A recent Amnesty International Report claims that the use of the death penalty is continuing to fall. The statistics show that, although the number of countries using the punishment has increased from 23 to 27, the number of deaths via the death penalty has decreased from 714 to 527.
The Death Penalty is more broad spread throughout the globe than you may think. Gabon used to have the practice, but ceased it last year. It is the 139th country to do so. Europe was free of the death penalty for 2009, but two executions in Belarus occurred in 2010. And "Mongolia [recently] declared a Moratorium on the Death Penalty."
The report also expressed that an alarming number of the executions were given to those convicted for drug offenses. This is particularly the case in Malaysia. According to this BBC News Article, "Methods of execution employed worldwide were beheading, electrocution, hanging, lethal injection and various kinds of shooting." And apparently stoning sentences were recorded in Iran, Nigeria, and Pakistan.
This figure, however, does not include China. Amnesty International claims that China most likely carries out more executions than the rest of the countries put together.
What do you think of this trend? Do you believe the human race could potentially reach a global abolition?
10 comments:
While I am happy to see the decline in the number of countries who use the death penalty, I think it will take several years before the death penalty is ever completely taken off the table as an option for punishment. I'm not aware of how the jail system is in other countries, but I do believe that a lifetime sentence in jail in the United States is a more efficient way to punish a person who has been charged with a high crime. A life sentence is more likely to produce feelings of remorse and sorrow, as well as overall emotional turmoil, which is a greater punishment than any physical pain inflicted on an individual. Depending on the convict's view of death, the death penalty may or may not seem like an easy-way out, a way to avoid feeling any form of guilt regarding what he or she has done.
Although i do believe that it is never right to take another's life, I'm going to have to disagree with Zoe on this one. A life sentence in prison can actually be more expensive to the state than the death penalty, depending on mode of execution and what country one lives in( Currently it costs about 740,000$ to incarcerate an inmate for life, and 1.2 million to execute a prisoner, on average in the U.S). However in China, the majority of executions are carried out by gunshot, which costs a mere 250$(USA Today)
So Overall i think that it will be a long time before capital punishment is eliminated everywhere, especially in countries with a large population like China. The incentive simply isn't there yet..
I agree with Bryce. Even though I do not condone it, I think it is necessary for China to use such force. China has an overpopulation problem. This problem led to policies like the "one child law". I think the reason they use execution is link to the problems of overpopulation.
I have to disagree with Casper. Utilizing the death penalty to deal with overpopulation and claiming that they "have" to is slightly disturbing. Put in plain English, what it seemed like you said was "Oh there are too many people here? Ok, we'll just kill the bad ones off!"
Get my drift?
I agree with Bryce on this one, but not necessarily with Casper. I do not think that China uses the death penalty to reduce the problem of their over population- that just seems coincidentally convenient. In most situations, I think that criminals are tried and given the death penalty, rather than the life imprisonment that they would have received in the US. I am not going to pretend to be an expert on the Chinese justice system, but I do know that it is not financially practical for a large number of prisoners to be given life imprisonment in this developing country. And who are we to judge? America had a pretty bloody history. Hopefully, as China develops more it will reform its justice system too.
I agree with Bryce in saying that it costs a whole lot more to keep someone in prison for a lifetime rather than the death penatly. However, besides that fact, I agree with Zoe on the fact that I think people who commit horrible crimes should have to rot in jail and think about what they did every day for the rest of their lifes. I think that the death penalty is the easier way out. Consider the quote, " Why should we kill someone, who killed someone,to show that killind people is wrong?"
I'm also going to have to agree with Jason and Nicole in the fact taht I don't think China is or should be using the death penalty to control their overpopulation problem. That is jsut unhumaine.
Going off of what Andrea said, Bryce and Zoe are right. It's expensive to keep them in prison, but then again killing them is the easy way out. There is a much larger amount of punishment waiting to die in prison than knowing you are going to die by execution in two weeks.
This kind of issue has been debated for a very long time. Many people come in with their own beliefs that obstruct its abolition. Like when is it right to actually take someone's life for taking another? Like when a Miami couple, Carmen and Jorge Barahona, murder their 10 year old adopted daughter? (CNN) In my opinion, when it comes to something that sick and disturbing, the death penalty should be put in place. Things like that will always be around in the world which is exactly why the death penalty will never be abolished.
I agree with Bryce, that the death penalty is easier on the state than life sentences on prison, and it may not be feasible for every country in the world to abolish it. I do not necessarily agree with Zoe and Andrea, however, that a life sentence is a greater punishment than the death penalty. For some it may be, but for others being allowed to live, even in prison, may be a mercy, as they can continue living and have a chance to turn their lives around. And it is for this mercy and possibility of repentance that I oppose the death penalty. I believe that even the worst of us should always have a second chance.
Some crimes have no other equal punishment to replace death. I'd also like to point out that China officially has 1.7 billion people, but there are still millions unaccounted for which would make the figure closer to 2 billion or more, so proportionally it would probably be similar to other countries in terms of population. Personally, I think that the death penalty is the least of our problems regarding the prisons considering we could do so much to prevent people from committing acts that send them to jail in the first place.
"I agree with Bryce in saying that it costs a whole lot more to keep someone in prison for a lifetime rather than the death penalty"
@Andrea
It's actually cheaper to keeps someone in prison then kill them due to the appeal process. Death Penalty inmates get numerous amount of appeals and their cases can take up to 10 years before getting finalized and by the time they kill them they will almost be old enough to die naturally.
@Bryce
The gun shot may cost $250 but I doubt the Chinese government kills people without giving them a fair trial with numerous appeals. If that is not the case then China has some problems to work out with their legal and punishment system.
I am strictly opposed to the death penalty, it is a waste of money and it drops us down to the level of the killer. I believe this saying: "An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind" fits perfectly well. Death penalty does NOT deter crime which weakness any argument for it.
http://www.deathpenaltyinfo.org/deterrence-states-without-death-penalty-have-had-consistently-lower-murder-rates
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