“What do Murderers Deserve?” is a very good essay written by David Gelernter, the writer puts across his views on how murderers should be treated. In the first paragraph he says that a woman who killed two people but was penitent about the same when she was produced in the court but was executed in spite of her being sorry about the whole thing, on the contrary a man who murdered three people and injured many other people including the author, was not executed in spite of being impenitent about the whole thing just because he struck a deal with the justice department. The author’s identity is very important in the essay, he was personally attacked by a criminal and this is why the author wants to ensure that justice prevails in the society, a clear picture of author’s take on what do murderers deserve can be made out from the essay.
This paper will throw light upon the views of the author on how murderers have to be dealt with. He presents an argument in his work which is immaculate. He approves of capital punishment and this has been very well put by the author. The author makes a very convincing argument and he also throws light upon the moral aspect of allotting capital punishment which makes his argument even sounder.
David Gelernter is flabbergasted by the fact that America has lost all its values and this was why the man who murdered got away lightly just by striking a deal with the justice department. The author argues that there is discrimination in America and the immigrants from other countries are not being treated well, their children are being denied schooling in English schools and there is a lot of bias which exists in the society. He points out the changing trend in America; he says that the innocent people are put behind the bars for child abuse just because some liars give testimony in the court against the innocent people and this result in trouble for the people who have done nothing wrong. David Gelernter questions the morality in modern America, he points out that the majority of people have become immoral. I firmly believe that the author succeeds in putting across his message. The author tries to convey that capital punishment is not the only solution to control the crime rate and he completely succeeds in putting across his point because he relates capital punishment to moral values and our moral values don’t permit us to assassinate someone.
David Gelernter questions the society why are murderers executed? He says that either they are executed to discourage this act or to seek revenge for the deeds of the murderer. He goes on to say that the murderers are executed because the justice department proclaims that “the act of murdering someone is intolerable and automatically calls for punishment.” Author believes that every murder demands a communal response and he firmly believes that death penalty sends across a very strong message to the other people.
David Gelernter ponders over this and says that the same strong message can also be sent by locking the convict in the jail forever and says that execution is probably overdoing the whole thing. He throws light upon the statistics, which the author gets by case study, he conducts case study in the article and arrives at a result which shows that people shrug off murders just like that unless their “near and dear ones” are involved. David Gelernter says that the attitude of the people has changed drastically; no person wants to get involved in other’s problems. He believes that the people reaffirm a saying in the bible which is to punish the evil activities carried out by a person and the same is done by executing that person. He strongly believes that we should not administer the death penalties allotted to the criminals. He says that the community at large prefers giving death penalties to the criminals but the cultural elite oppose this.
The concluding lines of the essay go back to the murderers mentioned in the opening paragraph. David Gelernter says that he would surely think for long hours before executing a person who is repenting for his mistakes or crime. He concludes the existence of communities in which the execution of people upon deliberately murdering the other people is not carried out. This goes to show that the author supports the concept of capital punishment but he also says that he would surely be morally obliged to allot capital punishment to anyone.