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Complete PICLE corpus of essays by Polish advanced EFL students (330,000)

/^t/The strongest argument that can be levelled against death penalty is its inhumanity. Unlike other punishmenys, this does not have any educational function, at least for the convict. The only, though very doubtful, value of capital punishment is its role as the deterrent of potential criminals who premeditate committing a crime, a murder in this case. Thus the significance of the punishment, if we assume that punishment can bring any positive results, is shihted from the individual to society. The individual is sentenced to death penalty not to be prevented from committing further crimes but to threaten the community against repeating his grave mistake. Yet, as we fortunately managed to observe, killing the murderers have never been a successful method of getting rid of them. Quite the opposite, cruel laws always produced ruthless and insensitive people who, living under harsh rule themselves, disregarded the universal and undeniable value of human life. Severe laws do not educate society but deprive people of their intrinsic moral sense, and thus create a vicious circle.