I've had my first meeting with my Extended Project Supervisor, and I went in with about 7 potential titles for my project - and now I have a really good idea of exactly what I'm going to write about.
The focus is going to be whether the intention that a person has when committing a crime should make them exempt from the consequences of that action, and what factors might be taken into consideration with sentencing. For me, it's an endlessly fascinating subject, and I really like the idea of being able to explore issues such as the manslaughter and murder debate, and also perhaps even look into whether the punishment ever really fits the crime.
Something else that I'd really like to explore, perhaps not as the major focus, but instead as a factor, is the Euthanasia debate. This is particularly poignant as the Tony Nicklinson case particularly caught my intention when it broke out in the news over the past three or so years, and it had been something that I was following as it progressed.
Personally, I think that Euthanasia, particularly "assisted suicide," is not an inherently bad idea, but something that I question is whether it would ever be able to implemented in society without some vulnerable people being put in danger. Not something for my essay perhaps, but it would be particularly interesting to explore what safe-guards and systems could be put in place to protect the greater society.
The main distinction that I'm going to have to make is what exactly "intention" means. I question whether pre-meditation should be taken into account, and whether perhaps some cases of pre-meditated murder may also be classed as self-defence, and whether killing a person may sometimes be the better of two evils (e.g. Euthanasia). There are even some cases where I want to explore whether the law has a right to interfere if people do not want or feel that they need protecting each other: this is particularly poignant in cases of sado-masochism, etc.
Similarly, the "anti-spanking movement" and the legislation which means that parents can no longer physically punish their children, families not only have a Right to Family Life, but - at least I found from when I was growing up - it was actually quite a good way of keeping me in line. I don't think I'm any less of a person, any more repressed than anyone else, and I think in some cases I literally gave my parents no other choice. But like I said, that's just my case - and I wouldn't presume to say that all children are safe from their parents - but I would perhaps argue that a blanket ban is not the answer. And besides, looking at my extended project title, the line between spanking children for punishment and abuse is that the intention is a loving one - parents want their children to learn from their mistakes, and be the best they can be. Perhaps this would take up some part of my Project, but I'll need to do a bit more research into the specific law.
Feel free to comment, in fact I encourage it - thank you for reading :)
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