e very fabric of modern society. The execution, once arrived at after years of waiting in fear, is brutal and primitive. Killing someone is not quite as simple as switching on a light. It requires violent trauma that eventually stops the brain from functioning one way or another. The five methods of execution used in the United States are electrocution, hanging, poisoning, gassing, and even shooting. The process is never as clean and efficient as a humane death should be and occasionally, things go wrong. Most of the time, those executed are fitted with a hood to spare spectators the gruesome contortions of pain the face undergoes, and allows them to view the person as more of an object. This brutality cannot be tolerated. The main argument against capital punishment as morally objectionable as it is, is cost. It is a documented fact, however, that the cost of a capital trial combined with the jail term and execution is exorbitantly more expensive than supporting the prisoner for the rest of ' his life in jail. In fact, in many cases it has been 200% to 400% more costly. The fact that capital punishment has survived thus far is due primarily to the fact that it appeals to man's bloodlust and need for revenge. While civilized law in the United States has stated it wrong to simply kill someone deemed "deserving", it has not stated it wrong for the government to kill those deemed "deserving". Consequently, there are laws in place that allow the punishment of murder, by murder. Society's integrity is diminished every time a criminal is executed. The very tenets of modern organization are opposed to the notion of capital punishment, yet this is constantly defied and ignored by the American legal system. If no changes are made and the death penalty remains an acceptable form of punishment, it is inevitable that this correctional method will bleed throughout the American legal system and be utilized for "potential murderers" and small-time thi...
