The death penalty, capital punishment, execution or whatever you want to call it may seem theoretically fair; a person’s life is ended for doing something morally reprehensible; but as a real-world practice, I’m totally against it for two reasons.
The first has to do with how flawed our justice systems are, which result in people being convicted of crimes they never committed. How often that occurs is beside the point. The point is it happens and, as far as I’m concerned, once is too often.
As bad as it is for an innocent person to spend time in prison, there’s a chance they’ll eventually be set free. Killing them kills that possibility. What s shame it would be for the real criminal to confess after the convicted is already dead.
My second reason is because morality is subjective. That means what’s wrong to you may not be wrong to me. Even when the person facing death is guilty of the crime, who’s to say it was bad enough to be killed for? Who’s to say it was bad at all?
There are plenty of crimes around the world I consider ridiculous like adultery because they don’t necessarily harm anyone or have any negative consequences. Yet because of other people’s moral opinions, they can have you killed.
I realize my argument goes against any moral punishment, not just death, but the point is that there’s time for change. Many laws of the past are now considered absurd. Who’s to say the ones we have now won’t be “absurd” in the future?
If anything, death should be a choice. Some people, both guilty and innocent of the crimes they’re convicted of, would rather die than spend the rest of their lives in prison. That’s fine because the person isn’t really dying against their will.
If the person chooses to live, they should be allowed to; no matter how bad the crime is in anyone’s opinion. The government shouldn’t end a person’s life as a punishment for crime, not without facing the same fate for the wrong they’ve done.