[originaltext]M: Now I’ll take some questions.W: Well, Mr. Brown, I have a que

M: Now I’ll take some questions.
W: Well, Mr. Brown, I have a question. Isn’t it true that the public supports the death penalty? I read that according to recent statistics, sixty-seven percent of Americans favor the death penalty in cases of murder. That’s two-thirds of the population! M: It’s true that there is support for the death penalty, but it is also true that people’s moods and opinions are difficult to understand through statistics. I think this figure might reflect people’s concern about violent crime in general. The United States is by far the most violent industrialized nation. In the United States, there are about nine murders a year per one hundred thousand people. In Japan, for example, that figure is 0. 5. In France, it’s 1. 1. So Americans are understandably concerned about violence.
W: Excuse me, Mr. Brown. What did you say the figure was in the United States?
M: It’s about nine murders per year, per one hundred thousand people.
W: I’d like to make a comment. I mean, if someone commits a really bad crime, don’t they deserve to be punished just as severely?
M: As I often tell my students at the university, the problem with the death penalty is that on an emotional level, you can understand why people want it. If you’ve suffered the loss of a loved one, your immediate response is to want revenge; it’ s a normal, natural reaction. But I feel that the reason we have laws is that they allow us to rise above our personal, emotional response to crime. This form of retribution is not the answer. The idea of having laws in a society is that together, as a society, we are stronger than the sum of our parts. We can rise above our personal, emotional response to crime. The legal system is supposed to elevate us: it is set up so that it is better than us. Individually, we are flawed, but as a society we are strong.
W: I thought it was interesting what you said about the death penalty not being fair, because it was applied to some people but not to others. Could you talk a little bit more about that to our students?
M: Yes. In many ways, capital punishment is very arbitrary. If you really believed in the death penalty as a principle, as a punishment for a horrific crime, then every single person who has committed this crime would have to be executed. But that would mean that we would have about fifty thousand executions a year. That’s absurd. Nobody would stand for that. It would mean that the state was some kind of killing machine. The fact is that we do execute some people, but other people who have committed similar crimes are not executed. So the death penalty is not applied equally to all people.
W: Mr. Brown, I’d like to thank you for your comments today. I’m opposed to the death penalty myself, and I don’t think we talk enough about these issues.
Question No. 11 About what issue is Mr. Brown being interviewed?
Question No. 12 What is the approximate number of murders a year per one hundred thousand people in the United States?
Question No. 13 What is Mr. Brown most probably?
Question No. 14 What does Mr. Brown actually say about the death penalty?
Question No. 15 Which of the following statements is true according to the interview?