The Double Bind of Gender Inequality in Capital Punishment Case Essay Example

this sameness/difference paradox with capital punishment cases, it is first necessary to understand its base and its significance. As part of their strategy for gaining an upper hand in equality discussions, women have contended that they are no different from men and should be viewed as equally competent to perform tasks and deal with any thrown challenges.

Despite some instances where this combative tactic has proven successful, women have also needed to turn the tide, set boundaries, and demonstrate how their gender difference could bring added worth to jobs and chances traditionally allocated to men. Although it seemed essential to play both offense and defense, it sadly allows room for inconsistency. Those opposing equality in several situations skillfully leveraged this back-and-forth between the arguments of similarity and difference used by women to mount their counter offensives. Myra Bradwell was one individual who encountered this instability.

Despite her admirable performance in the Illinois bar exam, she was initially prohibited from securing her license and practicing law by the Illinois State Supreme Court. Her case's presentation to the U.S. Supreme Court revealed the bias against her gender as Justice Bradley expressed his belief that a woman's primary role is to be a wife and mother. Kathleen Jamieson, an author, sheds light on two early occurrences (Suffrage and E.R.A) where women utilized the equivalence/disparity argument.

In her evaluation, she proposes that there's a significant risk and principal difficulty involved in this approach that assists in establishing the basic problem. Initially, The Suffrage Movement was formed by women asserting their equality to men, which they believed should afford them identical rights and honor. They contended that the Constitutional law should be viewed

as encompassing women. The primary opposition these suffragists encountered was the notion that permitting access to these rights would dislodge women from their household duties, thereby disturbing the traditional structure of home and family.

At this point, women turned the similarity/difference argument on its head, insisting that feminine characteristics should be recognized as a rejuvenating presence in public life. Their aim was to align domesticity and public spheres by stipulating that home management wouldn't suffer while they ventured into areas traditionally dominated by men. Jamieson's second example of this quandary was identified within the ERA movement. A key controversy within the ERA supporters and detractors was around "special protections" proposed to support women, acknowledging their unique circumstances.

The disparity argument advanced the notion that certain provisions concerning employment, education, and so forth necessitate preservation in order to foster a balance and provide opportunities for women. In the absence of these particular protections, women were condemned to continue being considered as inferior citizens. Conversely, supporters of the ERA advocated the uniformity argument which demanded the removal of these specific protections as they hindered women's progress, status, income potential, and overall rights. They believed that the approval of the ERA would move beyond superficial fixes and delve into rectifying the core issue of equality imbalance.

In the absence of the ERA, they saw themselves as perpetual second-class citizens, with no chance of transforming Wendell Phillips' statement "every occupation open to men shall be open to women" into a reality. Kathleen Jamieson highlighted a potential setback that could hinder progression through her focus on both of these cases that employed the sameness/difference argument approach. The benchmark in the sameness/difference debate is

often set with men being the control group. This poses an issue as it normalizes male traits, resulting in a zero-sum game scenario.

According to Jamieson, there's a significant issue wherein man's efforts in attaining gender equality are often misdirected, leading to a win/lose scenario. However, the underlying issue revolves not around winners and losers, but changing societal perceptions until attitudes and behaviors promoting equality become ingrained and effortless. This defines the conundrum at the heart of the sameness/difference debate. Now that we have addressed this, we can delve into how this situation seeps down into other domains – such as capital punishment incidents.

Victor Streib and Leigh Beinen, experts in gender bias, have reaffirmed through their studies that there exists a definite prejudice within the legal system concerning the execution of women implicated in capital punishment cases. Beinen attributes this occurrence to the symbolism represented by capital punishment. Ever since such punitive methods were introduced, contentious debates have surrounded executions and their association with uncivilized and harsh punishment. Despite the heinous nature of the offenders, several individuals struggle to accept the concept of reciprocal punishment – taking a life for a life lost.

The concept of capital punishment is often associated with aggression, severity, and is viewed as a fate that should be reserved for the most heinous criminals. This unpleasant emotion leads to a scenario where the death penalty is predominantly given to those portrayed as brutal, ruthlessly violent, and devoid of sympathy. With these assumptions at the heart of society's actions, women are often given an advantage in capital punishment scenarios. Societal subconscious beliefs about women's roles and their supposed nature influence these decisions.

Women are often seen as caregivers, heads of families, and educational supporters, owing to the nurturing and gentle traits they are thought to possess.

Women are often relegated to a domestic role so frequently that it becomes difficult to imagine them being capable of acts of extreme violence or heartless deeds which could potentially lead to a death sentence. The paradox of similarity and difference manifests itself in capital punishment cases involving women. Here, prosecutors are tasked with demonstrating that women, like men, have the potential for evil. Conversely, defense lawyers often aim to emphasize the deep-seated belief that women, often viewed as nurturing and compassionate mothers, are inherently good.

If they manage to convince everyone that the attributes are inherent in their clientele, this will trigger an essential contemplation during the awkward moment when there's a necessity to decide if someone has to face execution. Consequently, it is straightforward to comprehend that prosecutors, at the other end of the spectrum, strive to downplay the femininity of the defendants. Recognizing they are up against ingrained societal perceptions of women which puts them at a disadvantage, prosecutors have to exhaust every possible strategy to prove that the female defendant has the same capabilities as any other man.

The identical assertion ignites by placing these women in aggressive roles like gang leaders or ruthless criminals devoid of empathy. Other evaluations indicate that certain prosecutors bear the weight of overcoming this stereotypical perspective so heavily that they succumb to categorizing the defendant as a lesbian. If they fail to strip the defendant of their femininity, the ingrained belief that women are incapable of heinous acts deserving the death penalty may prevail.

In

this context, the dilemma of similarity and difference seems to be advantageous for women because societal perspectives view them as unique, and interestingly, they prefer this uniqueness. Instead of altering an individual's complete cognitive processing, a defense lawyer merely needs to ingeniously highlight and emphasize that women are traditionally perceived as more gentle and compassionate. In the broader perspective, the similarity/difference issue appears to be more detrimental to the pursuit of equality based on a significant drawback pointed out by Jamieson, as previously discussed in this essay.

The author holds the view that although women in capital punishment cases may experience some benefits from gender bias, this is not justifiable based on two key principles. The first principle named in this assertion relates to the ideal of equality. To attain a truly balanced society, we need to practice equity in every direction and circumstance. If gender bias is permitted in one scenario and disallowed in another, it creates an opportunity for inconsistent attitudes towards equality across all domains.

The aim of equality is to integrate it into our unconscious thought process. Maintaining gender prejudice in capital penalty trials simply leads to a detrimental pattern counterproductive to the intended goal. The second argument also concerns the principle of equality, but approaches it from a different perspective. If gender prejudice is approved in these situations, we risk falling into the similar snare of endorsing racial bias in the legal proceedings. Can it be justified, to categorize "all" African Americans or Hispanic Americans as implacable and cruel merely because they represent a significant proportion of offenders in our prison systems?

The likely answer would be no. If gender bias is tolerated,

we are implicitly condoning racial bias in our society. The concept of equality creates a connection across different groups and races. As alluded to in the initial statement, various groups have traversed their paths through history, often intersecting in their mutual pursuit for equality. Acknowledging the importance of diversity is essential, but we must also reach a point where we unanimously believe that at the very core, there is an inherent similarity amongst us as humans that cannot be dismissed.