It is said to be a deterrent. I cannot agree....I do not now believe that any one of the hundreds of executions I carried out has in any way acted as a deterrent against future murder. Capital punishment, in my view, achieved nothing except revenge.
Interpretation
The quote questions the effectiveness of capital punishment as a deterrent to crime, suggesting it serves only as a tool for revenge.
In this quote, Albert Pierrepoint reflects on his experience as an executioner, stating that he does not believe that the executions he carried out have contributed to preventing future murders. Instead, he argues that capital punishment merely satisfies the desire for revenge rather than promoting justice or deterring crime.
In practice
In a debate about the morality of capital punishment, this quote can highlight the argument against its effectiveness.
I have come to the conclusion that executions solve nothing, and are only an antiquated relic of a primitive desire for revenge which takes the easy way and hands over the responsibility for revenge to other people...The trouble with the death penalty has always been that nobody wanted it for everybody, but everybody differed about who should get off.
All in all you're just another brick in the wall
Language is political. That's why you and me, my Brother and Sister, that's why we supposed to choke our natural self into the weird, lying, barbarous, unreal, white speech and writing habits that the schools lay down like holy law.
A man may die, nations may rise and fall, but an idea lives on.
It is much easier to do something than to trust in God; we mistake panic for inspiration.
Nakedness has no color: this can come as news only to those who have never covered, or been covered by, another naked human being.
The roulette table pays nobody except him that keeps it. Nevertheless a passion for gaming is common, though a passion for keeping roulette tables is unknown.
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