Should the Death Penalty be Allowed?
Over the last many decades, the death penalty has remained one of the most controversial issues across the globe (Manski 133). In this light, punishment through a death penalty, , has been regarded as the toughest punishments that capital offenders can go through (Canes-Wrone et al. 29). Statistically, about fifty-eight countries around the world allow death penalties, as a way of punishing capital offenders (Bohm 22). Some of the offenses classified as capital in most countries include, and not limited to, various forms of murder, treason, and espionage, among others (Manski 138). However, due to the severity of the punishment, and probably the fact that it means ending someone’s life through methods such as lethal injection and electrocution, among other methods, the debate about death penalty remains a contentious issue, as to whether it should be allowed or not. Thus, there is a convincing view that death penalty should not be allowed in any rational society as it does not only go against the human rights, but also not help in deterring crime within in the society.
Death penalty usually goes against the basic human rights that advocate that all human have a right to live (Canes-Wrone et al. 25). Ideally, no one, for whatever reason, should take anyone’s life, as everyone has a right to live. As such, despite the form of crime committed, there is usually no point of depriving one the right to live (Bohm 12). Additionally, executing capital offenders has been regarded as inhumane, to a considerable extent. This has been supported by a wide range of interpretivism schools of thoughts, which have elucidated that executing capital offender as a method of establishing justice in the society is barbaric and uncivilized.
Administration of death penalty to capital offenders does not necessarilly help in deterring crime in the society. It is argued that this far, it has not been proven with numbers, that those killing capital offenders stop potential offenders from committing similar offenses (Canes-Wrone et al. 30). As such, it is not given that once those who commit capital offences are killed, potential offenders will not still go ahead and commit the offenses. In this regard, scientists have not been able to establish that administration of death penalty helps in reducing the rate of crime in the society (Manski 139). In this view, administration of the death penalty remains unjust.
Notwithstanding the eclectic elucidations from various scholars against the death penalty, some researchers have espoused that it is only the best way of administering justice when it comes to capital offenses (Manski 127). In this regard, most capital offenders are typically oblivious to the consequences of their actions. Therefore, most of them are not only prepared to be denied such human rights as the right to live, but they have also given up on their lives before they commit the offense. This stand, however, does not disregard the fact that some people kill out of circumstances such as anger, and have not even thought of the consequences in the first place (Bohm 14). Thus, such people may deserve a second chance to live because they had not thought of giving up their rights in the first place.
Conclusively, it is deducible that the issue of the death penalty has sparked a lot of debates over the past many years. This essay has established that death penalty should not be allowed given that it denies the offenders their human rights such as the right to live. Besides, administration of death penalty does not necessarily help in deterring crimes. Precisely it has not been proven with numbers that killing capital offender stops potential ones from committing similar crimes. In this view, there is a significant need to abolish the death penalty in the society.
Works Cited
Bohm, Robert M. Deathquest: An introduction to the theory and practice of capital punishment in the United States. Taylor & Francis, 2016.
Canes-Wrone, Brandice, Tom S. Clark, and Jason P. Kelly. “Judicial selection and death penalty decisions.”American Political Science Review 108.1 (2014): 23-39.
Manski, Charles F., and John V. Pepper. “Deterrence and the death penalty: Partial identification analysis using repeated cross sections.” Journal of Quantitative Criminology 29.1 (2013): 123-141.