{"id":63,"date":"2025-10-17T14:42:25","date_gmt":"2025-10-17T13:42:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/?p=63"},"modified":"2025-10-17T16:07:47","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T15:07:47","slug":"whats-so-funny-about-killing-people-the-assassin-ps-heads-of-state","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/?p=63","title":{"rendered":"What\u2019s so funny about killing people? \u2018The Assassin\u2019 (PS: &#8216;Heads of State&#8217;)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"453\" src=\"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/TheAssassin-1024x453.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-64\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/TheAssassin-1024x453.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/TheAssassin-300x133.png 300w, https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/TheAssassin-768x340.png 768w, https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/TheAssassin.png 1444w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>A shot rings out across the square of a village on a small Greek island, where a wedding party has just emerged into the sunshine. One person dies, then another; within seconds five people are dead. Pause (for reloading). Then another five as everyone ducks for cover. One person gets out of the square, drives into the hills where the sniper is shooting, lures him out of hiding, and kills him, smashing his head in with a large stone.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Then, three men, dressed in black and driving an oversized, black SUV, appear in the square. One says they are from Interpol, looking for the person who just has escaped. When challenged about his ID, the man shoots the questioner, and the other two men use their machine guns to mow down everyone else in the square, bar one man \u2013 ironically, the village butcher \u2013 who manages to stay hidden.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Cue laughter. But why do we laugh? <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Read the rest of <a href=\"https:\/\/donnordbergwriting.substack.com\/p\/whats-so-funny-about-killing-people\">What\u2019s so funny about killing people? \u2018The Assassin\u2019 (PS: &#8216;Heads of State&#8217;)<\/a> on Susbstack.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"179\" src=\"http:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/DNwriting-banner-large-1024x179.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-60\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/DNwriting-banner-large-1024x179.png 1024w, https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/DNwriting-banner-large-300x53.png 300w, https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/DNwriting-banner-large-768x135.png 768w, https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/DNwriting-banner-large.png 1204w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A shot rings out across the square of a village on a small Greek island, where a wedding party has just emerged into the sunshine. One person dies, then another; within seconds five people are dead. Pause (for reloading). Then another five as everyone ducks for cover. One person gets out of the square, drives &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/?p=63\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">What\u2019s so funny about killing people? \u2018The Assassin\u2019 (PS: &#8216;Heads of State&#8217;)<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-63","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-criticism","category-don-nordberg-is-on-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=63"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":65,"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/63\/revisions\/65"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=63"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=63"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stourbend.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=63"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}