#MurderTrending

In #MurderTrending, public executions are a source of entertainment for millions of the Postman app users. While this may seem like a far-fetched premise, the use of public executions as both spectacle and deterrent spans history and the globe—and may be making a comeback.

Public executions have been common throughout the history of human civilizations. Criminals were crucified in ancient Rome and Persia. In China, executions have been documented as far back as the Tang Dynasty. Americans and Europeans, however, are most familiar with the brutal executions that took place in the United Kingdom during the Middle Ages, when capital prisoners were burned, drowned, broken on the wheel, or if their crime was truly egregious—like being a traitor or assassin—hanged, drawn, and quartered. Those found guilty of witchcraft in Salem, Massachusetts, during the witch trials of 1692-1693 were hanged, with one exception, who was crushed to death by stones. The invention of the guillotine made beheadings the most common form of public execution during the French Revolution’s Reign of Terror from 1793-1794. Enthusiastic spectators would even take souvenirs, dipping their handkerchiefs into the blood of the executed nobility, much as the Postman app users buy merchandise featuring the Painiacs and the dead inmates. Dee envisions the sales of “T-shirts depicting her mangled corpse” helping her dad pay for her legal bills (5).

Historically, the purposes of public executions were to punish the offender, entertain the masses, demonstrate the power of authority, and keep people from committing crimes. According to a Harvard Law School exhibit, “Pageantry and spectacle helped achieve these goals” (“Visualizing Capital Punishment Online Exhibit: Spectacle.” Harvard Law School). On the surface, the Postman app has the same goals. Dee comments, “Broadcasting the over-the-top theatrics of the Postman’s psychotic killers—each with their own thematic brand of murder—not only reminded citizens of what awaited them if they broke the law but kept them glued to their screens, where they were less likely to break said laws in the first place” (2). Historian Richard van Dülmen called public executions “the theater of horror” because they followed a carefully scripted procedure and offered high drama for the crowds who came to watch. (Harrington, Joel F. “The Director of the Theater of Horror: What Was It Like to Be an Executioner in the 16th Century?” Slate, 30 May 2017). Executions on Alcatraz 2.0 have the same theatrical quality. The Painiacs draw attention to the violence of the victims’ deaths; Gucci, for instance, arranges Blair’s severed head next to her body for the greatest, goriest effect.

While some medieval spectators saw public executions as an opportunity to reflect on their own sins and consider how to atone for them, others “were drawn to the drama, the gossip, and the communal nature of the events” (Floyd, Trevor. “Don’t Lose Your Head: Why Were Executions Public?” Marin Theater Company, 30 Aug. 2023). The spectacle of public executions often included taunting and demeaning the condemned prisoners and displaying their bodies after death. The Postman app viewers react the same way their medieval counterparts did but use modern methods: making snarky, demeaning comments about the Painiacs’ victims. They are drawn in by “bloodlust,” as Blair thinks, and by the graphic, horror-movie adrenaline rush. They also have their own active community in the comment feeds and the Postman Forum.

Public executions declined in the 19th century. Today, most countries have abolished public execution and shifted criminal punishments to incarceration or private executions. Great Britain stopped public executions in 1868 and France in 1939. The last public execution in the United States was in 1936, when a Black man named Rainey Bethea was hanged in front of 20,000 people in Owensboro, Kentucky. He had confessed to raping and murdering an elderly white woman. The crowded, “carnival”-like atmosphere at his hanging likely led to the end of public executions in the US (“The Last Public Execution in America.” NPR, 1 May 2001).

Public executions went out of favor for several reasons. Opponents were concerned about the trauma it could cause witnesses. Others believed, as Elizabeth Bruenig, writing for The Atlantic drily states, “it was neither decent nor ennobling for the citizenry to enjoy deaths by violence as a spectator sport” (Bruenig, Elizabeth. “Don’t Execute People in Public: But Don’t Execute Them in Secret, Either.” The Atlantic, 10 May 2023). McNeil advances a similar viewpoint, suggesting that watching violent deaths on social media desensitizes users. Finally, most people viewed public execution as a horrific violation of human rights because “it is particularly cruel and degrading to the person being executed” (“Death Penalty Issues.” The Advocates for Human Rights).

McNeil’s dark vision of the return of public executions for entertainment and crime control, however, draws from recent developments. Donald Trump, the former reality TV star whose presidential administration executed more Americans in 2020 than were executed in all 50 US states combined, has indicated enthusiasm for returning to “archaic” methods of capital punishment like the firing squad and the guillotine. (Suebsaeng, Asawin, and Patrick Reis. “Trump Plans to Bring Back Firing Squads, Group Executions If He Retakes White House.” Rolling Stone, 14 Feb. 2023). Trump allegedly even contemplated creating a video campaign to promote new methods of execution containing actual footage of executions. While a spokesperson called the story about the ad campaign “fake news,” Rolling Stone notes that Trump had previously suggested creating grisly video ads showing piles of bodies to scare kids away from drugs (Asawin). The Postman app may not be so far-fetched after all.

Bruenig believes that if public executions return, they would be “vulgarized”—popularized and dehumanized (Bruenig). Bruenig imagines that “[a] vulgar execution may be televised or livestreamed or otherwise alchemized into content, but like any content, it need not expose the truth. If public executions were to return, they would be edited for effect, and consumed on phone screens and tablets and laptops; the profiteers would be the usual networks and streaming platforms” (Bruenig).