Punishment has a medicinal value; as far as possible it should contribute to the correction of the offender.

1 Society must consider every alternative when enforcing certain guidelines or theories that are accepted by the majority as being, in certain situations, the most appropriate. Once with the passing of time, American society developed and with it, the importance of each individual. In order to meet all the necessities of its citizens, society resorts to certain laws that may restrict, to a certain extent, the liberty of a person. One of the most cruel, inhuman and degrading method of restricting liberty, that society resorts to, in order to maintain its integrity, is capital punishment. I am going sustain and prove that the affirmation of Amnesty International has a strong foundation and is worth discussing. In order to sustain a point of view, for or against, is necessary to analyze in detail the thesis that is supposed to be defended or rebutted. As a result, logical thinking must be resorted to, because is important to know exactly what the thesis stands for. Questions like What is the death penalty?, What does the death penalty imply? or Does it have a good or bad influence over society? must be answered in order to stand on the negative side or on the affirmative side. Only after understanding the topic, certain ideas concerning its truthfulness or falsity, can be stated. The death penalty is a method used by law enforcers on perpetrators, when a law prescribes their acts as having an enormous negative impact with severe consequences on private or public goods or properties. To a certain extent, in the case of the death penalty, that is responding with violence and cruelty to violence and cruelty. Thus, this way of responding, is neither wise nor adequate if the purpose is to solve the problem. Mentalities have changed over the years but there are some persistent elements that influence the modern
1

Catechism of the Catholic Church, cited in Teaching & Resources on Capital Punishment by Catholic Bishop of Ohio, http://www.ohiocathconf.org/statements/cap_pun.pdf, p.2

American way of thinking (Philip Feldman, 1993). Responding to violence with violence in my opinion is inhuman. Reason must prevail over revenge and political goals. Human nature does not imply killing for survival; that is the way animals act in wilderness, not humans in a developed society. According to Wendy Donner (The need to understand human reason), human beings are civilized creatures that think and conduct themselves as to create harmony in coexisting with each other. If we sustain that we are indeed different from other creatures on earth, we should act as such, not inhumanly. Human behavior is characterized by four important elements: conscience, reason, logical thinking and love. Andrew Greeleys words: We are born with two incurable diseases, life, from which we die, and hope, which says maybe death isn't the end (Jeff Hearn, 1998) carry a lot of meaning if we transpose it in the situation in which a person is to be killed. This is the meaning of the expression being human, to hope and to have faith that somewhere, someday, things are going to get better but death penalty prohibits all these. It is better to die on your feet that to live and die on your knees says an old Romanian proverb. What I want to point out with this old proverb that carries a lot of wisdom in its words is that, in America and not only, capital punishment degrades the moral and physical status of prisoners by denying them their rights and forcing them to stand powerless in front of their death. American society denies them the right to be free and the right to be treated like normal citizens (Jeff Sparrow 2008). The term degrading can be understood an interpreted, in the context of the death penalty, in many ways. On the one hand, degrading may refer to the way in which society and individuals perceive the perpetrators. Once a person has done something wrong he will be seen with other eyes, as a person who is possible to destroy what others created until then, a possible menace. As a result of this self esteem will be affected, as Jerry Givens, executioner, explains how prisoners cry and pray when they are
2

washing themselves before executions. As Givens confesses, others begin to act like mad persons and ask if he is going to hurt them, but the ironic response is I aint going to hurt you. Each person should act as if driven by reason but where is the concept of reason in this context? Reason is man's particular and characteristic feature2, is the characteristic that makes it different from animals, makes him human. As I have shown in the example above reason is absent, law enforcers treat the prisoner without respect, like objects. As a result of that, it can be stated that capital punishment is degrading, inhuman but also cruel. On the other hand, degrading may refer to the way in which a prisoner is killed. Gassing, lethal shot or electric chair, are three killing methods, used nowadays in the United States (Jeff Sparrow 2008), that degrade the condition of prisoners; it must taken into account that they are still human beings, not animals. Degrading, in this context, refers to the condition in which a person on a death row dies. Death penalty is the cruellest method of punishment in America nowadays. The reason for asserting such a statement is very simple and easy to explain. I would like to give the explanation by quoting the Catholic Bishop of Ohio: if bloodless means are sufficient to defend human lives against an aggressor, public authority should limit itself to such means, because they better correspond to concrete conditions of the common good and are more in conformity to the dignity of the human person.3 Even though American law enforcers have another alternative, life imprisonment, they still prefer to apply this kind of punishment for accusations like murder (Jeff Sparrow 2008). One of the explanations may be because they want to show to the offender the effects and consequences of his or her own actions but this is not a strongly based argument because killing them, means denying their right to see what and how
2

http://mises.org/humanaction/chap9sec1.asp

Catholic Bishop of Ohio, Teaching & Resources on Capital Punishment; http://www.ohiocathconf.org/statements/cap_pun.pdf, p.2.

they did wrong and if possible to repent; killing them does not mean that the problem is solved. As I mentioned before there are several alternatives, as for example life imprisonment, but the American authorities still want to respond to violence with violence (Jeff Sparrow, 2008 and Feldman Philip, 1993). This is the reason which characterizes this punishment as cruel. In addition the way in which American law enforcers treat prisoners, like objects, is also one of the reasons for which the death penalty is considered cruel. The fact that the most clearly depicts the term cruel, concerning the death penalty, is that of the prisoners being totally aware of what is going to happen and also the fact that law enforcers are present to the scene and do not do anything to stop it from going on. As a counter-argument may be mentioned the fact that they are just following orders; but if the problem is looked at in more detail, it can be affirmed the fact that nobody is obliged to occupy this position, to do this job (Feldman Philip, 1993). Thus all these facts being mentioned it is clear that the death penalty is indeed inhuman, degrading and cruel. Often people are deluded into believing that problems can be solved thorough violence and killing. This readiness to end troublesome life is expressed in the death penalty, abortion and euthanasia, in political terrorism and assassinations, in the murderous policies of some political regimes, in the threat of nuclear war and even in violent crime itself. Killing may seem a solution to the problems of society, but, rather than solving our problems, killing contributes to the lack of respect for human life which is at the source of such problems.4 The act of killing is seen as a serious crime by the American society, and not only, therefore it should not be practiced by society itself to solve certain problems, because then society, disrespects the very rules that stand at its fundament. If people who were directly affected by the criminals that are supposed to be executed can forgive them so can society. For example Marietta Jaeger whose seven years daughter was kidnapped, raped and killed
4

Ibid. p.2

said: the death penalty leaves many victims families empty unsatisfied and unhealed. There is no number of retaliatory deaths which would compensate to me the inestimable value of my daughters life, nor would they restore her to my arms.5 She is one of the few persons that see, there is no reason in punishing death with death, because it will bring further on sufferance. The response to violence must not be violence and certainly the response to death must not be death if we want society to prosper and develop certain features that will further on characterize it as being civilized and developed. As I showed in this essay, the death penalty is indeed the mark of a decaying and degrading society that can not solve its problems in civilized ways. The death penalty is indeed cruel, inhuman and degrading because it treats a person like an object that has done his job for society, and now, because it is of no further use, it must be disposed of. Human beings must be treated as civilized persons who think and act as part of society not as living things that can be killed if something was not done according to the rules that govern certain societies. The death penalty should be abolished because it is indeed cruel, inhuman and degrading.

Ibid. p. 17

Bibliography:
Feldman, Philip. The psychology of crime. Cambridge University Press, New York, 1993. Jeff, Hearn. The Violences of Men. Cromwell Press Ltd., Townbridge, 1998. Catholic Bishop of Ohio, Teaching & Resources on Capital Punishment;

http://www.ohiocathconf.org/statements/cap_pun.pdf, 18.04.2008. http://www.uwec.edu/popekj/%20humanreason.htm, 18.04.2008. Sparrow, Jeff. Cruel and unusual punishment. http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/cruel-andunusual-punishment/2008/01/11/1199988590507.html?page=4 18.04.2008 http://mises.org/humanaction/chap9sec1.asp, 12.05.2008