Capital Punishment in film Dead Man Walking Essay

Capital Punishment in film f totallyen Man Walking - Essay modelThe film Dead Man Walking depicts the appeal process faced by a convicted murderer, and how his crime, streak and acts on death row affect himself, a nun who is working with him on his appeal, and the families of the victims. It invokes some of the hardest and or so troubling questions facing society today such as does the state have the right to annihilate its own citizens? and is it ever right to kill?. Philosophers and thinkers have been struggling with these same questions for thousands of years. Somewhat surprisingly in a field where many experts disagree with each other, three of the greatest pillars of Western Philosophy all over the past two thousand years, Aristotle, John Stuart Mill and Emmanuel Kant are all staunchly in privilege of the death penalty as a punishment for murder. Even more surprisingly, all three philosophers disembarrass their defence of capital punishment through three amazingly differ ent theoretical frameworks, all approaching to the same conclusion through very different means. All three philosophers, however, have serious flaws in their arguments for capital punishment (especially when considered in todays society) and strong arguments against capital punishment plenty lifelessness be made.This essay will critically examine cases such as those in the film Dead Man Walking through the lens of Kant, Mills and Aristotles value-systemal philosophies. This case can serve as something of a testing ground for when capital punishment would be the most justified.... 1 of the first recorded philosophers to try to tackle the question of capital punishment was Aristotle in his Nichomachean Ethics. These ethics do not attempt to address the issue of capital punishment, but rather form foundations from which he believes all ethics should be derived. These ethics are based on several foundations, and demonstrate an understanding of the circumstance that different societ ies will have different societal expectations, and in attempting to create a universal ethic Aristotle tries to make a flexible system that will gentle these differences. He main way that Aristotle attempts to accommodate for these differences is by introducing the idea of the just man (Aristotle 68). Aristotle says that moral actions can be viewed through the lens of what a just man in a particular society would do if a good just, ethical man of ones society would behave in a certain way therefore that action is what must be considered just. Aristotle adds two further theories to make sure their is some stability and objective morality across all cultures by adding the ideas of fairness and mateity to the idea of the just man, so that if a society would consider a just mans actions good even if they were unequal or unfair, Aristotle would still consider those actions immoral (74). The final aspect of Aristotles theory of justice is that of rectification, that is, when one comm its a wrong towards another he must make recompense to the person who he has wrong equal to the amount of wrong done (67). If for instance, someone killed another persons sheep, he would be responsible for providing a sheep to make up for the damages. All these theories combine to support capital punishment in a variety of ways. First,