Why The Death Penalty Is Wrong
1.
The highest sentence that can be enforced by the American Judicial system is that of death. Capital punishment has been carried out on criminals for quite some time, but never without a strong opposition. Many people view capital punishment as a heinous act that is morally incorrect. The fact still remains that in our current society, the majority of Americans support capital punishment. For every American that sees capital punishment as a senseless and unnecessary act of violence, there are several who believe that this sentence is the ultimate act of justice.
For as long as the act of capital punishment has been around, the arguments for and against it have also been clearly present. When forced to compare these arguments, it is clear …show more content…
Advocates of the death penalty support harsh punishments for violent actions that are thought out or planned rather than carried out on impulse. The death penalty is usually a sentence for those whose acts were etermined to be premeditated. When the death penalty is inflicted upon a criminal, the value of human life for both the innocent and the guilty plummets to a shameful level. Nygaard states,. This makes the act of capital punishment just as criminal and unjustified as that of the criminal. Society becomes barbaric when they take the time to plan out and then eagerly anticipate the death of another man.
As mentioned previously, one of the main claims of the advocates of capital punishment focuses on the idea of the death penalty acting as a deterrent. This is a concept that does not have much evidence to support it and can therefore easily be refuted. While many believe that the death penalty is the most effective deterrent, it is not a proven fact. It is simply impossible for the average person to get inside the mind of a criminal and see what he or she fears most. It is clear that an individual is deterred by what he or she fears most, but for many violent criminals there simply is no fear. Opponents of capital punishment see the death penalty as a deterrent that is no more effective than one of life imprisonment. David Conway writes, . Jeffrey Reiman also supports this claim by saying, . It does not seem like the death penalty is functioning as an effective deterrent, since the number of violent crimes has not dropped and the number of prisoners on death row continues to increase. The claim that the death penalty is a superior deterrent is simply weak and unsupported.
The highest sentence that can be enforced by the American Judicial system is that of death. Capital punishment has been carried out on criminals for quite some time, but never without a strong opposition. Many people view capital punishment as a heinous act that is morally incorrect. The fact still remains that in our current society, the majority of Americans support capital punishment. For every American that sees capital punishment as a senseless and unnecessary act of violence, there are several who believe that this sentence is the ultimate act of justice.
For as long as the act of capital punishment has been around, the arguments for and against it have also been clearly present. When forced to compare these arguments, it is clear …show more content…
Advocates of the death penalty support harsh punishments for violent actions that are thought out or planned rather than carried out on impulse. The death penalty is usually a sentence for those whose acts were etermined to be premeditated. When the death penalty is inflicted upon a criminal, the value of human life for both the innocent and the guilty plummets to a shameful level. Nygaard states,. This makes the act of capital punishment just as criminal and unjustified as that of the criminal. Society becomes barbaric when they take the time to plan out and then eagerly anticipate the death of another man.
As mentioned previously, one of the main claims of the advocates of capital punishment focuses on the idea of the death penalty acting as a deterrent. This is a concept that does not have much evidence to support it and can therefore easily be refuted. While many believe that the death penalty is the most effective deterrent, it is not a proven fact. It is simply impossible for the average person to get inside the mind of a criminal and see what he or she fears most. It is clear that an individual is deterred by what he or she fears most, but for many violent criminals there simply is no fear. Opponents of capital punishment see the death penalty as a deterrent that is no more effective than one of life imprisonment. David Conway writes, . Jeffrey Reiman also supports this claim by saying, . It does not seem like the death penalty is functioning as an effective deterrent, since the number of violent crimes has not dropped and the number of prisoners on death row continues to increase. The claim that the death penalty is a superior deterrent is simply weak and unsupported.