Ep 139 - When Justice Becomes Entertainment

The Trump administration abandoned its plan to livestream the execution of the Fort Hood murderer. But the fact that it wanted an audience in the first place tells us something disturbing about how the people in power understand justice.

When the government turns an execution into a public spectacle, the line between administering justice and staging entertainment becomes dangerously blurred.

On November 5, 2009, Army Major Nidal Hasan opened fire at Fort Hood, Texas, killing thirteen people and wounding thirty-two others. The victims were soldiers and civilians, people going about their lives in a place where they should have been safe. Hasan was convicted of premeditated murder and attempted murder, and in 2013, a military jury sentenced him to death. His crimes were monstrous, his victims deserve to be remembered, and nothing about the controversy surrounding his execution changes either of those facts.

Seventeen years later, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth decided that carrying out Hasan's sentence wasn't enough. He wanted the execution to be public. A Pentagon official subsequently confirmed plans to livestream it, potentially allowing millions of Americans to watch their government put a convicted murderer to death. President Donald Trump initially supported the idea before reversing course on October 15. The livestream was canceled, although the execution itself remained scheduled, subject to legal proceedings.

That reversal was welcome. But it left a question that deserves considerably more attention than it has received: How did the United States reach a point where its secretary of defense thought broadcasting an execution was an appropriate demonstration of American strength?

There is a fundamental difference between a government exercising its legal authority to punish someone and a government deliberately turning that punishment into a public spectacle. One concerns the administration of justice. The other concerns the performance of power. And when the people holding that power begin looking for an audience, we ought to be asking why.

America's Uncomfortable History With Public Executions

For much of American history, executions were public events. Communities gathered in town squares and courthouse yards to watch condemned prisoners hang. Authorities justified the practice as a warning to potential criminals, a demonstration of the consequences of wrongdoing, and sometimes a religious lesson about sin and repentance. The condemned would die, the public would supposedly learn something, and society would emerge safer and more obedient. That was the theory, anyway.

The reality was considerably less dignified. Public executions attracted enormous crowds, sometimes numbering in the thousands. Vendors sold food. Spectators drank, laughed, cheered, and treated the occasion as entertainment. What was supposed to be a solemn exercise of justice could become something resembling a carnival, with another human being's death serving as the main attraction.

Over time, Americans began questioning whether this was an appropriate way for a government to exercise its most irreversible power. During the nineteenth century, states gradually moved executions behind prison walls. The reasons varied, from concerns about unruly crowds to changing ideas about dignity and public morality. The transition was neither immediate nor universal, and private executions introduced legitimate concerns about secrecy and accountability. But the broader direction was unmistakable: Americans increasingly recognized that punishment did not require an audience.

One of the final chapters in that history unfolded in Owensboro, Kentucky, in August 1936, when Rainey Bethea, a Black man convicted of rape, was publicly hanged before an enormous crowd. Estimates of attendance reached approximately twenty thousand people. The event drew national attention, in part because of the disturbing atmosphere surrounding it. Bethea's death is widely remembered as America's last public judicial execution before an unrestricted crowd. Kentucky subsequently abandoned public hangings.

There is also a racial history here that should not be ignored. Public executions in the American South existed alongside the horrific practice of racial terror lynchings. The two were legally distinct, but both could involve crowds gathering to witness the killing of a Black person, sometimes in an atmosphere of celebration. That history is a reminder that the public display of punishment has not always been about justice. It has also been about humiliation, intimidation, and the demonstration of power.

Ninety years after Bethea's execution, Hegseth proposed bringing the audience back. Only this time, there would be no need to gather around a gallows. The spectators could watch from their living rooms, on their computers, or through their phones. And unlike the people who attended an execution in 1936, modern viewers could record the footage, edit it, repost it, and circulate it indefinitely. The government would not simply be conducting an execution. It would be producing material for the internet.

The Company We Would Be Keeping

Public executions have become increasingly unusual around the world, and the governments that continue conducting them are hardly models of democratic accountability. Amnesty International documented at least seventeen public executions in 2025, including eleven in Iran and six in Afghanistan. Those figures reflect documented cases, not necessarily every execution that occurred. Independent verification is difficult in countries where governments restrict access to information.

Iran's authoritarian theocracy has used public hangings as part of a broader system of punishment enforced by religious and political authorities. Under Taliban rule, Afghanistan has staged executions before enormous crowds, including one in a sports stadium in December 2025. Human-rights investigators have also documented testimony describing public executions in North Korea, where displays of punishment can function as warnings to the population. Saudi Arabia has a well-established historical record of public beheadings, although that history should not be confused with proof that its recent executions have all been public.

These governments are not identical, and neither are their legal systems or the circumstances surrounding their executions. Nor does proposing a public execution make the United States equivalent to an authoritarian dictatorship. America has constitutional protections, independent courts, and democratic institutions that distinguish it from those regimes. Those differences matter. But they do not make every decision by an American official automatically wise, moral, or defensible.

When a practice has become particularly associated with authoritarian governments and religious theocracies, perhaps the American secretary of defense should think carefully before deciding it would be a wonderful addition to our own system of punishment. The question isn't whether the United States has the legal authority to execute Hasan. The question is what purpose would be served by inviting the world to watch.

Pete Hegseth and the Performance of Toughness

To understand why this proposal is so troubling, it helps to consider the man who made it. Pete Hegseth is a combat veteran, and his military service deserves acknowledgment. There is nothing inherently wrong with a defense secretary emphasizing readiness, discipline, or the ability to defeat America's enemies. A military must be capable of using force when necessary. But there is a difference between possessing strength and constantly needing to perform it.

Hegseth has made toughness a defining feature of his public identity. His speeches emphasize the warrior ethos, maximum lethality, overwhelming violence, and the removal of restrictions he believes interfere with military effectiveness. He has criticized what he considers politically correct rules of engagement and promoted an image of military leadership rooted in aggression and masculine strength. Even an initiative involving testosterone screening for service members was publicly branded with the phrase “The High-T Department of War.” Apparently, even military health policy needs to sound like an advertisement for a testosterone supplement.

The consequences become more serious when that rhetoric touches the laws governing military force. In March, Hegseth used the phrase “no quarter, no mercy” while discussing American military operations against Iran. In the laws of armed conflict, declaring that no quarter will be given has a specific and deeply troubling meaning: refusing to spare enemy combatants who surrender. Such declarations are prohibited. Hegseth later insisted that American forces follow the law, and his remarks do not establish that he issued an unlawful order. But words matter when they come from someone entrusted with directing the most powerful military on earth.

Military professionalism isn't measured exclusively by the amount of violence an organization can deliver. It is also measured by discipline, judgment, restraint, and respect for lawful limits. Sometimes the most important demonstration of strength is knowing when force is unnecessary. That is not weakness. It is the difference between an institution that controls its power and one that merely celebrates possessing it.

Which brings us back to Hasan. He is not an armed enemy charging an American position. He is a convicted prisoner, already in custody, entirely under the government's control. There is no battlefield objective accomplished by broadcasting his death. No tactical victory. No military necessity. Whatever legal or moral arguments might support carrying out his sentence, turning that execution into a public performance adds nothing essential to the administration of justice.

Viewed alongside Hegseth's broader rhetoric, the livestream proposal raises a disturbing possibility: that the display of force has become almost as important as the responsible exercise of it. We cannot know his private motives simply by examining his public statements. But we can evaluate the philosophy those statements communicate, and we can question whether it is appropriate for someone holding such extraordinary authority.

When Religion Becomes an Excuse for Spectacle

The religious arguments surrounding the proposal were equally revealing. Robert Jeffress, the prominent Dallas pastor and longtime Trump supporter, defended the idea by invoking the biblical justification for capital punishment. His argument was that executions demonstrate the sanctity of human life and that allowing more people to witness them would reinforce the lesson.

That reasoning deserves scrutiny. Believing that capital punishment is biblically permissible does not automatically establish that executions should be broadcast. The authority to impose a punishment and the wisdom of displaying it are separate moral questions. And there is something deeply unsettling about invoking the sanctity of human life to justify making the taking of a human life into a public event.

Doug Wilson, an influential conservative Christian pastor whose religious network includes the church Hegseth attends, has also expressed support for public executions. Wilson has acknowledged the possibility that such events could become spectacles, yet he has nevertheless defended the practice. His religious and political philosophy is associated with a movement that seeks a substantially greater role for its interpretation of Christianity in public life. That connection does not prove Wilson influenced Hegseth's proposal, nor does it mean the defense secretary agrees with every position Wilson holds. But it makes the religious dimension of the controversy impossible to dismiss.

Fortunately, Christianity was not speaking with one voice. Catholic leaders, including Archbishop Paul Coakley and Detroit Archbishop Edward Weisenburger, condemned the proposed broadcast. Weisenburger invoked the public execution of Jesus himself and questioned how turning another person's death into a spectacle could be reconciled with the Gospel. The African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church also objected while acknowledging the horror of Hasan's crimes.

That disagreement matters because the question isn't whether Christians may support capital punishment. Many do. Others, including the Catholic Church, oppose it. The more immediate question is whether a faith centered on mercy, humility, repentance, and the dignity of human beings should be invoked to encourage an audience to watch somebody die.

And there is another question worth asking: Would Hegseth have been equally enthusiastic about publicly broadcasting the execution of a Christian extremist who murdered thirteen Americans in the name of his faith? We cannot know how he would respond to a hypothetical case. But given the religious and political rhetoric surrounding this administration, skepticism about whether the same standards would apply is hardly unreasonable. Justice guided by principle should not change according to the religious identity of the person being punished.

Hasan embraced a violent extremist interpretation of Islam. His actions were his own, and they should not be attributed to Muslims generally. Likewise, violence committed in Christianity's name should not be treated as representative of Christians generally. If we believe in equal justice, that principle must apply consistently, even when doing so is politically inconvenient.

The Deterrence Argument Doesn't Settle the Question

Supporters of the broadcast suggested that watching Hasan's execution might deter others from committing similar crimes. It sounds plausible enough. Show people the consequences of violence, and perhaps they'll think twice before committing it. But plausibility is not evidence.

In 2012, the National Research Council examined research into whether capital punishment deters homicide and concluded that the existing studies could not reliably establish whether the death penalty increases, decreases, or has no effect on murder rates. That finding does not prove executions have no deterrent effect. It means the evidence was insufficient to draw a reliable conclusion. And the question of whether broadcasting an execution provides additional deterrence is even less established.

There is also a serious possibility of unintended consequences. Extremist movements sometimes celebrate the deaths of their followers as martyrdom and use images of those deaths as propaganda. Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson raised concerns that footage of Hasan's execution could become a recruiting tool for terrorists. It would be a remarkable failure of judgment if a video produced to demonstrate American strength ended up supplying extremist organizations with material for their own purposes.

Then there is the argument about transparency. Americans absolutely have a right to know how their government exercises its authority, especially when that authority involves taking a human life. Independent oversight, legal records, official witnesses, and meaningful public accountability are essential. But transparency and unrestricted public spectatorship are not synonyms. A government can be held accountable without turning an execution into something people consume for entertainment.

The distinction also matters for the victims' families. Some relatives may want to witness Hasan's execution. Others may find the experience unbearable. Both responses deserve respect. These are intensely personal decisions for people who have already suffered unimaginable losses. But allowing a family member to witness the execution is fundamentally different from inviting millions of strangers to watch it on their phones.

And the American public appeared to understand that distinction. An October Washington Post–ABC News–Ipsos poll found that a majority supported executing Hasan by firing squad, while approximately eighty percent opposed livestreaming the execution. Opposition extended across party lines, including among Republicans. Many Americans were willing to support the punishment while rejecting the spectacle.

The criticism eventually reached the administration itself. Republican officials expressed concerns. Religious leaders objected. And on October 15, Trump announced that the execution would not be livestreamed. The administration had backed away from an idea that should never have been presented as a demonstration of American strength in the first place.

Justice Shouldn't Need an Audience

I oppose the death penalty. I believe life imprisonment is a more appropriate punishment, even for people who have committed horrific crimes. But agreement with that position is not a prerequisite for recognizing the danger in what Hegseth proposed. You can believe Hasan deserves to be executed and still believe that the government has no business transforming his death into a public event.

The victims at Fort Hood deserve justice, remembrance, and respect. Their families deserve compassion and the freedom to decide how they wish to participate in the legal process. What they do not need is for their suffering to become the justification for a government-produced spectacle.

For a few days, the controversy surrounding Hasan's execution shifted attention away from the people he murdered and toward the possibility of watching him die. The cameras became the story. The audience became the story. And the defense secretary's desire to demonstrate toughness became the story. That alone should tell us something about how easily the performance of punishment can overshadow the people justice is supposed to serve.

America has a long and uncomfortable history with public executions. We have seen what happens when the administration of justice becomes a form of entertainment, when crowds gather not to contemplate the seriousness of a crime but to experience the excitement of another human being's death. We moved away from that practice for reasons that remain every bit as relevant in the age of livestreams and social media.

The United States government possesses extraordinary power. Its military leaders command weapons capable of unimaginable destruction. Its courts can impose punishments that permanently alter, or end, human lives. Those powers demand restraint, accountability, humility, and judgment. They do not demand an audience.

The cancellation of the livestream was the right decision. But the fact that it was proposed at all deserves to be remembered, because it revealed something about the people entrusted with that power. There is a difference between administering justice and celebrating the ability to punish. There is a difference between strength and the performance of strength. And there is a difference between a government that exercises authority responsibly and one that wants the world to watch it do so.

The ability to exercise power does not establish the wisdom of displaying it. And when the people holding that power begin looking for an audience, the rest of us should be asking whether what we're witnessing is justice—or simply entertainment.

SOURCES

Trump cancels Pentagon plan to livestream Nidal Hasan's execution — Reuters - https://www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-says-military-execution-ewill-not-be-livestreamed-2026-10-15/ Bipartisan backlash and Trump's reversal of the execution broadcast — Associated Press - https://apnews.com/article/9b48781e88660064bf0f5aa020db8df7 Background on the Fort Hood shooting, Hasan's conviction, and the proposed livestream — People - https://people.com/pete-hegseth-says-fort-hood-shooter-firing-squad-execution-will-be-livestreamed-so-public-can-watch-12165170 History of public executions in America and why the practice ended — Associated Press - https://apnews.com/article/e9b41d2c6425aa75e25e65dddc91ab7b Historical background on Rainey Bethea's 1936 execution in Kentucky — The Washington Post - https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/10/09/what-know-about-public-executions-why-they-stopped-us/ International comparison of countries conducting public executions — Associated Press - https://apnews.com/article/8a1858aeaf90ad7fd8c2e5c41d1f4f95 Worldwide death penalty statistics, including documented public executions in Iran and Afghanistan — Amnesty International - https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2026/05/death-penalty-in-2025-facts-and-figures/ Full 2025 global death sentences and executions report — Amnesty International - https://www.amnesty.org/en/documents/act50/0778/2026/en/ Taliban public execution at a sports stadium in Afghanistan in December 2025 — Associated Press - https://apnews.com/article/1c3eeecfec9c4eaad9c193973f0e89d2 Hegseth's testosterone-screening announcement and "High-T Department of War" branding — Stars and Stripes - https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2026-07-15/hegseth-approve-testosterone-testing-troops-22274442.html Medical and factual examination of Hegseth's testosterone-screening initiative — PolitiFact - https://politifact.com/article/2026/jul/22/testosterone-replacement-therapy-military-hegseth/ Robert Jeffress's biblical defense of livestreaming Hasan's execution — CBS Texas - https://www.cbsnews.com/texas/news/robert-jeffress-nidal-hasan-fort-hood-execution-livestream-october-2026/ Christian leaders' reactions, including Doug Wilson's support and Catholic opposition — Religion News Service - https://religionnews.com/2026/10/09/head-of-u-s-catholic-bishops-conference-condemns-public-execution-plans-as-promoting-a-culture-of-death/ Republican opposition, religious criticism, and concerns about terrorist propaganda — Reuters - https://www.reuters.com/world/us/vance-says-he-does-not-know-if-pentagon-will-proceed-with-livestream-fort-hood-2026-10-09/ Public opinion polling showing approximately 80% opposition to livestreaming Hasan's execution — The Washington Post / ABC News / Ipsos - https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2026/10/15/8-10-americans-oppose-live-streaming-execution-fort-hood-shooter-poll-shows/ Research review finding existing evidence insufficient to determine whether capital punishment deters homicide — National Research Council / National Academies - https://www.nationalacademies.org/publications/13363 Concerns that livestreaming an execution could create extremist propaganda and undermine the dignity of punishment — Axios - https://www.axios.com/2026/10/13/hegseth-public-execution-opposition-grows-trump-private-misgivings