Law

Do you think a crime committed against a nun should carry a greater punishment than the same crime committed against a prostitute? Or in other words should their perceived social standing be taken into account when sentencing?

Comments

No, social standing should play no part in sentencing. Nor indeed should moral standing. We might think that the nun in question was more deserving of our sympathy than the prostitute, or we might think the reverse, but sentencing should be based on what the criminal deserves to receive, not on the qualities of the victim. On a consequentialist view of punishment we might seek to protect some social groups by punishing crimes against them disproportionately, and then there would need to be an argument as to why the effects of such a policy are particularly desirable, yet many would feel that such a policy reveals what is wrong with consequentialism in ethics, since it deviates from aligning punishment with desert.

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