certain people. Not everyone is a model citizen. Everyone has his own difficulties. To use capital punishment as a deterence in society is irrelevant here. We should try to indulge ourselves to forgive the mistakes people make. Capital punishment is not needed here. There is also the argument whereby capital punishment is here as an answer to the overcrowded prisons problem. Capital punishment exist not as a deterence but a measure to control overcrowding in prisons, to save cost in lodging the hardcore criminals. Isn t this the same as a cold-blooded murder?
In the Qur an, it is stated that death penalty is required for a wide variety of crimes, including sex before marriage, adultery, homosexual behavior and murder. So in an Islamic country such as Iran, a person found gulty in committing these crimes will be sentenced to death without any chance appealling. Capital punishment here is a need and in no way used as a deterence in society. Capital punishment is the religion of the society.
Whether or not capital punishment is necessary deterence in society is an issue that will continue to haunt us.. God has given mankind life. We should cherished the wonders given to us and in no way should we abused our authority. Using capital punishment to deter soceity from doing commiting crimes is unquestionable. Capital punishment should be abolished and in no way should it be accepted in society unless due to religious circumstances. There are other ways What are the chances of an innocent person being executed? It is better to prevent something discreet from happening before it happens. The fate of mankind lies at the hand of God.