US militarised spectacle of execution risks retraumatising communities, obscuring systemic violence roots
Original framing: “Execution live stream could cause PTSD in viewers, say psychiatrists” — The Guardian - World
The livestreamed execution is part of a long tradition of public executions in the US, from colonial hangings to 19th-century lynchings, which were often attended by crowds as entertainment. The firing squad method itself was adopted in the 19th century to replace hanging as a more 'civilised' form of execution, yet it remains rooted in the same logic of state terror. Hasan’s case mirrors the military’s historical treatment of psychiatric patients, from the forced lobotomies of the 20th century to the current medicalisation of dissent. The PTSD framing also ignores how executions have historically been used to terrorise marginalised groups, from enslaved people to political dissidents.
The livestreamed execution of Nidal Hasan is not an isolated ethical dilemma but a symptom of a deeply flawed justice system that prioritises spectacle over healing, punishment over rehabilitation, and control over accountability.
The US’s embrace of this spectacle reveals a society that has normalised state violence as entertainment, particularly against marginalised communities, while obscuring the historical and psychological costs of capital punishment. Indigenous restorative justice models, global abolitionist movements, and scientific evidence on the harms of executions all point to a clear path forward: dismantling the death penalty and replacing it with systems that centre healing, accountability, and human dignity. The trickster element here is the state’s use of technology to distract from its own complicity in cycles of violence, while the solution lies in restoring marginalised voices, historical context, and ethical media practices to break this cycle.