Capital Punishment should be abolished as a form of legal punishment.

What my fellow opposition seems to believe here, is that human rights are the most important thing in the world. Half of his arguments are based on the human rights act. Two can play that game. I’d first like to ask a very important question: Is it more cruel to kill somebody or trap them in a jail cell for the rest of their lives? Which punishment abrogates more rights? I’d like to answer these questions before I start my rebuttal.My fellow opposition is all in favor of Human Rights, yet he has failed to realize that by sending someone to prison, you are actually abrogating more human rights than executing them. When you trap someone in a prison, you are intruding upon Article 3, which is the Right to liberty and Personal Security, and the rights to movement, association, and property rights from convicted criminals (as mentioned in my previous argument), whereas execution only abrogates the right to life. Opposition then continued to contradict himself, saying that the government cannot give the right to movement to convicted criminals because it abrogates societies rights to safety. This is where I got confused. If opposition is all for the right to life in convicted criminals and not the right of movement, opposition has not done his job. If he is to use human rights as a primary source for his argument, he needs to support all of human rights. Is he saying that the government can intrude on some rights but not others? My fellow opposition has not clearly stated whether he is all for human rights or whether he is against. He has not clearly drawn the line between what he stands for and what he doesn’t. Moving on to my rebuttal, “This means that people are not only sent to prison as a form of punishment, but are sent there for a specific amount of time to isolate them from the society, thus protecting the society from those convicts." If this is the case, then why not execute the murderers instead? They clearly deserve it. If you really did care about society from convicts, killing them would guarantee 0% murders from them in the future."Capital Punishment can possibly be painful, thus should be abolished.... Capital Punishment is the cruelest form of certain unorthodox methods of punishment worldwide...yet one very obvious alternative would be life without parole" Firstly, just because an execution method may result in pain, either by accident or as an inescapable consequence of death, does not establish the sort of 'objectively intolerable risk of harm. According to my fellow opposition’s logic, all forms of punishment in society should be abolished because they could be possibly “painful”. Is that what he means?Life in prison is basically a longer and more painful death sentence. Here’s why. Firstly, Poor sanitary conditions, inadequate lighting and ventilation, extremes of temperature, insect and rodent infestation and insufficient or non-existent personal hygiene supplies all have a negative impact on prisoners’ health. Unfortunately, this is the case for most prisons around the world. Secondly, rates of infectious disease, notably HIV/AIDS and TB, are much higher in prisons, and lastly, Prison overcrowding is a serious problem in many prisons around the world. (3) So instead of having them suffer through these horrible conditions until they die, why not execute them? Additionally, the amount of cases of failed attempts or painful attempts of execution is too little to be considered a problem compared to the countless murderers who have to suffer in these terrible prison conditions for a LIFETIME. "Capital Punishment is expensive"Firstly, the prices my fellow opposition has given us is per person. Obviously, there are more people in life imprisonment then people who need to be executed. When you add the prices up, Capital Punishment doesn’t seem so expensive now, does it?Even if it may be cheaper to keep them in prison for life, why are we using our tax money to keep a killer alive? Why are we paying for someone who isn't going to go out into the world? According to my fellow opposition’s logic, life imprisonment should also be abolished. Considering the status of many prisons around the world, life imprisonment is also a form of cruel torture that abrogates human rights. Even my fellow opposition admits that sending people to prison abrogates their rights, "True, one’s free movement between nations and movement in general might be restricted, but that is only to secure the welfare and public order for others. If the government had released convicts and criminals onto the street due to their free movement rights, it would mean that they are violating the right to security of even more people". I feel like what opposition is trying to say is, “We should abolish Capital Punishment because it abrogates human rights and it is cruel”. What about other forms of punishment? Prisons are also cruel. You stay in a jail cell for the rest of your life, confined in a zone where you cannot go out into the world ever again. Opposition replies with “Oh but it’s alright because we are protecting the rights of everyone else”. What I don’t understand is the fact that I have stated this in my previous argument, but I will state it again as opposition has not replied to this comment whatsoever. Why can’t the government abrogate the right to life, but can abrogate the other right when it comes to punishment? Why is Capital Punishment so unique that it has to be abolished? I’ve already proved that it isn’t the cruelest method of punishment, so why?"Capital Punishment brings shame to a country"This point is absolutely absurd. My fellow opposition truly believes that the type of punishments will affect the tourism and economy of the country. Does this seem reasonable at all? If you wanted to go on vacation, and you wanted to go to Shanghai, China. It’s a very beautiful city, but “OH LOOK! China still implements the death penalty. I guess I can’t go then.” Is this really the way people think? Besides, my fellow opposition has no proof/evidence that countries having the death penalty will affect it’s economy and tourism.I am now going to strengthen my previous points and perhaps add a new point.For years, criminologists analyzed murder rates to see if they fluctuated with the likelihood of convicted murderers being executed, but the results were inconclusive. Then in 1973 Isaac Ehrlich employed a new kind of analysis which produced results showing that for every inmate who was executed, 7 lives were spared because others were deterred from committing murder. Similar results have been produced by disciples of Ehrlich in follow-up studies. Moreover, even if some studies regarding deterrence are inconclusive, that is only because the death penalty is rarely used and takes years before an execution is actually carried out. Punishments which are swift and sure are the best deterrent. The fact that some states or countries which do not use the death penalty have lower murder rates than jurisdictions which do is not evidence of the failure of deterrence. States with high murder rates would have even higher rates if they did not use the death penalty. Ernest van den Haag, a Professor of Jurisprudence at Fordham University who has studied the question of deterrence closely, wrote: "Even though statistical demonstrations are not conclusive, and perhaps cannot be, capital punishment is likely to deter more than other punishments because people fear death more than anything else. They fear most death deliberately inflicted by law and scheduled by the courts. Whatever people fear most is likely to deter most. Hence, the threat of the death penalty may deter some murderers who otherwise might not have been deterred. And surely the death penalty is the only penalty that could deter prisoners already serving a life sentence and tempted to kill a guard, or offenders about to be arrested and facing a life sentence. Perhaps they will not be deterred. But they would certainly not be deterred by anything else. We owe all the protection we can give to law enforcers exposed to special risks."This not only shows why the death penalty is the best answer to murder, but how it also works as an effective deterrent.Secondly, crime disturbs the order of society, where each person receives what is due to him. If my fellow opposition is really into human rights, then executing the murderers would be the right thing to do. The criminal takes from people their rights to lives, peace, liberties, and other worldly goods just so he can get benefits. Deserved punishments protects society morally by restoring the just order, making the convict pay a price equivalent of the harm he has caused. This is retribution. It is not “revenge”, or “two wrongs don’t make a right”. In retribution the motivation is the virtue of indignation for the good of the public. My fellow opposition also seems to agree that our goal is to help society and prevent further crimes. So by abolishing the death penalty, we are actually harming society for the reasons stated above.This motion shall stand because of my strong rebuttals I have made to go against opposition, both offensive and defensive. I have also pointed out some of the major flaws and some illogical statements made by opposition. I have added evidence and more logic to my points, and after making my argument, I truly believe that Capital Punishment should not be abolished for the harms it may cause is much greater than the harms my fellow opposition stated.Thank You.Sources:(3) http://www.penalreform.org...