Yes. It SHOULD ring alarms. It should have rang alarms 100 years ago. It should make the rich and elite sit down and really contemplate the fact that nobody, NOBODY, gives a damn if they die, and we’ll openly celebrate the fact that they just got shot in the face. The world will be happy they’re gone.
It should make them sit down and ask the all important question of WHY.
Why would a nation cheer wildly at their death? What have they done to deserve that kind of treatment? And when they start asking those questions, hopefully they find the answers. Hopefully something is put right in their face that forces them to empathize with those they’ve hurt, and those that would not hesitate to shoot.
I do not know the shooters name. I do not know the shooters identity. However we ALL know the shooters story. We may not know the specifics. He may be dying, and was denied his own health. He may be losing or already lost a loved one. Whatever the case, we all know the motive. And what should scare these CEOs is that Brian Thompson never learned a lesson. There was no 3 ghosts of Christmas. Brian Thompson was just walking down the street one day. And suddenly he was dead. He didn’t even have time to process it. He never knew his killers name. He may not have even known he was targeted. He may have died before he even realized what’s going on.
But the rest of them? They should all be sitting in their homes, thinking about if they’re next. WHY they would be next, and what they’ve done to potentially be targeted in the future. What can they do to stop it?
Because for once in my life, I’m seeing real consequences for corrupt and evil behavior. THATS why everyone is cheering. It’s been a long time coming, and we’re all just hoping this turns into Americas version of the french revolution.
We’re not against the idea of working hard and becoming rich for it. We’re against the idea of becoming rich by exploiting the literal lives of those you step on. And that seems to be almost the exclusive way to become rich in this country. It’s sickening.
We (in the US) just elected a grifting, criminal “billionaire”. I don’t think the animosity so loudly and gleefully displayed in the reactions to the murder of this asshole insurance ghoul is representative of a newly heightened consciousness of wealth inequality. I hope that it is the start of something, but I’ve been disappointed in the public way too many times.
Just dropping in to remind everyone, that there have been 2 assassination attempts on the ‘grifting, criminal “billionaire”’ in just the last 8 months and he’s been hiding behind thick glass in public.
I don’t think it will stop, because however many people you manage to manipulate via targeted brainwashing (social media), you create at least a few super angry, unpredictable folks with ever less to lose. And they all have guns.
Edit: Also, nothing stops someone with a gigantic grudge, patience and high motivation from joining a private security company, getting training, a gun, and placed directly in the vicinity of a potential target. Really, there’s no good defense except not giving a ton of people reasons to want to get rid of you.
Edit: Also, nothing stops someone with a gigantic grudge, patience and high motivation from joining a private security company, getting training, a gun, and placed directly in the vicinity of a potential target. Really, there’s no good defense except not giving a ton of people reasons to want to get rid of you.
Not to mention the use of DIY suicide drones.
I’m scared of his supporters becoming disenfranchised by and turning on him. They’re already so volatile that their violence isn’t always going to be as precise as a single bullet. There’s going to be civilian collateral damage. It’s hard celebrating all this, knowing the motherfucker had it coming, but considering the reality of violence, vigilantism and the kinds of people that do this (and the state they’re in when pushed enough)… yay dead rich murderous fuck… but shit, I’m scared for all of us. That dude could have missed… a stray could have killed someone. Couldn’t have gone through his head, shattered on his skull and shrapnel ricochets through a kid walking to school. Everyone wants street justice but forgets that living by the sword means living by the sword.
Definitely. This was more of a general comment.
I will copy/paste a thought I had about more a structured approach for dealing with corruption/oligarchs:
You need to put them on trial in a legitimate court (i.e. exclude compromised judiciary systems).
If the oligarch/senior lackey is found guilty, you could use real rehabilitation methods that would creates incentives for good behaviour for other criminals:
- Full asset seizure (every last cent, home, house, everything).
- Extended family and business partners being required to sign affidavits detailing their knowledge re: assets in [1], with an understanding that if the affidavit was found to have not been signed in good faith, they will be subject to full asset seizure and their own family and business partners will also have to sign similar affidavits for their own case. No statue of limitations for affidavits.
- 20 years mandatory live-in community service as junior support person at a hospice centre (minimum wage). Exact focus of community service would depend on crimes committed.
Agreed - the alarm bells should have been ringing long ago.
There was a social contract between the upper and lower class (the middle class is a lie used to further divide us) that was basically - we’ll let you have your mansions as long as our quality of life improves as well. But the rich have been hollowing out that agreement for decades. The highest tax bracket (the percentage taxed on income only above a certain amount) has plummeted since the middle of the 20th century. Regulations have been removed and replaced with weaker regulations (like Dodd/Frank) and then THOSE regulations have been hollowed out. Any sense of responsibility and duty the rich might have ever had to the people and place that rewarded them so greatly has vanished and in place of it is cynical and manipulative and greedy - because the only thing that matters is getting more and taking more - removing the safety barriers that keep them from getting more, no matter who it might hurt because somehow acquiring wealth has become the most important thing (not doing something great, improving the world, or helping others).
At each step, the social contract weakens. As long as enough people aren’t feeling the pain they’re going to abide by their part of the bargain because most of the rest of us ARE actually just trying to live good lives and make sure it’s good for those around us. But there will be a moment when enough people are feeling the pain and won’t have any other choice but to act. In a system where justice is only dealt to the lower class - that action is guaranteed to be carried out outside the system.
I like ownership and working class. That’s the real distinction seperateing us. People who work for money, and people who own things for money. Even 6 figure doctors and lawyers are working class.
There was never a social contract. Sorry, but that’s absolute nonsense. The power of the wealthy has always been engacted through manipulation, intimidation and fraud. Claiming there was a social contract between the wealthy and the rest of us is like claiming that there was a social contract between slaves and slave owners.
There’s no contract, there’s no agreement, there’s no relationship; that’s a fantasy concocted by the wealthy to justify their wealth. There is only power and exploitation. And exploitation will always grow worse over time.
They abuse us, and we let them abuse us because we’re not desperate enough to stop them.
Not yet.
But it’s getting there.
I mean the social contract is not always a physical thing and not always by explicit consent. Just by carrying out our part of the system and accepting the benefits of it (infrastructure/protection/stability) we are implicitly consenting to it.
That being said, I absolutely agree with you that it is always slanted heavily toward the wealthy and not to benefit the working class but only to keep them in line.
In a system where justice is only dealt to the lower class - that action is guaranteed to be carried out outside the system.
Ironically it appears that the solution is the second amendment solution that is championed by the right.
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Remember when the Panama/Paradise papers came out and there were practically no Americans listed in them because American tax law is already so favorable to the rich that they don’t even need to bother hiding assets?
The better technology gets, the better the oppression and suppression will get, the worse it will be before people revolt, eventually they will be too feeble to revolt effectively.
Where do you think we are in that progression?
Maybe, maybe not. There’s no way to predict what direction technology will go with certainty.
It could be the case that it eventually becomes impossible to revolt due to technology being insurmountable. Maybe it won’t be the case.
But what is certain is that people will revolt in mass if they have their backs against the wall and nothing to lose. And we’ve been circling the drain on that.
Considering how many people a year die at the hands of insurance companies delaying and denying life-saving treatments to make a quick buck, the glee over this insurance CEO’s death is a fairly rational response - a reminder to the 0.1% that they’re not quite as immune to consequences as they think they are.
Structural violence is s great term that should get more use in cases like this.
I hope we’ll get some data on how much more money and effort is spend on this compared to cases where the target is just some regular nobody.
This case is a great reminder of who the police really work for. If/when the shit hits the fan, you know whose side they’ll be on.
In before it gets rebranded Critical Structure Therory.
Wish people channeled this sentiment at the voting booth when Trump got on national TV and said he’d replace Obamacare with “concepts” of a plan he apparently was clueless of after 8 years of actively trying to destroy Obamacare.
Wish Harris channeled that sentiment in her campaign by championing M4A, so people might actually want to vote for her
It would of been a lie and never implemented. Even if they had the votes they’d find a democrat spoiler to ruin it in the last hour. Like they always do.
Yeah I mean it still wouldn’t have earned her my vote, but I guess I meant she should’ve just not been a liberal/Democrat lol
The system failed. It’s over.
Did it fail? As far as I can tell, the system has sucked since its inception, and continues to benefit the same people it always has
Point taken, I was referring quite literally to the system. It’s unlikely we’ll have another election, but if we do, expect the democrats to run Liz Cheney. Centrism doesn’t offend their class interests and they don’t care if they lose. So they’ll run a Republican and kneecap anyone to the left of a Republican.
I’m sure she would have if she had more campaign time. There were only so many news cycles between when she started and the election and the media did it’s usual thing of monopolizing coverage of Trump’s insanity (because outrage brings views).
why are there so many delusional Democrats?
It’s ok to admit both parties suck. Yes to different degrees, but you don’t have to gaslight yourself into thinking Democrats care about you
M4a wasn’t even on her platform (it was in 2020, so not having it was deliberate)
I voted for Harris, and straight Dem downballot. But no, Harris did not support M4A. Harris did in fact tack to the right during her campaign to try to pick up more moderate Republicans, and this killed my (and many others) enthusiasm and her campaign.
As said in one of the other replies to this comment, it is okay to admit both parties suck. (I am not both sides-ing this, they are not the same, but they both suck for the average American)
The Democratic party has a problem, and the last 3 presidential elections prove it. The last time a Democrat ran on a message of change (Obama), they won handily. But Obama didn’t deliver, and now if any Democrat promises change…well the masses are disillusioned…they don’t think the Democrats actually want change, and the thing is… they are right. Party insiders don’t want significant change to the systems. Biden barely won on a message of “getting back to normal”…when Americans were dying but the thousands, think about how close that race was. I voted for Biden, and Biden actually did okay, he steadied the ship…but did he change anything? Anything I could see and would effect me in my day-to-day life. No, not really. In fact, in most ways life has gotten worse since the pandemic. That may not be Biden’s fault, but he was the president, fault or not. It was his responsibility. Again, nothing changed. Then Harris ran on a slogan of “Not going back”… There is no promise for a future there. Not going back is just not MAGA. I voted for Harris, I hoped as her campaign got off the ground she would distinguish herself from the failure of imagination of the Biden admin. But she kept tacking rightward, she was showing up on stage with all these “centrist” republicans, she leaned into border policy, pro-business, pro-capital, pro-war stances. The same Democratic Party schlock that keeps killing any enthusiasm for a Democratic president since Obama.
The worse things is, we all know what the problems are, and for many of them we know the solutions. They aren’t easy, but there is nothing unique about the problems facing America.
“Unprecedented” Wealth Inequality has a precedence…see the gilded age and the new deal
Healthcare … Every civilized nation has a form of nationalized healthcare, except the US.
Political Polarization… the yellow journalism caused polarization in the 1880’s. Truth in journalism laws were passed, and not repealed until Reagan.
A stagnant ineffective congress. Repeal the filibuster. Beef up ethics investigations.
A compromised judiciary. Multiple presidents throughout history have decided to just ignore the supreme court, because the court has no means of enforcement, enforcement is invested in the executive branch (checks and balances and all that). Additionally, the SC right to review a law for constitutionality was created whole cloth by the Supreme Court, and does not itself exist in the constitution. Finally, expanding the SC can be done by Presidential Order. I mean the SC can decide that it is unconstitutional…but then what…the president seats the justices anyway. Done.
Money in politics. The president is the head of the Law Enforcement branch. There are already laws on the books to shut down corruption, foreign interference, etc… American citizens commit multiple felonies a day without even realizing it (thanks to our byzantine legal system), this is doubly true of all these Corporations and Super-PACs funneling money to and from campaigns and foreign nationals. The laws are there, the will to enforce them is not.
Most/All of this has precedence in the US or other liberal democracy. I am not saying it is easy, but I am saying that it could have been done if the Democrats wanted it.
And addressing these things has popular support. Everyone knows what is wrong, and everyone can see no one is even trying to fix it.
But instead we get slogans that amount to, “nothing will essentially change, but the other guy is worse”, and then wonder why 40% of Americans don’t show up to the polls.
There are a lot of people who have stopped showing up for the Democrats, not because they like Republicans, but because the Democrats stopped showing up for them.
Please copy and paste here, Good Sir or Madam:
I’ve been telling everyone I know for years that Healthcare is Americas biggest problem. The country is designed to pick your body clean before you die. You can work your entire life here and everything can be taken from you if you get sick.
The country is designed to pick your body clean before you die
This is called extracting value and people pay a lot of money to learn how to do it.
they did channel callous neolibralism in the defense of wealthy, white institutions at the voting both. you just think one of the choices would not have been that.
If the murder of the United Healthcare CEO is horrible news…
At the very annual general meeting that would have occurred had this not happened, would there have been a word describing the horribleness of the news that United made billions more than last year off the backs of American policy holders, American doctors/nurses/physicians/pharmacists, American taxpayers? I highly doubt it.
Every dollar in profit is the standard extraction of value from people, which may be warranted at a fixed rate for the services provided. Every dollar in increased profit is a squeezing of their customers, hopefully for an enhanced service to them in return. In healthcare, it was found that an enhanced return in value to customers was no longer necessary, when making money in crushing people’s lives is more profitable, legal and encouraged by shareholders and management.
It is bad that vigilantism is being celebrated (though I’ll admit to being aboard the “laugh about this specific murder” train).
But I think the reason that this is being celebrated is that this is the only kind of justice this guy could have ever faced because his crime is legal
If CEOs get to celebrate making money by killing people we get to celebrate vigilantism.
At least with vigilantism fewer people die.
People should have re-optimized the economy a long time ago.
Dont beat yourself up about it. Look at the context the public still has the last time billionaire died it was a submersible.
The reaction to that and this are very similar except the challenge deep wasn’t involved to making healthcare unaffordable.
Not to mention Rick Scott also defrauded millions from medicare in Fl
Almost as if the media values billionaires way more than the average person does.
Well those are their buddies who sign their outrageous checks. Of course millionaires are protecting billionaires and other millionaires. Class interests come before all else.
One thing is that a company does work, gets a fair payment from that, and if you do a lot of work, you get a lot of payment
A whole other subject is when you squeeze every last dejt out of the people you say you work for
A completely different subject is when your company’s policies are so bad that you cause untold suffering and literally thousands of preventable deaths.
We shouldn’t need not want a vigilante shooter, these people (CEO’s of these kinds of companies) should all be in jail for life.
I’m a CTO at a small medical supplier company and I work hard to make sure we’re ethical. I can honestly claim were ethnical. We’re a bunch of people trying to make life easier for others, for doctors and patients. None of us are rich, but we are passionate and we honestly want to grow the company not by squeezing every cent out of our customers, we grow by just making sure we’re the best and fairest. It is very possible to be c level and to be ethical, but it has to be a choice.
Private or public company?
Finally, a genuine and intelligent question. Thanks for that, so far I just got idiots responding
Private, of course.
When having a publicly traded company, it’s almost impossible to be ethical. Publicly traded companies should be outlawed. Investments here and there are fine, but the current system as-is is indeed fucked up
I’m a CTO at a small medical supplier company and I work hard to make sure we’re ethical.
Good for you, tell me, what is the average wage/compensation for your company? What is the ratio of CEO pay to worker pay?
Do you know those numbers off the top of your head? Does anyone but the CFO know? If you don’t know those numbers off the top of your head, you aren’t really trying your best to be ethical.
Oh fuck your attitude already.
Sorry but you have a rotten attitude. Nothing is enough, people trying suck anyway, and no true Scotsman!
Here: I have a relatively high salary, it’s give or take a little over twice the country’s average. My salary is about twice as high as the lowest salary at the company. The lowest salary at the company is slightly below he country’s average. I’m also the first to enter, the last to leave, and I work on the weekends as well to try and give my best to everyone. Not bragging, it is what it is. I also live in a < 500sqft apartment with my wife, and I’m totally happy with it, we don’t need more. I’m not rich, I’m upper middle class at best.
I don’t know the salaries of the other C levels, but I know how they live and what they drive and where they spend their vacations; Their salaries are comparable to mine. I got my salary because of the shit tonne I give tonhe company, same goes for the other C levels.
Your attitude of " everyone who has more than me is evil" is shit and is also part of the reason why things are as bad as they are. Goes for all people who think that any company automatically is evil because some companies are. There are LOADS of people who just work hard for what they have and who really try to make sure other have it good too.
You don’t get to judge me, so take your damned attitude and fuck off until you can behave normal
Actually, those are pretty good answers. Good on you. Have a nice night.
Thumb up
I’m sorry but you’re not ethical. I’m sure you’re doing your best but you’re a small fish in a very unethical ocean. It’s not your fault, you’re just another cog in the machine.
Are you seeing what you’re writing there?
I’m unethical because I’m a cog in a machine?
So in other words, we’re all evil, you are evil, maybe we should all kill ourselves and get it over with because why even bother trying, rite?
Fuck your attitude
And the dead who they killed by denying people what they paid for…there are dead victims here from this shit company and shit leaders.
My eyes started rolling the second the writer said “the horrifying news.”
It’s really bringing the corporate shills out of the woodwork.
This incident is casting fresh light on norms that has basically become invisible to us in our lives - like the media’s natural tendency to side with the establishment.
If you push past that, they do essentially conclude that this is an inevitable consequence of our current situation. It’s a better take than I expected.
I’m more horrified that it took this long for the backlash, but I’ve been expecting it for years.
If we have more politicians like Bernie and AOC, we’d see less of this kind of mess. Where’s the movement that gets people like them more support?
Suppressed by the people in power. It’s better for them if we fight over culture war bullshit and that’s (IMO) why the right pushes so hard against things being “woke” or “dei” or whatever new scary buzzword those dumb fucks come up with.
We’re too busy arguing amongst ourselves to realise we should all be looking up at the corrupt rich. But with bought off media and the ability to push propaganda at a previously impossible level just a few decades ago, a ton of the population is kept perpetually angry because non-white/straight people have the audacity to exist.
I’m a native (aka native American/indigenous however you want to call it) and over the last few years I’ve noticed people are increasingly comfortable showing their racism. I get followed around in stores while I’m shopping for groceries occasionally, I get managers staring me down because I took too long looking around and they think I was trying to steal and that my debit card will be declined, people happily making small talk with others and then blankly staring at me and saying nothing to me even when I’m being pleasant to them etc. All anecdotal of course and I could just be getting more bitter as I get older, but it honestly feels like a trend to me.
I’ve been dealing with that shit since I was a teen, you always get judged just for having the audacity to be born the wrong skin color anywhere but it’s (anecdotally) gotten much worse over the last few years, which just so happens to coincide with the rise of the right all over the world.
I really hate the world sometimes tbh.
So sorry man. Don’t let the right wing assholes get to you.
I’ve learned to live with it, and while it pisses me off in the moment I’ve learned to let it go after it happens. No sense staying angry over losers, best to prove them wrong and then forget about them.
Thank you though, I appreciate your comment.
2016 was the year that people demanded a populist leader. The DNC sabotaged Bernie, which lead to low D voter turnout and the RNC bent at the knee at Trump’s threats to run as a third party.
The outgoing chairman of the dnc is a former corporate lobbyist.
DSA, Working Families Party, Our Revolution, maybe other more radical groups like CPUSA or PSL.
Being suppressed by the Democrats?
Tbh, I don’t even have faith in them.
expect more of them to move to gated communities, entrenched beyond even higher walls, protected by people with even bigger guns.
Protecting oneself from gunmen by surrounding oneself with gunmen with bigger guns sounds great until you think about it a bit more.
Thats when paranoia hits.
With a big enough crowd, no matter the size of the gun, the crowd wins.
Thats when paranoia hits.
Let them feel uncomfortable for the rest of their existence.
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That’s why you end up with an army that is too powerful for anyone civilian to resist.
What a painfully milquetoast article. The writing on the wall was there for a long time, and thinkpieces like this are nothing more than a shrug and “it do be like that”.
Again, people on Lemmy are frustrated that something “we all know already” was written down.
Can’t the world just hop on here and read our lemmy commentary instead?
In the immortal words of Heavy Weapons Guy:
Waaa! Waaaaaaa! CRY SOME MORE!
You are dead. Not big surprise.
I’ll ring that alarm in their fucking face
Ring all alarms you say? Like that alarm for our world burning down? Or people living in ever shittier conditions? Or do you mean the one for sick people dying because they can’t afford the inhumane prices for treatment?
Just a rhetorical question, my friend. The writing was on the wall for a long time.
The only ringing in my head is that tingtingtingting of the starter ship in no man’s sky
