Death penalty: Making a storm in a teacup without understanding issue

Dear Don Manu.

I read your ‘Sunday punch’ in the Sunday Times of July 15. I am writing this, to prove the comments by our Archbishop, Ranjith Malcolm as reasonable and correct on the death penalty issue. You seemed to have really got upset, just because these comments came from none other than the Archbishop of the Roman Catholic Church. You have made a ‘storm-in-a-teacup’ over this.

It is a pity you have not grasped the deep thinking of a person who agrees with implementing the death penalty. Those who agree with the death penalty are those who have a deep feeling for humanity; Those who want and wish others to live in peace and tranquility; Those who know what human suffering and poverty is. One who knows the trauma, anguish and sorrow and suffering of a mother, whose only 6-year-old daughter has been raped brutally and murdered and dumped in a muddy field.

Instead of trying to find out why one wants the death penalty, you have used your column to ridicule the Archbishop. In the first instance the Archbishop never said directly “I welcome the death penalty”.

On what basis do you say he agreed ‘without any reasons or rhyme’? Everybody has their reasons when they give their opinion.

Let’s analyse the death penalty issue:

Now if a census or a referendum is taken not only in

Sri Lanka but in every country around the world asking who is for and who is against the death penalty, obviously the majority vote will be ‘for the death penalty’. Therefore, the majority cannot be wrong. It shows that people have had enough of suffering from a few.

Human rights groups, some religious groups and others who are against the death penalty have not obviously grasped the seriousness of the vicious problems. To those who believe that the death penalty has no effect on stopping these kinds of crime or is not a deterrent, I would explain as follows:

1) Of course, enforcing the death penalty will not completely stop for example the drug menace but the menace will drastically drop (eg Saudi Arabia). It is definitely a deterrent. The laws and the police in a country are only a deterrent and will not stop crime completely. The state of a criminal’s mind is such that when he knows the consequences are not severe, he tends to commit and continue in more crime. Imagine a country without a police force and no law and order. The criminals will really ‘go-to-town’.

Some argue that it is unethical or inhumane to take another’s life. Maybe they think a life of a human is very valuable. Is it? Consider the following:

Are all life forms on this planet valuable and equal on the same scale? Due to religious teachings some will agree. But it is not so. Undoubtedly, human life is more superior, more valuable than other forms of life. That’s the reason humans had the right to kill other forms of life to feed themselves and exist. That’s why they have the right to kill other forms of life like mosquitoes, flies, rodents etc in order to exist. Now is all human life valuable and equal in one scale? No, for example the life of a wicked, vicious criminal or an uneducated fool or mad man is not equal or valuable as that of a genius who has done a lot of good for the human race.

Therefore, the life of a particular human who by his actions brings misery, sorrow, hardship and is a nuisance and a curse and a hindrance to the rest of the society, must be eliminated for the betterment of other humans as much as we remove and burn the weeds, that choke the useful plants.

B. Joseph Wattala