Abhorrent public executions are used in dictatorships like Iran, Afghanistan, and North Korea. We might not be surprised by the savagery of the Mullahs or by dictatorships which routinely resort to barbarism. But such macabre and grotesque spectacles should have no place in a democracy like the United States. In 1849 Charles Dickens wrote to The Times after witnessing a public execution and said “I stand astounded and appalled by the wickedness it exhibits.” Britain banned public executions in 1868. The death penalty has been banned in all cases since 1998. In the case of Iran, tomorrow’s “No to Execution Tuesdays”campaign will be marked by political prisoners across 66 Iranian prisons who have staged weekly hunger strikes demanding the abolition of the death penalty. Gina Romero, UN Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of peaceful assembly and of association, will join tomorrow's hunger strike campaign and has shared this video: If we truly believe in the Greek, Roman, Judaea-Christian values which have shaped our civilisation, we must be clear in spelling out what distinguishes us from barbarism- public executions being a very clear example.