Capital Punishment In History Essays - Capital Punishment, Penology

Capital Punishment In History Many people support the death penalty, and a lot of them use the defense that comes from the Bible: an eye for eye, and a limb for a limb. I on the otherhand believe otherwise. Punishment by death, in my opinion, is a very barbaric way of penalization . In the world, it is known that at least 2500 prisoners are executed in at least 37 different countries, on an annual basis. There will be various statistics, opinions, history, and background information discussed through out the residuum of this thesis. The history of the death penalty, dates back to the days of Hammurabi and his code to the days of the present. The methods nowadays are certainly different, but the objective and goal has remained the same. The earliest known date of any form of organized capital punishment was in 1750 B.C., with Hammurabi and his code. The Bible prescribed death for more than 30 different crimes, including: murder, treason, theft, arson, and rape, to name a few. In the Medieval Times, treason ( grand and petty ) murder, larceny, rape, and arson were all crimes recognized as punishable by death. During the reigns of King Canute and William the Conqueror, it was not used at all. By 1800, though, more than 200 crimes were construed as punishable by death, but most were commuted by a royal pardon. In the American Colonies, in the years before the Revolution, it was commonly for a wide variety of offenses. Near the end of the 18th century, though, efforts to abolish it arose in Europe. It was led mainly by the Quakers, who believed in non-violence all together. Then when influential documents arose, it prompted and inspired the great French philosopher, Voltaire, to oppose it publicly. At the present there are many fundamental questions raised pertaining to the fact that with the death penalty intact and fully operational, isn't the government condoning killing. Also, isn't the government being kind of hypocritical when they say taking a human life is bad, but then they go ahead and do exactly the opposite of what they are saying? One of the axiomatic questions erected is: "Whether the death penalty is more effective than life-time imprisonment?". Also, is it an effective deterrent to future violent crimes? Defenders point out that since taking a life is more severe than any sentence imaginable, it must be the right and just thing to do. Public opinion in the United States supports it by more than a 2 to 1 ratio. They, also, point out that there is no other adequate hindrance in life imprisonment that is effective for those who commit heinous crimes inside or outside of the prison walls. On the flip side of the coin, the opposers say that in adjacent states in which one has it and one doesn't, there is no long term significant differences in murder rates and amplitude. Also, and this seems hard to believe, but states that use the death penalty actually show higher murder numbers than states that do not. When a local execution occurs, the murder rates do not fluctuate at all, they stay the same. There are literally thousands of ways to kill someone or something. But only about 10 of those are used in conjunction with the death penalty, itself. Many of those thousand are considered barbaric and uncivilized by today's standards . There are usually specific procedures for each execution method, to ensure a quick and painless death. There are nine methods of execution that I will now discuss. The first is crucifixion. Crucifixion was most likely first used in the 6th century B.C. and was last used in approximately the 4th century A.D. Most notably, it was used on Jesus Christ in the year 33 A.D. It is where the person is nailed to a cross for as many hours as it takes them to die from loss of blood. The second is boiling in oil. Boiling in oil usually occurs after a severe beating has been administered. It burns the cuts and open wounds, it is truly a very painful way of death. Death by boiling in oil is considered savage by today's society. The third is death by beheading. It was used commonly during the Medieval days. Usually some form of torture is performed beforehand. Some tortuous acts include: partial hanging, taking out and destroying of the innards, and incinerating. It can be carried out with either an ax or a guillotine. For an example, watch the movie,

Horror movie Essays

Horror movie Essays Horror movie Paper Horror movie Paper Essay Topic: Film * Usually, horror movies are set at night or in the dark as this is usually when people feel the most insecure which relates to the audiences real life * Horror movies almost always contain a scene that makes the audience jump. The audience are intrigued by this as it makes them feel tense, as the situation builds up but therefore encourages the audience to read on * Some typical slasher movies may contain some sort of mystery which leads the audience to question who is or are the potential villains within the plot. This is used to interest the audience, and to encourage them to watch until the end to find out who caused all of the horror within the story. * Every horror movie needs to contain a victim and a villain. Villains can be anything from monsters, aliens, vampires, or just your average everyday people. Although, usually the victims within a story are women as they are known to be some of the most vulnerable people. This adds success to horror movies as young women watching the movie are going to be encouraged to find the movie scarier as they may imagine themselves to be in the same situation. * Modern horror movies contain many special effects in order to make the movie more realistic to the human eye, and therefore making it again scarier for the audience to watch as they picture themselves within the same situation * Some horror movies however, leave some of the special effects to the imagination. For example, the movie The human centipede displays across the idea to the reader of a messed up surgeon having a sick fantasy of creating a human centipede. The actual creation of this isnt shown within the movie and is infact left to the audiences imagination. This encourages the reader to be interested to watch the film as they are given the chance to make their own assumptions about how everything happened within the film, and then are then lead to potentially more awful thoughts. * Music plays an extremely big part in the creation of horror movies. Especially tense music that gets louder over time as this creates suspense within the movie and leaves the audience on the edge of their seats. Usually, tense music is used in order to build up to a scene that either shocks or makes the audience jump. By letting the audience become aware of the fact that the film may make them jump this weirdly makes them want to carry on and watch the movie. * Gore and violence are commonly used within horror movies as it is not something that humans typically want to come across in their life time, and this adds to the shock of the whole horror movie genre. * A lot of more modern horror movies carry a physiological sense which provides the audience with a false sense of security. For example, the movie Physco shows a woman in a shower, which is usually a place where a woman would typically feel safe, but this security is taken away from her as she is stabbed to death within her shower. This shocks audiences, and encourages them to be scared that this may potentially happen to them. Movies like this may stick in humans minds after watching the movie, and even scare them afterwards when they are in the same situation. Within our horror movie Santas Sack we have mainly used the physiological aspect of the horror movie genre. The fact that the movie will contain a killer Santa Claus who acts on Christmas Eve will shock the audience as this is typically known as a happy time for most humans. This provides the audience with a false sense of security of Christmas time, and will intrigue them to watch what happens. The movie will also be set at night, which is a typically know place for horror movies to be set as this is however somewhere where humans typically dont feel safe. An example of another horror movie which uses the aspect of a false sense of security is The Grudge. This movie uses places such as someones bed to place someones murder, which is usually a place where a person would feel safe. Therefore, taking away the safe aspect of the persons bed. We have decided to choose a little girl named Molly to play the victim within our short horror movie as this is a typically know generic horror movie convention. Molly will be displayed to be your typical sweet gullible little girl who is let in for a shock when she realises Santa Claus isnt who she expected. Also, the fact that the little girl is going to be murdered will shock the audience, and intrigue the audience into watching the rest of the film. The generic convention of a false sense of security will then be used later on in the film when the movie plays on the song Santa Claus is coming to town. Earlier on in the movie, Molly and her little brother Max will be shown to be singing the song cheerfully whilst decorating the Christmas tree. Later on, when Molly is displayed to be dying she sings the song in a slow and daunting way with the words altered which will intend to creep the audience out. This is also a false sense of security as the song is a well known happy song that represents Christmas time around the world. The slow pace that Molly is going to sing the song as may also stick in the audiences mind and make the movie have a lasting impression which shocks the audience. The end of the movie will be left to the audiences imagination as we are not actually going to display what happens to the character of Molly. This will leave the ending to the audiences imagination and will encourage them to think of more sick and vile thoughts that could have actually been created, which will create a bigger effect on the audience. This is also a typically known generic horror movie convention that is used widely throughout horror movies.