Fighting Murder with Murder?

How crazy does that sound? Except to some people I guess it makes perfect sense.

I am firmly against capital punishment. To me, that doesn't seem like a controversial statement but I have been seeing a lot of discourse surrounding the topic this year, as Attorney General Bill Barr decided to resume federal executions in 2020 for the first time since 2003, before I was even born.

The fact of the matter is that execution is wrong. In elementary school we would discuss with disgust, the medieval traditions of beheading, hanging, burning, boiling, and drawing & quartering criminals, what makes lethal injection and electrocution any different? The eight amendment of the United States Constitution bars "cruel and unusual punishment", which is meant to prevent the government from imposing barbaric and inhumane punishments. What is considered inhumane if murder is acceptable? How is it that the constitution is so important when discussing freedom of speech and the right to bear arms, but this important note is neglected?

Regardless of what or whom you believe in, we as humans do not have the power to decide who lives and who dies. Innocent or guilty (a lot of them the former), no one should be killed by the government of their country. There is never enough evidence to take someone's life. We all know that often times people are unfairly prosecuted due to the prejudice and structure of the United States justice system. People are in prison right now who have been suffering due to racism, ableism, and classism placing them in a position where they cannot defend themselves and will not be believed. Even those who have committed horrible crimes, why is there such a lack of human decency that the instinct is to kill, rather than rehabilitate? The latter of which having the ability to make people safer and crime lower than capital punishment ever could.