The sanctity of life is a belief that sentient life is the most valuable force on earth. When the sanctity of lifde is questioned then society has a tendency to fall apart.
I watched the 2014 movie Dawn of Planet of the Apes (spoiler alert). In the movie the Apes have been genetically modified and can speak. The apes form a human like society and make rules like the Code of Hammurabi. The major rule is “Ape no kill Ape”. THere is an ape named Koba is is totally anti social and killing other living beings. The movie has a pivotal fight scene between the protagonist Caesar and Koba. Koba is hanging on for dear life and looks up at Ceaser and repeats the number one rule. “Ape no Kill Ape”. Ceaser tells Koba he is not an ape and lets him fall
When he allowed Koba to die Ceaser choose to rationalize his behavior by stripping away Kobas ape status. In Ceasers mind Kobas life was not as valuable as an apes life because Koba was acting in an un ape like manner.
Six people in Goshen California were brutally murdered. Among the murder victims was a 10 month old baby. Because of the heinous nature of the crime’s law enforcement in Goshen is asking that the death penalty be used. The last time the death penalty has been used in California was to kill the prisoner Charles Ray Allen. It is unclear if the death penalty will be used in California but the brutality of the killings of the six souls in Goshen definitely strip away the status of human being from the people who killed them. Right now two people are in custody for the murders and will son face trial. The trial will decide the accepted guilt or innocence not really actual guilt or innocence. The only people who know what happened are those who have experienced and or observed the action. Observation can be an issue because of a bunch of reasons. Eyewitness testimony is very unreliable. The elusive nature of guilt makes most people object to the use of the death penalty. What if we got it wrong? In 2022 more than 260 people were exonerated in the United States. an average of 3.94 people on death row are exonerated per year. A wrongful conviction can be overturned and someone can be let out of prison but no one can be brought back from the dead. The argument for mistakes is there for a case against the death penalty and then there is the morality of taking sentintent life. A very good rule for life is that, it is never ok to kill a sentient life.
It is my conviction that killing under the cloak of war is nothing but an act of murder.
Albert Einstein
When society tries to apply value to lives in an effort to justify taking them society is experiencing a moral failing.
On February 26 2012 George Zimmerman followed a 17 year old boy through a neighbourhood. Zimmerman confronted the unarmed minor and murdered him. A court case commenced to decide if the death of an unarmed 17 year old boy byu an armed adult was justified. This court case was a moral failing. There is truly no justification for killing an unarmed child.
Some historians argue that there are tipping points or critical points in the narrative of history that determine what the era will be like. It has been ten years since the death of Trayvon Martin and the justification for killing an unarmed boy was made by society and it has been ten years of violence and destrutcion of life in the United States. It feels like Trayvon Martins death was a tipping point for the destruction of the moral fabricate in the United States. SAome activist started the Black lives matter movement to counter the tipping point and I am hopeful that this will work but as long as society finds ways to justify murder I am skeptical that much will change.
The Corrigan Encore 