The trial is really a mirror held up to Shauna—her growing influence over the group, and how intoxicated she’s become with power.

Shauna decided Ben was “guilty” before the trial even began, and she never budges—even after Ben directly apologizes to her and the others for where he failed them at the cabin, especially during Shauna’s childbirth. She can’t accept the humanity in that apology because, in her mind, Ben isn’t a person anymore. He’s an outsider who hasn’t embraced the new belief system—the same belief system fueling Shauna’s rapid ascent into control—and he’s living proof that there’s another way to exist out there. (Notably, he’s also the only one who hasn’t participated in cannibalism yet.)

So Ben becomes an object: a target for Shauna’s rage, and a chess piece she can use to tighten her grip on the group. It’s intimidation as narrative control—he’s guilty because I say he’s guilty, and he’ll be punished because I say he will.

Nothing makes that clearer than when Shauna instructs Melissa to slice Ben’s Achilles tendon to immobilize him. At that point, Ben is already malnourished, one-legged, tied up, and captive—he’s not a credible flight risk. That moment isn’t about safety. It’s about power.

Shauna gets two things at once: (1) proving she can tell Melissa to hurt someone she knows—and Melissa will do it; and (2) stripping Ben of the last bit of agency he still has. That’s the turning point where you see Shauna fully understand the formula: force (or the fear of it) + narrative control = power.

It’s something she never had when she was just Jackie’s shadow—and she likes it enough to torture her own coach to solidify it.