In Cold Blood Persuasive Essay The debate nature versus nurture is a prevalent topic in today’s society because the violence going on. People would like to know whether a criminal is born or a criminal is made. A great example of nature versus nurture is the nonfiction novel In Cold Blood by Truman Capote. This book follows around two characters Perry Smith and Richard (Dick) Hickock. Together, they killed a small town family for forty dollars in cash. Capote tells of their lives before the killing, on the run, and when they were on death row. It is clear to the reader that Perry was not born a criminal, but his horrible childhood coupled with mental illness allowed him to not feel the wrong he was doing. Dick, on the other hand, was born a criminal, and this is shown through his pedophiliac episodes and the fact he was able to be ashamed of what he was. Nurture is more important than nature because with good nurturing what nature has given somebody can be erased or made better. Perry Smith had nature curse him but nurture fail him. In his childhood he recalls his parents fighting from an early age. He witnessed his father beating his mother. Perry showed signs of abnormality in his childhood several times such as the time he took a gun and pretended to shoot his brother. “After I …show more content…
In Perry’s case the environment around him allowed him to never be taught right from wrong he was never shown how to treat other people. If Perry would have had parents who were not fighting each other and payed more attention to him, Perry would have never become a killer. On the other hand, there is no explanation to why Dick was the way he was. Nurture was overpowered by nature, but if Dick was able to college maybe he would not have acted upon the urges that he had. Nurture could have allowed both of these men to not be involved in a killing that not only ended the lives of four innocent people but ended their