Teen Times: Who's the real monster? Saddam Hussein has been sentenced to death by hanging and it seems that the world is rejoicing. Finally we have a verdict after a year of trial and finally the world will be rid of this monster. But was the decision the right one? Saddam Hussein had a long and bloody history as ruler of Iraq. He fabricated numerous conspiracies over the years as a way to eliminate potential competitors from the government. In 1980, he launched a war on Iran that would last eight years and cost hundreds of thousands of lives, writes Fiona Fahy

Truly, he was a ruthless dictator, whose methods were nothing short of barbaric. Of course we're better than him. Aren't we? After reading about the sentencing, I was interested to see the world's reaction.

I went researching on the internet and as I skimmed through the forums, I was shocked by people's reactions. An alarming number of people think the death penalty is too good for him and one passionate American teenager typed: "Hang him up and let the world be rid of him. Hang him up." Nobody seems willing to speak out against this atrocity, so I guess it'll have to be me.

The death penalty is barbaric; there is no other way to put it. The motto of today's world is "equality for all", but clearly this didn't even come into consideration when deciding on such a medieval method as hanging. Why don't we just guillotine him instead?

Let's forget for the moment the possible consequences of this action and strip this matter down to the bare minimum. A man committed a crime and was responsible for the death of many other people. Now we are going to kill this man to even the score. That just doesn't make sense. Two wrongs don't make a right and the deaths of those other people will not be changed by more death.

President Bush has said that Saddam is at last facing the justice he denied to millions. Will somebody please explain to me how this is justice? Lock Saddam up and he will have a lifetime to think about the crimes he committed, but sentencing him to death means just one more death on a list that has already gone on too long. Nothing validates taking a life, and that includes Saddam's war crimes. It's absurd that we claim to have the high moral ground when in reality we're stooping to his level. The death penalty is nothing more than murder masquerading as justice. Are we going to join him on the list of murderers? Are we going to put ourselves on equal standing with him?

I think back on those comments I read in the internet forums and I'm sad for the world, which still feels that violence is the only real way to get results. I ask myself, who is the real monster here, because I somehow don't think it's the old man who sits in prison, waiting for the noose to drop.

Fiona Fahy (17) is in sixth year at St Joseph of Cluny in Killiney, Co Dublin

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