WoodScientist @ WoodScientist @lemmy.world

Posts

5

Comments

834

Joined

11 mo. ago

Then we'll build it again, but even bigger.

I would say "my pleasure," but this brings me none. It's not a perfect estimate, but it is a reasonable first order one. The real number is likely somewhere between 30k and 70k. But really, at this scale, the numbers lose all meaning.

Luigi Mangione did not have the right to serve as Thompon's one man judge, jury, and executioner. But make no mistake, according to all available evidence, Brian Robert Thompson was a mass murderer an order of magnitude worse than Osama Bin Ladin. When he hit the pavement on that New York morning, he did not stop falling. He kept falling, and falling, and falling. Right into the Pit of Hell itself. If there is a Hell behind this mortal realm, he is almost certainly burning there right now.

About 68,000 Americans die each year from improper denials of necessary care. With UHC's share of the private health insurance market and higher than average denial of claims, a conservative figure is 40 UHC customers per day dying from denial of care. Brian Robert Thompson served as the CEO of UHC for approximately 3.5 years. That comes to about 51,000 people dead at the hands of Brian Robert Thompson.

Is it fair to pin all of UHC's murders on one man? Maybe not. But he gleefully took credit for the record profits that came from UHC's soaring denial rates. He earned an obscene salary and bonuses from the record profits that those deaths produced. He took credit for all the consequences of these deaths; it is entirely reasonable to hold him morally culpable for them.

Make no mistake. Brian Robert Thompson killed approximately 51,000 people, or about 17 times as many people as Osama Bin Ladin. Brian Robert Thompson suffered for seconds. Osama Bin Ladin's victims suffered for about an hour. Brian Robert Thompson's victims suffered for months to years. And this is just deaths, not those who suffered injury, debilitation, or bankruptcy at Brian Robert Thompson's hands.

The German corporate elite thought they could control the last guy as well...

Let's compare:

Osama Bin Ladin/Brian Robert Thompson

Number killed by own hands: 0/0

Number killed through orders to underlings: _3,000/51,000

Reason for killings: religious and geopolitical reasons/profit motive

Cause of death: execution by gunshot/execution by gunshot

Date of trial for killings: N/A / N/A

Date of issue of death sentence for killings: N/A / N/A

Response to killing: celebration by US president on national TV, celebration by commoners and elites / celebration by commoners, condemnation by elite.

Consequence to assassins for extra-judicial slaying: national praise / indicted for 2nd degree murder

Race and class: weird Arab guy in traditional garb / rich white man in a a suit

I think we should crowdfund an art project. Specifically, just to send a message, we should erect a big bronze statue of Luigi Mangione. Put it on a main road close to UHC's headquarters in Minnesota. Make the bastards drive right past the thing every day on the way to work.

An amendment to the Constitution is no trivial thing to pass. It typically requires a 2/3rds vote in both houses of Congress, then it passes to the states for ratification. 3/4 of the individual state legislatures then have to ratify the amendment in order for it to be added to the Constitution. Through the whole nearly 250 year history of the Constitution, only 27 have been passed, and 10 of those were in the original Bill of Rights that passed nearly concurrently with the original Constitution.

Every amendment thus by necessity is a major exercise in compromise. Which means different groups will support it for different reasons. So even if you are an originalist, a justice that attempts to rule based only on the original intention of the authors of an amendment, you will be able to find writings supporting numerous interpretations for it. And it's not like we're talking about a document millennia old, where most contemporaneous writings have been lost to time. We still have almost all the myriad writings associated with the various amendments as they were written, debated, and ratified. So a justice can find citations for any reasonably plausible interpretation. There's probably no way to contort the 14th amendment to mean "private property is now abolished and we now live under Communism." But you could interpret it anywhere from it being effectively toothless one one extreme to "even citizens of Germany under US occupation post WW2 automatically get US citizenship" on the other.

And there other judicial philosophies. Some are textualists, they disregard any intent behind the words and focus only on the literal meaning of the words themselves.

Others have a "living document" interpretation, willing to extrapolate and read between the lines.

And this assumes actual good faith on the part of the justices themselves. Often justices with a political axe to grind will start with their conclusion and work backwards from there.

Sure, that may be possible. But again, that would just serve to radicalize people further. If people are being labeled terrorists and put in camps just for venting on social media, expect the level of violence to multiply a hundred fold. People will avoid posting on social media out of fear, but people will be so enraged that the number of people actually willing to resort to violence will increase a hundred fold. Currently Luigi is the rare exception. Put someone's brother in a camp for posting a picture of Nintendo's Luigi, and they may pick up a gun.

And yet, there still wouldn't be a civil war. There won't be armies fighting each other on a field of combat. There won't be an ISIS to wage war on. There would be multiple Luigis per day, each one acting independently, utterly unpredictable and utterly unpreventable. This would make Trump look completely weak and powerless. And even if everyone was too afraid to say it, most of the population would be supporting the Luigis.

In a nation with widespread access to highly lethal firearms, the government simply cannot prevent single individuals from going on killing sprees. Sure, if a group of people plan an elaborate plot, that creates an opportunity to intervene. But in a case like Luigi's, it was planned entirely in one man's head. There's nothing the government can do to prevent such random lone gunman attacks.

And this is why I wouldn't expect Trump to start arresting people just for social media comments. Ultimately it would multiply violence a hundred fold, and it would make Trump look weak and ineffective. And that's the last thing someone like Trump wants. I would instead expect pressure to be applied to social media companies to wield the ban hammer more vigorously, but actually arresting people for venting on social media seems very unlikely.

Exactly. It's the combination of peaceful movements and violent movements that make change possible.

That isn't necessary. Birthright citizenship is based on the 14th Amendment, which states:

"All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside."

The key clause here is "subject to the jurisdiction thereof." This clause has long been interpreted broadly, with few exceptions. Think foreign diplomats that have diplomatic immunity, or the hypothetical case of a foreign army invading US soil. But with very few exceptions, it has been interpreted that anyone on US territory is "subject to the jurisdiction" of the US. Thus, even the children of illegal immigrants gain citizenship at birth.

But note, nowhere does it actually explicitly say, "anyone born on US territory is a US citizen, full stop." All SCOTUS has to do is to rule that "subject to the jurisdiction thereof" means "in the US legally." So if you're a foreigner here on a valid visa, and you have a kid, that kid gets citizenship. But if you're not here legally, then your kid doesn't get citizenship. Conservative legal theorists have already written elaborate legal theories backing up such an interpretation. All SCOTUS has to do is to adopt those interpretations.

The Supreme Court has ruled that even the children of illegal immigrants get automatic citizenship since 1898, but that interpretation could be changed at any time. It's not like the present court has a great deal of respect for precedent. Roe v. Wade was the law of the land for 50 years, and striking it down stripped civil rights from half the population. Ending birthright citizenship would harm fewer people than rulings the court has already recently made.

Nowhere in the Constitution does it explicitly say, "anyone born on US territory automatically gets US citizenship." That is the straightforward interpretation of the text that has been precedent for well over a century. But it's not like the present court gives much credence to historical precedent. Hell, look at the 2nd Amendment. The idea that it grants a strong individual right to unrestricted firearm ownership is a very recent interpretation, historically speaking. Or look at the Emoluments clause, which Trump flagrantly violates. Conservative legal scholars already have an interpretation on the Constitution that would allow them to end birthright citizenship. All SCOTUS has to do is to endorse that interpretation.

Approximately 68,000 Americans die from health insurance denials of medically necessary care every year. United Healthcare's share of that comes to about 40 people per day. And yes, it's the company killing those people, not the CEO directly. But Brian Robert Thompson gleefully gloated and took credit for the huge profits that resulted from UHC's industry-leading rates of care denial. If he can take credit for the profits that resulted from those deaths, it is entirely reasonable to place the moral culpability for those deaths on his head. Did he ever kill someone with his own two hands? No. But neither did Osama Bin Ladin (at least on 9/11.)

And Luigi certainly acted according to the Golden Rule, you're just not seeing it from his perspective. His version of the Golden Rule was, "if I ever kill thousands of innocent people, feel free to kill me." And if, in some bizarro world, Luigi somehow ends up with the blood of thousands on his hands, then by the Golden Rule someone would be justified taking him out as well.

You don't have to agree with Luigi to understand his motives. From his perspective, his and Thompson's situation were entirely different. Luigi killed one man, Brian Robert Thompson killed thousands. From his perspective, Luigi killed as an act of righteous vengeance against the wicked, while Thompson killed for profit. And if we judged him according to the Golden Rule, someone would be justified in killing Luigi if he ever killed thousands in the name of profit.

This is a long term struggle that will take far longer than the next Trump term. And what can Trump really do? I'm expecting what violence to occur to be more acts like Luigi's. I'm not expecting some rebel army to form up and lay siege to Congress or to United Healthcare's corporate headquarters. Instead, the path will be similar to other periods of political violence that were contemporaneous with nonviolent social movements in US history.

There were people killed in the name of worker's rights. There were people killed in the name of women's suffrage. John Brown killed in the name of abolition. Black civil rights had acts of violence done its name, as did the women's and queers rights movements. Mostly these took the form of random small-scale acts of violence by individuals and small groups.

We're not talking about a civil war here. These are isolated acts of stochastic violence. We're talking one or two individuals occasionally taking out a CEO, assassinating a politician, setting a building on fire, planting a bomb, etc. That's the kind of violence we've had in similar historical settings. We're not going to have some American ISIS that you can wage a bombing campaign against.

Remember, America is absolutely awash in firearms. Someone doesn't need to join a formal terrorist group to commit an act of terror. They can just go buy a perfectly legal AR-15 and commit an act of terrorism with it. Giant acts of mass murder probably require a more organized group, but no one is going to try and commit a 9/11 scale attack in the name of health insurance reform. Giant attacks with huge collateral damage aren't really the kind of thing that appeals to people who are ultimately motivated by a desire to save lives. Expect more Luigis, not more Bin Ladins.

There is no organization for the US government to wage war on. Imagine every school shooting being substituted for a shooting against the health insurance or other industry. That's the kind of scenario that could happen if this anti-corporate violence became widespread. Sure, Trump can lock up a Luigi and throw away the key, but that was going to happen anyway. It's not like anyone commits one of these attacks thinking they're just going to be able to go back to their lives afterwards.

What can Trump really do? Is he going to start arresting people for posting pro-Luigi comments on social media? You going to try to prosecute half the country? There aren't enough jails to hold everyone. And any such crackdown would only create a bunch of sympathetic figures that would serve to radicalize the populace and swing public opinion even more in the direction of meaningful reform.

Look at what has already happened. One act of violence, and the national conversation has entirely changed. Each act of violence turns up the national temperature just a little bit, and makes peaceful reform that much more palatable. We've already seen several new reform bills introduced into Congress in the wake of the shooting. As things continue to degrade, as health insurance becomes ever crueler, as wealth inequality grows ever higher, the national temperature will continue to slowly rise, one act of random unpredictable and unpreventable violence at a time. Eventually some critical threshold will be reached, and the political center, which desires stability above all else, will be moved to finally embrace meaningful reform. This is the pattern that has happened with every major social movement in American history, and it is likely what we will see eventually in this case.

Exactly. No group has ever won rights by asking nicely. The truth is that it doesn't actually take too large a portion of a population, acting together, to cause a society to come screeching to a halt. Law, order, and the right to private property can only be maintained if the vast, vast majority of the populace is willing to peacefully go along with the status quo. If tomorrow 10% of the population wakes up crazy and decides to just start setting everything they can on fire, we'll be back in the Stone Age within a month. Most meaningful reform has come down to forcing those with power to choose between modest, but potentially painful reform on one hand and "watch as we burn it all down" on the other.

The black population would not have been able to credibly win against the white population if an all-out eliminationist race war had been sparked in 1950s America. But ultimately, they didn't have to be able to win such a war to create a credible threat of intolerable violence. The black population alone couldn't win a total war against the white population, but any kind of wide-scale race war would have completely collapsed the American economy and society. And such a war likely would have had factions receiving military support from US adversaries such as the Soviet Union. The threat of the Black Panthers was essentially, "we may not be able to win an all out war against our oppressors, but if push comes to shove, we can turn the US into another Vietnam." Compared to that potential nightmare, the modest and quite understandable reforms that MLK demanded seemed quite reasonable.

Same thing with workers' rights. "Give us an 8 hour workday" seemed extreme in isolation. But if the choice was, "give us an 8 hour workday, or we burn this factory to ashes" or "give us the right to unionize, or we can start listening to those literal Communists over there promising to bring out the guillotines..." well suddenly an 8 hour workday or a right to unionize doesn't seem so extreme.

It is very much a good cop bad cop dynamic. It's no coincidence that unionization, workers rights, and redistributive economic programs peaked when the Soviet Union was at the height of its power. Literal Communism is a philosophy that can appeal to downtrodden groups anywhere. And when the Soviet Union was ascendant and actively fomenting socialist revolutions and violent uprisings across the globe, they were able to serve as the "bad cop" that allowed modest reformers in the US to be the "good cop" pushing for various reforms and social programs.

Lives are already being lost. Today, approximately 186 people will be murdered by their insurance companies through the wrongful denial of life-saving, medically necessary care. By raw body count, Brian Robert Thompson killed far, far more people than Osama Bin Ladin ever did. The health insurance industry racks up a 9/11 worth of deaths every 16 days or so. That is how many people are currently being murdered by the private health insurance industry.

Luigi Mangione treated Brian Robert Thompson exactly how Brian Robert Thompson treated others. Treat others the way you want to be treated, lest others treat you the way you treat others. Luigi Mangione judged Brian Robert Thompson according to the Golden Rule. Right or wrong, Luigi Mangione's actions were a direct and terrifying application of the Golden Rule.

Brian Robert Thompson murdered approximately 40 human beings every single day. And for that, he became a victim of murder himself. The Golden Rule put him in his grave.

And it's true!

It's called oat milk because it's a nut-based beverage deliberately designed to mimic many of the properties and uses of actual cow's milk. It's not like oat milk is literally just juice pressed from oats. There are a whole series of steps, added ingredients, and chemical processes meant to make the resulting product as interchangeable for cow's milk as possible.

I mean, with advanced enough genetic engineering, we might be able to make nut teets a thing...

Yeah the Golden Rule didn't work out so well for Brian Robert Thompson...