attraction. This may explain in part why executions encourage some homicides and why some convicted killers have asked to die. 4. But there is an additional reason: The real message of the death penalty is the legitimacy of lethal violence. Some potential killers see executions as evidence that lethal vengeance is justified. Instead of identifying with the offender who was caught and executed, they identify with the executioner. They learn from these executions that it is acceptable to eliminate someone who wrongs them, that violence is justified against the deserving. One study has concluded that the atmosphere of violence surrounding an execution encourages someone who has reached "a state of readiness to kill" to translate this attitude into action. Many argue that a primary function of the death penalty is to communicate the message that killing is taboo. Certainly we need to make that statement, and strongly. But other ways may be more effective. The example of a life for a life may actually cheapen life, not increase its value. Because these assumptions about the deterrent effect of the death penalty are inaccurate, the death penalty has offered us a false sense of security. And we are left with a series of moral dilemmas: Can we bear the moral weight of taking a life when the effect is so minuscule that we cannot measure it, and for an effect that we can have, at least as effectively, by alternatives short of death? Can we take a life when our action may actually encourage violence? Even if the death penalty did deter, do we have the moral right to take the life of one person hoping that we might possibly deter another person? Specific deterrence refers to the fact that executing a known offender prevents that person from killing again, "deterring" at least that specific offender. Preventing the recurrence of murder is certainly a serious concern. Families of murder victims wrestle with this issue, as we all must. Although death ...
