This is the central meaning of this event, regardless of the killer’s actual motivation.
so you’re in favour of random assassination of unpopular figures? If I’ve misunderstood you, please correct me.
We didn’t get to this point because people in power treated us with respect and compassion.
People in power see the rest of us as resources to be plundered.
Maybe it would be good for a few CEOs to look in the mirror and ask if millions would cheer at their own assassination, entirely because of how they and their companies treat those millions.
So you’d be okay if you got shot in the street because someone disagreed with your political views?
Political repression is what normally happens if there is a wave of political assassinations. The people in power will close ranks to protect themselves.
- AI says 125 Americans die each day by firearm. They’re all tragic and overwhelmingly preventable. Most get very little attention, though;
- I don’t want more avaricious corporate types to suffer. I want fewer regular Americans to suffer at the hands of corporate avarice and perverse incentives.
Which is why I don’t approve of it; as pleasant as the fantasy is, rule by violence just leads to the most violent people getting what they want, who are very unlikely to be good people. I feel zero sympathy for him personally, but I do realize the direction this sort of thing ends up going.
That said, it’s predictable that so many people are both happy about the killing and think we’d be better off with more. Guys like the murdered CEO are responsible for many thousands of other people suffering and dying for their own profit, and the law and government refuses to restrain them in any way. When there’s no *non-*violent recourse to deal with other people trying to hurt them, people tend to turn to violent ones.
If anything the surprise is that this killing is unusual.
Am I personally responsible for creating/maintaining/defending a system by which millions of Americans are mistreated? Am I personally profiting off of a system that compromises the health of millions of Americans?
The answer to that is no, which is why millions of people won’t be cheering at my assassination.
I’m very much not OK with being shot on the street, as a gun control supporter, but millions of Americans think that the 2nd A is a bulwark against tyranny, and what is our health care system but tyranny of profits over people’s lives.
But you don’t get to decide whether your behaviour warrants political assassination. The person exercising the Propaganda of the Deed does.
Quibble: this is not a political difference of views. It is, to some degree, an economic one, and to a much greater degree a moral one.
Which is not to say that I condone vigilantism, but given that the practices of some of these companies amount to corporate murder this is not just an academic debate over ideals. People are literally dying or being driven to ruin by unscrupulous practices. So it’s not surprising they’re not just going to settle for a strongly-worded letter to the local newspaper about it.
Politics and economics are inseparable in discussions of health care funding in the US, in my opinion.
As are morals, but one can take the “everything is politics” argument too far.
The more salient point is that the problem isn’t “views”; it’s “actions”.
I’m about 10,000x as likely to be shot and killed for reasons other than political assassination, so this prospect doesn’t really hit my radar.
Moved from the other thread…
“May have”? DID deny roughly twice the average number of claims, leading to a great deal of suffering and death.
He can get in line, behind the tens of thousands who harmed a lot fewer people than he did.
I am reminded that the French people were fed up in 1789.
I was trying to be precise with my words because it is all speculation at this point, it could be a lover’s quarrel for all we know, but for the purposes of the discussion we can assume that is true.
So assuming that, you believe this killing to be an ethical and morally justified act? You clearly implied it does not merit condemnation.
So the answer to my question appears to be that you’re okay with other people being killed by vigilantes for political reasons, because you’re not at jeopardy.
There is also the salient point this insurance company, like every other, is not in the business of saving lives. And sure, people are entitled to be angry about loved ones being treated unfairly but we recognize as a society that the way to resolve this is through contract law. How many people were saved by their insurance policy? Is everyone who works at United Heathcare evil or only the CEO? Your BIL who works in accounting? Should he be targeted too?
People tend to not get that violence if it becomes acceptable will expand from its original targets. It’s unlikely that whomever was behind this killing would consider me (or probably anyone else here) a valid target…but everyone fits someone’s targeting criteria.
Sure. And what were the actions of the health care industry when Obama introduced the AHA? Did they take action to support it, to give political support to the measure? Or did they pour money into lobbying against the AHA? Those are actions.
What current political lobbying did this fellow authorise, as CEO of a major health insurance company? The health insurance companies are one of the biggest lobby groups in Washington. He presumably had contingency plans if Trump ever gets around to his “concept of a plan” for health care.
Lobbying to protect your business model is action. Political action.
There’s been a lot of speculation about the motives for the killing, but they mainly seem to be personal: failure to give coverage to a loved one, etc.
What if the motive was political, as @Cheesesteak is suggesting? What if the killer did so as a political attack on the health care industry, and says he did it to send a message to Washington?
Exactly. I’m sure that worker bees in mailrooms or at secretarial desks never think that they will be hurt for political reasons.
Until they open the package that the Unibomber has sent to their employer, because he is practising the Propaganda of the Deed against their employer.