Thursday, August 22, 2013
The Death Penalty and the Debate Over "Affirming Life"
In section 4 of his essay "Death and Justice," former New York City Mayor Ed Koch argues that capital punishment does not "cheapen the value of human life," but rather "It is by exacting the highest penalty for the taking of human life that we affirm the highest value of human life." At the same time, David Bruck states in the sixth paragraph of his essay "The Death Penalty," that "For those who had to see the execution of J.C. Shaw, it wasn't easy to keep in mind that the purpose of the whole spectacle was to affirm life." Which statement do you agree with and why? In approximately ten thoughtful sentences in which you cite at least one line of text from one of the articles, let us know. Feel free also to take into consideration both points we made in class and the short articles that I sent in this e-mail today.
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How would killing another person help to affirm life?
ReplyDeleteThere's that eye for an eye expression that we were always taught when we were young. Like people told you that if you were punched in the face you're not supposed to punch some one back.
Killing the killer might make the family and friends of the person who was murdered feel better.
But also when I hear about people being killed by states, I just think it's bad that more people are dying.
But even if millions of people feel the same way I feel does it matter?
What I'm trying to say is that maybe it's worth more to the family and friends of the victim to feel better than millions of people to feel bad that so much killing is going on.
Is it justice if the murderer is killed?
I don't know.......
I agree with David Bruck’s statement due to the fact that Koch’s beliefs encourage death, rather than affirm life. Koch states that “It is by exacting the highest penalty for the taking of human life that we affirm the highest value of human life.” I believe it is impossible for someone to “affirm” life when all he is doing is taking away another life, guilty or not. If Koch’s goal was really to affirm life, he would have the murderer locked up in prison where he would harm no more people but still be allowed to live. I like murderers no more than anyone else and I also believe that we should “Strengthen the value of human life,” but I believe that we should keep as many people living to do so. I think a core reason that the death penalty exists is some people have a deep want for revenge, it is no wonder that one of the first laws made in history is “An eye for an eye.” While I understand this deep want for revenge, I deem it unnecessary, because adding more death to this world will not help affirm life, but rather continue the never ending cycle of intentional death. Koch and many other capital punishment defenders may still use the words “affirms life,” or “discourages murder,” to cover up their want for revenge, but it is still revenge all the same. Therefore I believe that, unless we wish to resort back to Hammurabi’s code, where we would kidnap kidnappers and steal from robbers, the outdated form of punishment known as the death penalty should be banned due to the fact that all it encourages is more death in this plagued world.
ReplyDeleteKilling another person for your crimes, although is justified, is pretty hypocritical. Nor is killing those people help affirm life. Robert Lee Willie, a convicted criminal, stated before he died "Killing people is wrong...It makes no difference whether it's citizens, countries, or governments. Killing is wrong." If a criminal can get this why can't we? There is no affirming a life by ending one. Affirming a life would be locking the murderer in jail where he would hurt no one. There is no need for a death penalty when we have the option of doing something differently sentence wise. The death penalty has no correlation to crime rates either. Florida, without using the death penalty, dropped crime by 17%. Once the death penalty was reinstated crime in Florida actually rose by 5.1 %. The death penalty does not help drop homicide rates, but instead encourages the state to seek the easy way out.
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DeleteI can understand both sides to this argument but I still think that it affirms life more than not. I think Koch summed it up perfectly with “When we lower the penalty for murder, it signals a lessened regard for the value of the victim’s life.” If you don't kill them and just make them serve a term in jail then you are saying that the victim’s life was only worth making the killer give up freedom for this many years. This isn’t true with the death penalty. With the death penalty you are making the victim’s life worth the exact same as the killer’s. In most states 1 life sentence isn’t the convicted whole life, it has a cap. So with that you are saying that the victim’s life is now worth about 25 years max. with the chance of parole sometime. That’s just not fair. By letting them out you let them live a ‘normal’ life again and that’s something that the departed will never be able to do again.
ReplyDeleteI agree with David Bruck that the death penalty does not affirm life. The death penalty is arbitrary and not applied uniformly. In addition an innocent person could be killed by the state. According to the New York Times, in Florida, twenty-five death row inmates have been exonerated since the state reinstated capital punishment in 1973. As Bruck states, “This lottery of death both comes from and encourages an attitude toward human life that is not reverent, but reckless.” Regarding the execution of J.C. Shaw, this act of executing an inmate with people cheering outside the prison is a sign of the corrosion of our nation’s integrity and values. Between the difficulty of making sure the inmate is truly guilty and the dehumanization of these prisoners I believe the death penalty is something that diminishes the image of America.
ReplyDeleteBoth sides of the argument are good, but how Koch put his argument was much better. I agree with Koch's statement, that the death penalty doesn't cheapen the value of a life. If someone got a life sentence, it would be saying to the victim that your death was only worth someone being put in a confined space with no rights for the rest of his life. If the person got the death penalty then it would be more respectful for the victim because they know who ever killed them won't be doing anything else to anyone and have another family have to go through what their family had to go through. I also agree with Kock's statement, "It is by exacting the highest penalty for the taking of human life that we affirm the highest value of human life." If the murdered is executed their life isn't just forgotten about it is honored. Their life is being affirmed when they are being executed and that should happen because the murderer does have a family and would most likely not want to be just executed and thats it. The family of the murderer will be sad but think of the family of the victim they were some innocent person who was murdered by someone who most likely knew what they were going to do and had some idea of what was going to happen. I can see both sides and understand both sides of the argument but overall I still agree with what Koch had to say. Also I feel that the victims family would feel better knowing that the murderer is not going to hurt anymore people. Yes, sometimes things might go wrong in the justice system, but if you don't take a chance with that than nobody will be in jail because there is always going to be a risk and possible mistakes in any given case.
ReplyDeleteThe statement Koch makes about "the death penalty affirming life" is simply a ludicrous statement, by exterminating another humans life you don't affirm it you do the complete opposite. "The penalty center" states: "The idea of executing innocent people is horrifying," if the death penalty is to protect the lives of the innocent, then what happens if the person on death row has the possibility of innocence? Many people who are put on death row did not have enough evidence in their trial that could prove them guilty, does that mean that some people's convictions were just a guess? Ouch mentions religion in his article, but if he is religious doesn't the bible state that only god is aloud to kill people, not man? Ok he's statement is simply false.
ReplyDeleteI understand why people think the death penalty is hypocritical, but I disagree. People ask why murder is fine when the state is doing it. The death penalty is justifiable murder, but no one on the death row performed a murder that was justified. All murder is horrible but the death penalty is for the safety and well being of our society. Putting someone in jail does not keep them from harming others, and why does a person who ended someone else's life deserve their own? Even if they could keep a murderer in jail from harming someone else, it's not enough of a punishment. I very much agree with Ed Koch's statement "It is by exacting the highest penalty for the taking of a human life that we affirm the highest value of human life." Some argue that people can be wrongly convicted and an innocent man can be executed. This rarely happens and it is a risk that we have to take. Dying at the hands of the state is a horrible death, but it is not worse than what their victim(s) and their victim's family went through
ReplyDeleteWhen I first read these two essays, I was debating whether I agreed more with Edward Koch, or David Bruck. After a lot of going back and forth, I finally came to the conclusion that I agreed more with Koch. One quote that Koch said that resonated with me was: "capital punishment cheapens the value of human life. On the contrary, it can be easily demonstrated that the death penalty strengthens the value of human life." The arguments that Bruck stated were good, but in my opinion I think the criminal justice system in our country needs to be improved and more consistent in how it functions. Only cases where it's very clear that the perpetrator has repeated a horrific murder, that the death penalty should be employed. The fact that we are not doing a great job with the death penalty doesn't mean that Kochs argument isn't valid. We just have to fix our way of using it, and try to avoid the other problems that Bruck brought up in his essay. For people who have repeated multiple murders, there's no reason they should stay in prison, there is too much of a risk of them killing someone else. If they are sentenced for life in prison, first of all, it is a risk for guards and other inmates, because they are cold blooded killers. Second, it is very costly for the prison to keep them in a cell, and take up more room. The longer the prisoners are in there, the more time they have to think, and is at greater risks of going insane. In life in general, I think that killing is a horrible crime, but yet, I still think the prisoner can have another chance. It depends on the case, but I believe that the more people they kill, the more strongly I feel that the death penalty should be used for them to protect other people's lives.
ReplyDeleteThe death penalty should always be a option as extreme as it sounds to some it is sometimes the only way to protect the innocent and set an example. When thinking about the events of September 11 2001 terrorist leader Osama bin Laden was the head to one of the worst terroristic attacks on U.S soil ever an estimated 3,000 were killed would it be morally right to let this man live after all he has done to not only the U.S but the world in general? Ed Koch states that "It is by exacting the highest penalty for the taking of human life that we affirm the highest value of human life." in this case as well as others I couldn't agree more. The killing of people is not right but I have a question for you, if you had the chance to kill all those behind the terroristic attack of 9/11 would you? The reason you say yes is because you as a individual try to make the best choices for your self and those you love and for that same reason you must understand that their has to be a sense of closure for all the families who have lost loved ones under these "extreme" cases. Although I believe that the death penalty should always be an option I have to speak out against the law Florida is proposing to quicken time in death row. This is a unjust law to those who might have been placed in death row unfairly. The death penalty is to be used when necessary this law is a mistake that Florida might pass. Any execution anywhere around the world will be controversial but we must use our moral and conscious for cases like these. The death penalty should never be eliminated as an option anywhere it is an essential part of our society.
ReplyDeleteI find it difficult to choose a side on this argument because both arguments have equally sound evidence to back them up. I think that one's opinion on the topic of the death penalty really comes down to their definition of justice and morality. However, I must agree with Bruck's argument because Koch's statement just seems hypocritical. What Koch is saying is that death is needed in order to prevent more death. I recognize that killers need to be punished, but I don't see why death penalty is the way that it needs to be done. Couldn't the criminals be kept in some sort of super maximum security prison for life? Some would argue that keeping that many people in that sort of facility would cost too much, but I don't think we can equate a human life to money. After all, these people, even though they may have done a horrible act, have a life, a family, friends and interests outside of killing people and they can be learned from. Who's to say they won't solve the national debt problem while imprisoned? Well, maybe that's a little bit of a stretch, but it's been made clear that criminals can realize what they did was wrong by Shaw's last words as mentioned in both Koch and Bruck's essays, "Killing was wrong when I did it. Killing is wrong when you do it." Maybe, if a prisoner is determined mentally sound enough to go back into society they could begin change the way that we as a country seem to view convicted murders, as cold blooded criminals who never did anything in their life but kill people.
ReplyDeleteI agree with David Bruck who is against the death penalty. One reason why I believe the death penalty is wrong because the jury can accidentally put people to death, and once they are dead they can't undo it. Bruck mentioned Hugo Adam Bedau's findings of murder convictions where "The state eventually admitted error is some 400 cases long." The consequences of prison can sometimes be worse then death. Prisoners would be in solitary confinement for long periods of time and are not allowed out that often. Solitary confinement ruins people mentally, emotionally and physically. Prisoners usually face abuse from other prisoners of guards. All these things out together can make someone want to wish that they were dead. Overall the death penalty costs more, and people don't get sentenced to death that often.
ReplyDeleteI don't know which statement to agree with. While capital punishment does cheapen the value of human life, killing is wrong. And isn't that what they're trying to teach? And who does it benefit really? If they are trying to give justice, I don't think it's working. The ones that should be helped when a person is murdered is the families of both the murderer and the victim. By issuing the death sentence, I would think that this would strongly affect the family members of the killer. First they have to live knowing that someone they loved did a horrible thing, and then they have to loose them. By issuing the death sentence, not only does it affect the murderer(obviously), but also innocent people. And for the family of the victim....I'm pretty sure that most people would not want to do the same thing to a person that was done to someone they loved. So do they issue the death penalty to prove a point to the convicted? Well it's hard to know if you got through to someone when they're dead. I liked David Bruck's quote, "So what if the death penalty doesn't work? At least it gives us the satisfaction of knowing that we got one or two of the sons of bitches." After a person is killed, who would actually feel satisfaction besides a psychopath? I think instead of the death penalty, they should have the choice of life in prison or death.
ReplyDeleteI personally think Koch summed up this point very well. Although I agree with rehabilitation, it doesn't seem like justice to let a murderer go while the someone he killed is buried in the ground. By instating the death penalty you are effectively making the victims life worth what it is: Life. You do this by taking his life for the victim's he killed. If you put the killer in jail you are essentially saying that victims life is worth as much time as the criminal stays in jail. Also, many people who commit single murder are not put under life sentence and many even have a chance of parole. Which you might agree with. However, I can guarantee you that if you went to the victims family and said, "The man who killed your son is going to be let go because he took a 45 minuet class and didn't start that many fights." That it would not receive a very good response after just hearing that their sons life is worth 10 years and 45 minuet class. A capital offense deserves capital punishment.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I agree with the well thought out points of mayor Ed Koch. The reason that I believe this is because by taking the life of the criminal, you are saying that the life of the person who was murdered was valuable. Like Koch stated, ”If the penalty for rape were lowered, clearly it would signal a lessened regard for the victim’s suffering, humiliation, and personal integrity.” This statement backs up my point very well.
ReplyDeleteThe reason that I don’t agree with David Bruck is because I feel as if he is in a way trying to make us feel sorry for the murderer. I think that his point is incorrect in the way that he is trying to say, “This criminal made a mistake by killing someone and is sorry. We should give him another shot.” Clearly, the murderer knew what they were doing. So why should we feel sorry? In this way, we are not cheapening the value of human life, if the life of the criminal is not innocent and not really worth it. Obviously, that murderer didn’t feel as if the life of the victim was worth it.
Lizabeth Frohwein
While I find it extraordinarily difficult to take sides in the matter,I agree more with Bruck than Koch. While I do understand that the killer should be punished, I think killing the person is neither cost effective nor productive. For one, it's ridiculously expensive to kill someone, and, in the end, what does it really solve? It doesn't heal the family who lost the loved one. Studies have shown that in order for the family to heal, they first need to forgive. They need the murderer to not only apologize for what he's done, but fully understand that he has hurt so many people by killing this person. But, for some more extreme cases, I think they should be putting in loads of community service hours. If they can't seem fathom how what they did was flat-out wrong, then they can certainly understand that, by helping the community, they are helping prevent further crimes.
ReplyDeleteI do not believe in the death penalty, so I absolutely agree with Davod Brucks statement about not affirming life by executing. Who is the death penalty really for, the victim or the split-second sense of relief the community gets when they know one murderer will never kill again? The death penalty doesn't make all murderers go away or make a man rethink of murdering, it just deprives one more man of living.
ReplyDeleteI also don’t understand why the Supreme Court is trying to find a way to justify their murdering because, honestly, man should not play the role of God. In Mayor Koch’s essay he had tried to defend the death penalty by quoting the bible, “Thou shall not murder.” But those were the words of God, so there is no justification to why the Supreme Court is allowed to murder.
“So what if the penalty doesn't work? At least gives us the satisfaction that we got...one or two of the sons of bitches.” David believes that the public is frustrated at the government for not “coping with crimes,” and that the death penalty is the government’s way of saying that they are trying to manage the murder rates. He also believes that anger is fueling the public's want for the death penalty. I believe in that statement personally because I want the government to make me feel safe from murderers, but it makes me more afraid of the government when they have the power to end a life.
Since the beginning of civilization humans have used death as a form of punishment and to this day it has been debated whether or not this is the best method of punishment. In Edward Koch’s essay Death and Justice he states that "It is by exacting the highest penalty for the taking of human life that we affirm the highest value of human life." But then David Bruck counters this argument in his essay The Death Penalty with his statement that "for those who had to see the execution of J.C. Shaw, it wasn't easy to keep in mind that the purpose of the whole spectacle was to affirm life." And to many, it probably wasn’t. But what was the alternative? A life in prison? But what would ones quality of life be if they were to spend it behind bars? Keeping someone locked up for the rest of their life and forcing them to do manual labor isn’t affirming life. It’s taking life and slowly deflating it. No matter how much you believe in letting murderers live, you must look at this logically. The death penalty should be in use but only when it is absolutely needed.
ReplyDeleteHow does executing a person convicted of murder, show that you affirm life? Instead, it violates the right to life as proclaimed in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Shouldn't the person believed in or did the crime, have the chance to understand their behavior wasn't lawful? I'm sure that the person suspected of murder wished to kill or did kill, because their emotions was what completed their action. But emotions can easily be dealt with, especially if that was the first crime he/she committed. If the person gets executed instead, that would be unjust, because their right to life would be taken away. Yes, that person murdered someone. Of course he/she deserves punishment, but guilt proves more of a punishment. If the person learns what they did was wrong, they would have to live with it; alive while in jail. The positive side to this is that we can see how accurate the statistics Bruck shared. Florida banned execution for almost a year. Intentional homicide declined by 17 percent. When execution was allowed again, it rose 5.1 percent. That's only one state. Imagine all 50 states testing this out and saving numerous lives if we prohibit execution.
ReplyDeleteI agree with David Bruck, because killing isn’t life affirming no matter who does it. Mayor Koch says “It is hard to imagine anything worse than being murdered while neighbors do nothing. But something worse exists. When those same neighbors shrink back from justly punishing the murderer, the victim dies twice.” I disagree with this statement, because two wrongs don’t make a right. Killing won’t bring a person back from the dead. Revenge isn’t justice, no matter how satisfying it may be. When we kill people, because it feels right, we quickly forget what we are ourselves, via our legal system, also committing murder. To be so reckless with something so precious can end with devastating results; and overall devaluing life in our society.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Bruck's statement. And actually my main argument for this comes from Koch's articles. When Koch is arguing against people who say the bible says "Thou Shalt Not Kill" he says it actually translates to "Thou Shalt Not Murder". But that doesn't actually prove his pint because the death penalty is murder. Just because it is state sanctioned murder doesn't make it better, somehow, to me it makes it worse. I find it difficult to agree with Koch that the death penalty "affirms life" when the death penalty allows state sanctioned to happen. I don't know if Koch has ever seen an execution in person but if he has I am astounded he doesn't see the death penalty as murder, and if he hasn't I feel like he can't make the argument that the death penalty "affirms life". Multiple people have made the argument that the death penalty is more logical, but where is the logic in "Let's affirm life by killing more people". That is basically the message Koch has, and to me makes no logical or ethical sense. How can the state say that they value human life by taking more lives? Everyone has the right to live, and when someone violates someone else's right to live they should be stopped from doing that again. But NOT by taking away that person's right to life.
ReplyDeleteLogan Casey (I cannot fix my typo of my name)
ReplyDeleteWhile Ed Koch's piece is very well written and makes several good points, I am predisposed to agree with David Bruck's arguments, particularly in this instance (about whether or not capital punishment increases the value of life). Killing cannot make life more sacred. The case Bruck refers to is a perfect example of how executions create excitement about death with little moral repercussion. Saying that killing murders makes everyone else's life more important is much like arguing against gay marriage by saying that it weakens straight marriage. Though it is stranger to feel threatened by homosexuals than convicted killers, knowing a killer is dead instead of locked up does not make you any safer than banning gay marriage makes you less likely to divorce.
In 'avenging' innocent deaths, we end a life just as complex and multi-faceted as our own, prematurely ending the existence of someone, however many terrible things he has done, who experiences happiness, sadness, anger, and remorse, just as we do. As the Pope recently announced, "Who am I to judge?" (Religion, while close to ethics, should not play a part in law or politics, but if the Pope can't judge people than who can?) If we were born into different circumstances, could we have killed someone on impuulse, in a robbery or drug deal? Prison gives almost everyone enough time to think about what they've done.
Perhaps we should focus on how to keep rich and powerful criminals from being released early on minor technicalities or on how to prevent homicides from ocurring in the first place. If the government could keep weapons from the wrong people or keep track of those likely to be involved in violent situations, then surely the murder rate would decline. According to a 2012 study by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, the US has higher murder rates than most developed nations (almost all of Europe except for some former Eastern Bloc states), as well as many more 'violent' nations, such as Afghanistan, Iran, Israel, Egypt, and Libya. This would suggest that Americans are more violent or have more access to weapons. Maybe, just maybe, there is a connection between the prevalence of death – and executions – in our culture and our murder rate.
Sorry I rambled around
I disagree with Edward Koch, and do not think the death penalty affirms life. Like David Bruck I think capital punishment cheapens life. States having the power to kill people and doing so often seems to cheapen human life, like it is a thing you can just throw away. The courts being able to end your life makes it seem like your life doesn't matter, definitely not affirming it. Sometimes at executions people while gather outside cheering for the death of another human being, not even thinking about what is being taken. "And while Shaw died, the TV crews recorded another 'curiosity' of the death penalty - the crowd gathered outside the death-house to cheer on the executioner," The lose of human life is not something that should be cheered for no matter what the circumstances. I can see where Ed Koch is coming from, saying that the death penalty existing makes life important. He would be right except for the extant it is used makes life seem unimportant. I think Bruck is correct that the problem with capital punishment is its disregard of the importance of life.
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ReplyDeleteBoth Bruck and Koch had good arguments, but I agree with Koch's statement more. The way he uses some analogies in his text to get the reader to understand the point he is trying to convey is so much easier than Bruck's examples of various executions. For an example, Koch said earlier in the text,
ReplyDelete"Today, we are faced with the choice of letting cancer spread or trying to cure it with the methods available, methods that one day will almost certainly be barbaric. But to give up and do nothing would be far more barbaric and would certainly delay the discovery of an eventual cure."
Based on that quote, I think the most logical thing to agree with is to execute the "cold-blooded killers” to protect the lives of innocent people. "When we protect guilty lives, we give up innocent lives in exchange."
I agree with that quote to some extent. I believe some murderers can change their paths to become a part of society again. The other murderers that don't change just have to face the consequences of either execution or being in jail for multiple sentences. There is no telling what they could do during that time; they could continue to kill people in jail.
Overall, I think there needs to be certain limits on capital punishment so people can make sure they triple check to make sure they don’t execute innocent people. I believe people shouldn’t consider execution a payback to the murderers, but a lesson to everybody so they won't have a mindset of killing anybody intentionally. I also think at some point, everybody will eventually have the willpower to create a peaceful environment for everybody to enjoy.
ReplyDeleteI can’t get my mind to wrap around the idea on how it’s okay to kill a man to gain justice. Therefore I agree with David Brucks remarks upon the death penalty. I believe a lifetime in prison is more than enough of a punishment for a man to have after proven guilty of murder. I don’t comprehend how we can say it’s not acceptable to kill, then give a man the death penalty and act as if it’s affirming life. When in reality it’s giving people too much power to be able to decide when to end a man’s life. I don’t understand how we can continue such a custom when there are many cases brought to the table where an innocent man has died. One mistake can cost someone’s life to be taken away from them and never be returned. I think its injustice to leave the government with so much power to decide when it’s okay to take away a man’s life. I’m frightened by giving man the power to decide when it’s ok to kill. I believe only God can have such a judgment to give such a punishment to man. Overall I only believe no one shall kill be permit to kill and if someone does choose to kill a lifetime in prison is enough justice to affirm life.
I am a believer in Mayor Ed Koch's statement "cheapen the value of human life," but rather "It is by exacting the highest penalty for the taking of human life that we affirm the highest value of human life." Human life is sacred, and deserves the highest respect. If a person murders multiple people in a brutal/premeditated way, the only true justice would be taking away that person's greatest privilege, their life. Now I certainly think that the death penalty needs to be used in a controlled and precise way. Cases need to be look over long and hard, and it needs to be decided with certainty that the perpetrator is guilty of a horrible crime. I think that the death penalty saves lives and as Mayor Koch put it, "When we protect guilty lives, we give up innocent lives in exchange." A statistic from 1977 and 1978 says that in New York City alone, a murder was committed by a person with a previous arrest for murder every eight and a half days. To me this statistic is unacceptable, and if the death penalty is the only way to stop a killer from killing, then by all means bring it on. There is also the issue of racial bias in capital punishment. This may not be as prevalent as many people think. Black's and Latino's are less likely than White's to be put to death for murder. And while Black's and Latino's are put to death more often than White's, this is most likely because of higher murder rates among those groups. The combination of all these factors leads me to believe the death penalty can be the right punishment in certain situations.
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