Similarly, I feel that I would not like to live in a society that is no better than that of a killer! People are going to commit horrific crimes however do they deserve to die? Such an act by any society or any law is the mirror image of the criminal’s willingness to use physical violence against a victim. No system is or could conceivably be capable of deciding fairly, consistently and infallibly who should live and who should die. We are turning into the killers if we cannot punish them in a rational way. We shall punish them, but we shall not become them.
In many cases innocent people have been inhumanly killed due to someone else’s unlawful mistake. A man must be proven guilty first. A great deal is implied in that. For you and I to do something is one thing but for someone else to do something is quite another. To know whether one is guilty requires infinite study, which no one can give. When someone is sentenced to death the jury must be 100% sure that, the man or women is guilty of the crime he or she has been blamed of. There must be hard evidence to link someone to an incident as once the execution has been performed, there is and never will be any turning back. Hypothetically if in many years to come evidence were found to link someone else to the crime and to prove the innocence of the deceased what would then happen? It is too late to bring to justice the true criminal and some innocent man has had to suffer at the cause of another man’s error. Through life we all make mistakes but someone doesn’t always have to die for your actions. Is this any different? Putting a stop to capital punishment would save innocent lives!
A classic example of why people think capital punishment should be reinstated is that if someone had the hatred to conceive a crime then why not be able to face the consequences that come with it. This to some extent is true. But I feel that no human however full of hatred has no guilt for what they have done. Murderers may not feel any emotion for their victim at the time of the assault however, has anyone ever stopped to think what goes on in the brain after they come to terms with what they have done. For a period of time they enter a stage of denial and can not come to terms with what they have done. If they are then condemned to the same punishment then the criminal does not have to come to terms with the guilt and have to face the consequences of their actions. To some death is a consequence. To me this is an easy way out. So that the criminal does not have to live with the thought of what they did for the rest of their lives, day after day. Which would you rather if someone you knew was savagely murdered, for the criminal to live and face what he did for the rest of his life or to die and be given an escape route from all the pain and suffering he had caused?
On the contrary, criminals may not always feel remorse for what they have done. An illustration of this is Timothy McVeigh who bombed Oklahoma. He felt no sorrow for the pain he had inflicted and he knew what he would receive in return for the massacre he brought down upon Oklahoma. He was executed on June 11th 2002 and to this day he lives on. He is not someone that the world wishes to remember but he always will be, just like Hitler and many others who caused so much grief to the world. Timothy was the “master of his fate” and the “captain of his soul.” He is unconquerable because each day those affected by the bombing have to remember him and know what he put them through. This should show that in some cases people will not regret what they have done and will not change how they feel. Death will not change this. If they do not fear death and know that if they carry out their actions that they will be terminated. Why give them this pleasure?
In addition to this, many people say that it is not like the criminal suffers in any way. However, lethal injections have not always been successful. The first lethal injection was held in Guatemala and was a painful and horrific experience for everyone there that day. The person to attach the line that was to supply the constant, steady flow of poison to the prisoner’s body was so nervous that it took a long time to start the procedure. There was then a power cut which stopped the flow of poison reaching its prey and the prisoner took 18 minutes in total to die. This to me does not seem like an easy, pain free experience. Any form of execution is inhumane. All methods can be painful and have their own unpleasant characteristics. Moreover, it must be remembered the death penalty is not only about the minutes during which the prisoner is brought from the cell and killed; a prisoner lives with the penalty of death hanging over his head from the moment he or she is sentenced to the moment of unconsciousness and death. The search for a “humane” way of killing people should be seen for what it is and not for what it should be. It is a search to make executions more palatable to those carrying out the killing, to the governments, which wish to appear humane, and to the public in whose name the killing is to be carried out. Man only seeks to find new methods to make it less pain staking for themselves not for the victim. That is what the criminal is. A victim. Anyone who under goes such a procedure is a victim. A victim of society.
Should we refrain from using capital punishment on mentally disabled and children? Everyone should be treated as equals and yet this is not the case. We are brought up to treat everyone, as we would wish to be treated and to treat everyone as equals however, special treatment is given in certain cases. Whether or not someone has complete control of what they are doing they still should receive the same punishment as someone who is capable of controlling their actions. If a mentally disabled person was to kill then shouldn’t they be given the same treatment as someone who is not disabled. This doesn’t happen and if someone can be made an exception then why bother having capital punishment at all. As every person is an individual. No two people are alike but everyone is treated equally apart from those with special needed. This is wrong under all circumstances. If a disabled person was capable of committing a crime they too can suffer the consequences. Child executions also need to be brought up here. If a man can kill and be sentenced to his death then if a boy of 15 years of age was to commit the same crime shouldn’t he be penalised in the same way the man was? Whether or not you could punish so harshly as to sentence a child to death is not the question. The question is if you can do it to a man why not a child? Introducing the capital punishment back into Britain will start arguments as to why some people are not convicted of the same punishment because of their age or their disability.
However hard I try to convince you that capital punishment is wrong and that it should not be brought back into Britain, many will not change their minds due to principles or religion. However, would you like your children to one day grow up in a society that has a punishment of death? I do not believe in capital punishment and feel it is inhumane and that it is unlawful to kill another being whether through law or not. It should not be brought back into Britain who is above that degrading standard. If you believe capital punishment should be brought back into Britain I would like for you to imagine yourself- standing, watching as a victim is pumped with a warm liquid, which drifts them off into a calm sleep and obliterates their body. Taking away what we believe is so precious. Life.
