Pro

Recently, the face of Kang Ho-sun, a serial killer, was published in several newspapers. Since then, the issue of whether criminals' faces should be published or not has become a controversial matter. Should the faces of criminals be published? My answer is "Yes."

We need to support the public publishing of criminals' faces because the public has the right to know. In other words, they have the right to know who criminals are, what they did, and what they are like. However, the mass media often show us police urgently hiding the face of criminals. The reason for their behavior is to protect the rights of criminals.

Is protecting the rights of criminals important? I think it is not important. The object which the government must protect is not the criminals. That is victims and their families. After criminals are caught, victims and their families' severe pain and sorrow still continue. Not considering the rights of victims and their families, talking about protecting the rights of criminals is preposterous.

In addition, criminals have infringed on human rights. In other words, they violated a law. Without the law, liberty cannot exist and human rights cannot be protected. Protecting the rights of criminals who ignore the rights of others is contradictory.

In Japan, the moment criminals are arrested, their faces are published by the mass media. America is almost the same as Japan. Those countries put more importance on the public's rights rather than on each criminal's individual rights.

Also, I think publishing the faces of criminals is effective in the prevention of crimes. Common people are not afraid of publishing their faces, but criminals and potential criminals can be afraid of it. In other words, publishing the faces of criminals strikes fear in them.

At this moment, criminals like Kang Ho-sun still commit crimes. To solve this problem, we need to have effective precautionary measures. If publishing the faces of criminals is effective in the prevention of crimes, there is no reason for putting it off anymore. Therefore, the faces of criminals should be published to protect the good of the public and public safety.


Con

Recently, the matter of publicizing criminals' faces has become a hot issue. On the Internet, many netizens argue about whether criminals' faces should be publicized or not. Most of them claim that they should be publicized, but there are also several problems if criminal's faces are publicized.

The first reason objectors oppose the matter is the protection of the human rights of criminals and the privacy of their families. On the other side, supporters of this issue can claim that criminals didn't keep the most basic human morality, and people also have a right to know their personal information. However, if their faces and personal information are publicized, their families and relatives who didn't do anything wrong will suffer a blow in normal life. In addition, it is not legal to reveal criminals' personal information before receiving a verdict of their guilt. If a criminal's personal information is revealed when their guilt is not completely certain and they are given a verdict of "not guilty," they will not be able to get back to their normal life owing to the information publicized about them.

The second problem is the difficulty of setting standards on publicizing information. For what crime can we publicize their faces and at what stage in the judicial process? If publicizing a criminal's face is allowed in the circumstance that these ambiguities are not solved yet, it is possible that the mass media can abuse information to satisfy the public's curiosity even though the evidence which proves their guilt is insufficient.

Finally, the most serious thing for publicizing criminals' faces is that they are destined to live in darkness forever, excluded from any opportunity to change their lives, even if they admit their crimes and atone for their faults. Especially in the case of juvenile criminals, rehabilitation is more important to prevent crimes.

Before we think of publicizing criminals' faces, exact standards and careful consideration should precede its enforcement.