• Suavevillain@lemmy.worldEnglish
    0·
    17 days ago

    Brian Thompson’s case shows systemic vs direct violence: one hidden as “civilized,” the other viewed as evil.

    Technology and bureaucracy weaponized for murder and suffering on a massive scale, yet his killer is condemned for directly responding with the same violence Thompson’s actions produced. I only few sorry for the people who are suffering or have passed away due to the healthcare industry.

    • ProgrammingSocks@pawb.socialEnglish
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      17 days ago

      I’ve heard the term “social murder” recently I’m relation to this. He might not have personally used a weapon against them but anyone who had died as a result of denying coverage for a life-threatening condition has been murdered socially.

      • CeruleanRuin@lemmings.worldEnglish
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        17 days ago

        Did his wife and children know what he did for a living?

        If anyone doesn’t know what the point of my question is, I can only direct them to go watch The Zone of Interest (2023).

      • explodicle@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
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        17 days ago

        I’m a husband and father. I wouldn’t disappoint them by killing thousands of people and getting shot for it. It’s a reason to not do evil things.

      • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.eeEnglish
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        17 days ago

        Which means he should’ve had more empathy for the families he’s denied medical care for, right?

        I saw someone post a pic of his family trying to get people to empathize with him, and to be honest it just makes me think even less of him.

        I don’t really know how someone can love their kids, but deny healthcare to other children. He’d be less of a monster if he was just completely devoid of humanity all the time instead of when he’s just clocked in for work.

        • Malfeasant@lemm.eeEnglish
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          17 days ago

          I don’t really know how someone can love their kids, but

          Did he? Just because he had a family doesn’t mean he gave a shit about them…

          • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.eeEnglish
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            17 days ago

            I mean, fair enough. Kinda hard for me to remember people can actively feel contempt or just complete disinterest for any kid, let alone their own.

            • Allonzee@lemmy.worldEnglish
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              17 days ago

              Also there’s a “love” that’s prevalent among the affluent that isn’t love at all.

              Where children are seen more as and expected to fill the role as familial assets of the patriarch, more an extension of the parent’s legacy. No appreciation for the kids themselves as individuals, but attempted clones of the parents, and met with disdain when they fail to fill that mold.

              The Trumps and Murdochs come to mind, and among extreme wealth, thats the exception not the rule.

              It’s not contempt at the outset or disinterest, they see their children as assets, no different than stock or capital, to play to increase the reach of THEIR leverage, even after they’re dead.

              As a parent, I have a great deal of contempt for parents that expect their kids to further their own interests or expect/demand they become little clones of them.

              Kids don’t owe you shit, you owe them.

        • GelatinGeorge@lemmy.worldEnglish
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          17 days ago

          This is the thing, exactly! It’s called The Banality of Evil. When Adolf Eichmann was being tried in Nuremberg for war crimes he committed in Auschwitz, it was widely remarked on about his lack of ‘evilness’. The dude seemed like a mild mannered accountant, and by all means was, but he helped enact one of the most heinous and calculated acts of genocide in all of history.

          Monsters are easy to point at and shudder, monstrous humanity is far harder to accept let alone vilify. This piece of shit CEO is firmly in the Eichmann camp of evil and we should fucking celebrate he’s dead.

      • spirinolas@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        17 days ago

        The wife chose marrying a psychopath. She’s no better. The kids will be somewhat better off being raised by only one piece of shit instead of two.

  • Mr_Dr_Oink@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    17 days ago

    It’s such a weird place to be.

    We are all trying to be respectful. A person has died, and that is a horrible thing. But this guy runs a company that has cause so much suffering to so many people. He may not be directly responsible for pain, suffering, and likely death, but if he had run his company more fairly, none of that would have happened.

    When people made jokes about trump nearly getting killed, people kicked off and said it was abhorant to wish death upon him (despite him being a foul human being)

    But I really want to just say this guy deserves it and tell people to fuck off trying to make me be respectful of this terrible person.

    Somebody validate my anger.

    Somebody just tell me i can hate this individual and not be bothered that he died.

    • JIMMERZ@lemm.eeEnglish
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      17 days ago

      I already have been called evil for simply not having any empathy toward this man. Apparently there are some that believe even the worst people deserve empathy despite being shown time and time again they don’t care about the sick and dying over making a profit. I never advocated for violence or murder, I never cheered or claimed more should die. But I’m the evil one for not caring about this guy somehow. I honestly don’t know if humanity has a chance with all of this corporate dick sucking.

      • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.eeEnglish
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        17 days ago

        It is because they are insulated from the damage these people leave in the wake of “doing their jobs”. If I or you sent their family into financial ruin by extorting their health/existence they’d be whistling a different tune.

    • NastyNative@mander.xyzEnglish
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      17 days ago

      Most of us couldn’t care less about this guy! I for one thinks he deserved it and let this be a warning to other corps doing the same shit! The people have to take the power back and I support these actions!

    • TranscendentalEmpire@lemm.eeEnglish
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      17 days ago

      Somebody validate my anger.

      I work at a children’s hospital, a couple times a week United Healthcare denies treatment that could allow some of my pediatric patients with severe mobility issues to do things like run, or play outside with their friends. All because having a somewhat normal life isn’t medically necessary, or isn’t a covered benefit, or were not a preferred provider…and the nearest in network provider is 6 hours away.

      Every time I have to explain to a parent that Medicaid would have paid for this, but mom and dad worked a little too hard and so they don’t qualify for state care… I die a little on the inside.

      So I for one don’t really care about being respectful, and can reassure you that you shouldn’t feel the need to either. People who show no humanity towards disabled children are not human in my book.

      Today has been cathartic and I’m going to have a little pep in my step on my walk home.

    • gamermanh@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
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      17 days ago

      We are all trying to be respectful

      Speak for yourself, I and many others are doing our best to make it clear we offer 0 respect at all

    • Notyou@sopuli.xyzEnglish
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      17 days ago

      Fuck that dude. You can be happy when bad people die. It’s normal to laugh and even cheer when someone that has caused the death of many people gets what is due to them. You just feel odd about it because we aren’t used to seeing rich and power people face consequences.

      I wish more of these public and mass shooter actually use their energy and focus on a positive act for change. Our collective empathy has been stolen in this current system. We aren’t supposed to bat an eye when kids get shot in school, but NOW it’s a problem and we shouldn’t joke. Fuck off with that noise.

      • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        17 days ago

        While I agree that is a likely outcome, he has the advantage of being white. Historically, as long as the gunman got away from the scene ✅, isn’t actively brandishing a weapon ❓, and is white ✅, the cops racist thugs with badges just arrest them, and possibly buy them McDonald’s on the way to the precinct.

        As someone who visually presents as much whiter than this guy, I don’t like that is where we are at. I just recognize that my “natural camouflage” has allowed me to verbally berate cops racist thugs with badges all over this country without me even being arrested. This is just the reality of how the thugs with badges operate.

  • zqwzzle@lemmy.caEnglish
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    18 days ago

    It would be the funniest thing if a bunch of terminal patients submitted confessions just to tie up resources. A real “I’m Spartacus” situation.

    • chad@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
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      18 days ago

      It was me. I shot Brian Thompson, CEO of United Healthcare.

      I’m not even terminally ill.

  • nolefan33@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
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    18 days ago

    It’s simple, just get the company to create a list of all the people in the last 3 years who died after being denied healthcare. And then stare in horror at the list and decide that maybe the world is a slightly better place this afternoon and we should tear down the whole company and all their ilk.

  • Grimy@lemmy.worldEnglish
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    18 days ago

    Wow, I really hope this isn’t the moment it starts and a bunch of copy cats spring up targeting all the parasites. That would be terrible.

    • Tinidril@midwest.socialEnglish
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      18 days ago

      With all the suicides caused by extreme wealth inequality it’s a good thing that suicidal people don’t kill a CEO before killing themselves. That would be tragic.

    • ProtecyaTec@lemmy.worldEnglish
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      18 days ago

      The fact that the man got away (and had a silencer) goes to show that it’s more rich targeting the rich. Likely not a peasant. The billion-dollar question is: Why?

        • ByteOnBikes@slrpnk.netEnglish
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          18 days ago

          I was reading about how it cost this family $100k to keep their child alive and they were paying out of pocket with gofundme because the insurance rejected them.

          And I did think to myself… What can you do with that 100k to get revenge?

      • krashmo@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        18 days ago

        Suppressors, like anything else gun related, aren’t that hard to come by. You can even make your own pretty easily. They won’t hold up over 1000 rounds at the range but they would be more than sufficient for something like this.

        You’re right that we don’t know why this happened. I’m just saying I don’t find the possibility that a suppressor was involved to be particularly indicative of anything other than the fact that the shooter wanted to be harder to catch, which yeah, you would expect to be the case.

        • TexasDrunk@lemmy.worldEnglish
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          18 days ago

          Yep. A few hundred bucks for an inexpensive one, and a pretty good one costs in the neighborhood of a mid tier PC gaming rig. Theoretically you have to pay a tax and do some paperwork to get one, but you’ve already mentioned how easy they are to make.

      • Echo Dot@feddit.ukEnglish
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        18 days ago

        The robot dogs are just pompous posturing by rich idiots, they don’t do anything that a cheapo CCTV camera couldn’t do.

  • jubilationtcornpone@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    0·
    18 days ago

    I refuse to celebrate the man’s death. That just doesn’t sit right with me.

    However, I’ll climb on my soap box long enough to point out that first, an insurance business model is fundamentally incompatible with healthcare. It does not work on basically any level and the need for profit will always be in conflict with the need to provide high quality healthcare.

    Second, this conflict between the need for profitability and providing healthcare means that most of the health insurance industry is built on a foundation of ethical compromises. For profit health insurance companies like UnitedHealth are just straight up immoral. Any business that has to give loyalty to shareholders at the expense of anyone’s life and health is immoral. Not to mention the incredible amount of work health insurance companies have done to effectively rig much of the American medical system for their own benefit.There are lots of corporations that do lots of bad things but I would classify for profit health insurance as a special kind of evil.

    As much as they like to pretend they’re the good guys, the good guy doesn’t make it their sole mission to extract as much money as possible from their customers before they die while doing the bare minimum to keep them from dying.

    Long way of saying, my condolences to the guys family. Having your husband/father/etc. assassinated in the street has to be awful. At the same time, screw UnitedHealth. They’re a bunch of worthless blood sucking vampires.

    • Cethin@lemmy.zipEnglish
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      18 days ago

      I don’t celebrate that this needs to be done, but I do celebrate it being done. When they destroy any sense that the justice system will see justice done to them, it requires people to seek justice in to her means. It’s their fault. They can choose to repair the system and remove their advantages whenever they want. Until them, I welcome justice.

    • Tinidril@midwest.socialEnglish
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      18 days ago

      My feelings are exactly what they would be if the head of a vicious mafia was just assassinated. Probably because the head of a vicious mafia was just assassinated.

    • Shadywack@lemmy.worldEnglish
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      18 days ago

      My condolences to the victims of the victim. Sorry but I couldn’t disagree with you more. The rich represent despotism with no recourse for all the injustices they inflict upon the rest of us, and it shows why the cycles of Anacyclosis are real and persistent throughout human history. Business leaders have no virtues, only greed and profit motive. Given the context of history and what happens to despots as they get worse, they’ll be lucky if there aren’t mobs beheading them and leaving their heads on spikes adorning the walls of Wall St for all to see.

      That’s where this goes next if the greed and suffering continues.

    • lemmy_outta_here@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      18 days ago

      How evil does a person have to be before it is acceptable to celebrate his death? This man devoted his life to profiting from human suffering. The fact that the law was on his side does not excuse his actions; it simply means that he worked within an evil system.

      • Rekorse@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
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        18 days ago

        I think the ideal outcome is the person changes and stops hurting people. Though in america its pretty unlikely to happen due to greed and ego.

        • MrPoopbutt@lemmy.worldEnglish
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          18 days ago

          And if that outcome isnt guaranteed, or even likely, is violence that may save many justified?

            • RandomGen1@lemm.eeEnglish
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              17 days ago

              Feels a lot easier to me since in my mind the analogy becomes “do you kill the dude that’s pulling the lever to a track with many thousands on it instead of the track with some money on it so you can see if the next person will change the lever back”

      • Bahnd Rollard@lemmy.worldEnglish
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        18 days ago

        Feelings on the topic should allow for nuance and shades of grey, not everything is black and white. Im in OPs camp… Dont celebrate the death of any human, and the amount of damage to peoples lives the company this guy helmed does is unfathomable. You are allowed to hold both opinions.