Missouri
Missouri
Don't you mean Missoura?
Misery
I know that's Francine without opening the link. Time to hit the or-a-gone trail.
can we change it to millionaires and give kids guns instead?
Millionaires are still about a billion dollars away from being billionaires
People don't realize the gulf between the two.
1 million seconds is 11.57 days.
1 billion seconds is 31.8 years.
You don't know that he wasn't also doing it for his own personal pleasure.
Do what you love, and you'll never work a day in your life.
I've heard this saying many times; if only I could figure out how to get paid for railing other furs, and cuddling them before the real fun starts and the other 13 canines enter the room...
Ehh, traditional porn is a dime a dozen though, and is boring. I want to bang a room full of furs, and throw normalities out the window immediately, ya know?
Maybe I'll open up my own studio or something. There's tons of amateur stuff if you know where to look, but having a safe place, with trained staff controlling the production, and just letting raw, passionate, kink-friendly action happen between the participants, is an idea I could get behind. Or in front of. Gotta take pride in your work, y'know?
and the other 13 canines enter the room...
What does this mean?
Or possibly community defense.
We have class-action lawsuits, and self-defense as a legal defense against murder charges. In this case, a think we should combine the two into a "class-defense" legal doctrine.
When people are healthy, they can work. This is profitable for companies. When someone is sick, they can't work. This is not profitable for companies. So it's better to kill the ill. Just like in Auschwitz. Right, insurance companies? Right, Musk? Right, Trump? Right, most Americans who voted in favor of this system and empowering mega corps at the cost of most people by voting for Trump?
Issue is, most people's main issue is with the people in the system. They think, the right people will make the system work.
A lot of right-winger, who agrees with the CEO killer would say the CEO's main problem was going after good people, and not the "drug addicts", etc.
Ah, yeah, the drug addicts. Mostly created by the same system. Which created drug addicts from these "good people", as rich white people got loads of Oxycontin prescribed. I don't know what's in the food in the US, or what it's lacking, but making connections as simple as 1+1 is for most too difficult.
When you have shitty insurance and you're working 60hrs a week to barely make ends meet. Then, you hurt your back or fuck up a joint.
You can't stop working because you can barely afford to live. Workman's comp is a joke and you'll get fired if you try and get your job to pay for your work related injury.
However, there for a while, they were handing out oxycontin like it was candy. You can kill the pain and keep working. Until they won't give you anymore pills. Then you buy pills from a buddy or a friend of a friend. They're fake, the fentanyl in them hits different. Pain is still mostly killed. You can still keep working, keep food on the table for your kids.
But yeah, it's a rich white people thing because of something in our food.
Unless you've been in it, you don't understand the suffering built into the system. Lots of people that are suffering don't have the time, energy, or resources to do anything but tread water to keep them or their family from drowning.
Yet the majority chose for Trump, who gives the biggest tax cuts to the rich and barily any to the poor. While Kamala would have given a much bigger tax cut for the poor and middle class, much less for the rich. Plus they want all the immigrants out, you know, the people who build houses and stuff. But who cares about a housing shortage, not like that's going to increase rent or anything right? Honestly, how long will it take until all the water in the US is replaced by Gatorade? It has electrolytes.
Fun fact: did you know Kamala's campaign spent $1.5 billion in just 15 weeks compared to Trump's campaign spending only $382 million?
I think people voted for Trump more for his promise to fix the economy and to deport the illegals. I guess we'll find out over the next 4 years, if we don't end up destroying the planet in that time. It's also worth noting that even Kamala wasn't planning to get rid of privatised healthcare.
That's because the majority of the democrats are also really right. As soon as a more left oriented candidate steps up, like Bernie Sanders, they're called a communist and people run to right oriented big corporate pawns instead.
The end candidates of the 2 parties (which is a dumb system itself) are a product of what the entire party chose to represent them. Maybe the situation this time is a bit different, with Biden stepping down and formally pushing Kamala forward, but Biden is also a product of the democrats. He was chosen to represent them. Biden is also right wing. Mildly compared to Trump, but strongly compared to what the rest of the world considers to be left. The entire states shifted further to the right. And never was left in the first place. I mean, slavery is still legal. Wtf.
The US is shifting further and further towards an autocratic state. Everyone claims it's the land of the free, chooses for leaders who will take away their freedom and then complain they aren't free anymore. Yeah, well, you get what you paid for. It's just fucked up the decisions these people made will fuck up a lot of people their lives. "I want all those other people to suffer, but I didn't think it would also harm me."
"I want all those other people to suffer, but I didn't think it would also harm me."
I don't think anyone wants others to suffer, they just want better management and accountability on how public funds are being distributed, because the consequence of bad management has been the steady decline of quality of living in America the past few years. My taxes are being spent on housing illegal immigrants instead of homeless veterans. Politicians we elect to office don't know how to do their job. Biden got us mixed up in two wars instead of de-escalating. Billions down the drain. Things felt generally better under a Trump presidency because he was "America first" (sorry non-Americans), and they're chasing that feeling/hope that he can do it again. The majority vote was for Trump, so unless there was election tampering, it's safe to say the majority of Americans feel that way. I personally didn't vote in the election, because I didn't like either candidate. I'm somewhere in the middle, so I understand why both sides voted the way they did. I used to be more left, but over time I started to clock the hypocrisy in the party. Especially with Kamala.
People like Bernie never had a chance because the rich control what the media covers, just like they control elections to a certain extent like with Elon funding Trump's campaign. It's just the way the U.S. works, sadly. The only other effective way to change things quickly is to send a message to the rich like Luigi did.
I don't get how things felt better under Trump. The economy was shit thanks to him. It's much better thanks to Biden. To me it sounds like people believe in the hate speeches of Trump and throw all facts and statistics down the drain.
The money spent on illegal immigrants, Trump wants to spend 10x the amount to get them out, then to create a massive vacuum in jobs no one wants to do.
Tariff wars with China already fucked everything up during his first term, now he even wants to increase the shit which already turned out to be extremity bad.
All those American farmers who voted for Trump expected better prices for their corn and soy, they didn't expect China wouldn't buy from them anymore and they would become unable to pay for fertilizer from China, helping all those farmers into bankruptcy. This is just one example of Trump's amazing 'America first' plan.
Trump says prices for groceries have gone up. That's true, but the salaries have gone up more then those grocery prices. That's not thanks to Trump.
Trump his dealing with covid got so many people killed. Advicing to drink bleach, to stop testing so there won't be that many cases, etc. Now he appointed antivax moron RFK Jr as health minister with the bird flu around the corner.
I get the voting system is fucked up, with the 2 party system which is corrupt AF. But not voting gives half your vote to the one you like the least. So it's better to vote for the lesser evil, otherwise nothing will change for sure.
Trump's 'America first' is not for the USA and for all Americans. His America consists of just a very small group of billionaires and the rest are just slaves and peasants to him. Everything he did was to fill the pockets of the rich, while making life of the poor even more miserable.
He lies. Constantly. But no one cares about all the fact checking. People expose his lies but all they care about is their feelings. And those feelings are based on his lies.
This shit truly is on an Idiocracy level. People are digging their own grave. Trump offers them a bigger shovel and they gladly buy it from him, with the last pennies they have.
Kamala's campaign spent $1.5 billion.
This is the real election prize, not the presidency.
Not really murdering for profit. More like stealing their money while leaving them for dead.
We really need to end health insurance all together.
And also probably pull out the guillotines and remind the aristocracy how many of us there are and how much they actually do depend on us.
I honestly believe a general strike across the country would very quickly put things back on a course for the better.
He would have been safe in jail where he and his cohorts belong
It's cute that you think the justice system works the same for rich people like it does for the rest of us.
Every hear of suicide by cop? Now hear me out, what if it wasn't a cop who pulled the trigger but just a regular person? Hmm...
Fuck Matt Walsh.
Ok, carry on.
Whoops. Yes. I did mean to say fuck Crowder. But fuck Walsh too.
factual opinion
lol
Sic semper tyrannis!
Should Photoshop that coffee cup to get rid of cuckface crowder with D.D.D.
Believe.
If the blame is transitive based on who writes the rules then Voters have more responsibility than that CEO ever did.
That the US Citizens voted for these deaths and they got them. The solution seems pretty clear, convince people to vote differently.
This is your brain on electoralism.
How can someone speak so boldly when they know nothing of what they speak? Unless they're a troll
You seem like the expert to me, Socrates.
I fail to see a definition of murderer that includes this CEO and doesn't include literally everybody. I mean how many future people do we all murder when we drive our cars or even order a package delivered. Unless you're just sitting in a corner eating rice and beans and washing it down with water, you've probably contributed to someone's death by now.
The real murderer is the capitalist US health care system, and that's still very much alive and well. This CEO's death is negligible compared to the problem, instead it's just a second problem.
It's the same mistake that all of society has made for about 5000 years now. Punishing individuals for preventable deaths that are caused by bad systems at best causes suffering for a steep cost and virtually no actual benefit while providing an opiate that keeps us from confronting the actual problem, and at worst actually contributes to those preventable deaths.
The CEO was basically a captain of the capitalists us healthcare system. If he wasn't responsible for the misery caused by his command of his part of that system, then who is?
The lawmakers that created the system? The voters that demanded it?
Keep going, you're almost there...
...and the individual business owners/leaders that wake up every day and voluntarily choose to knowingly, indirectly murder fellow humans in pursuit of endless profit on the loop hole a broken system allows them.
You gotta go back to Mesopotamia for the invention of health insurance. This one is 100% the fault of "free markets".
So... the system at large is at fault?
I fail to see a definition of murderer that includes this CEO and doesnāt include literally everybody.
The difference is that Brian Thompson was a willing participant and policy maker of an organization that had twice the industry standard of insurance denials (and therefore deaths). He was willingly participating and aiding in those killings, even if indirect.
Even something as simple as rice and beans can indirectly lead to the death of somebody, but the difference is that buying a bag of rice at the grocery store is something you are unwilling to do because you are forced to eat as a part of your physiology. By buying a bag of rice, you aren't enforcing a policy of deforestation or slave labor. Your only other option is to commit suicide to never burden anyone else for any resource ever again, but that very clearly isn't a morally correct option either.
So yeah, it's pretty easy to have a definition that includes the CEO but not everyone else, an intentional and willing killing of another person.
This CEOās death is negligible compared to the problem, instead itās just a second problem.
His killing has overnight launched a nationwide discussion about how bullshit the current system is. There is immense value in that. It ain't a problem.
Punishing individuals for preventable deaths that are caused by bad systems
This was an individual who helped make the system. Brian Thompson was directly responsible for it's creation.
while providing an opiate that keeps us from confronting the actual problem
This is backwards. Between the action itself and the national discussion, both the action and result directly confront the actual problem of oligarchs wielding unchecked power. They don't listen to begging for scraps.
So I see what you're saying, and of course there's ways to argue this killing could accomplish something good. But let me ask you this - based on the history of society and the typical results of assassinations, violence, and instability, what do you predict will actually change from this?
When I look at this, I see parallels to past emotional leftist movements like Occupy Wall Street and BLM, that did garner a lot of attention and lead to a lot of discussion, but in terms of policy change were only followed by political defeats for those movements. It seems to me that yes these movements get attention, but it's the wrong kind of attention.
But let me ask you this - based on the history of society and the typical results of assassinations, violence, and instability, what do you predict will actually change from this?
Columbine spawned numerous copy cats, and I think there is a large potential for a similar thing to happen in this case. In terms of the vague revolution you are implicitly asking about, no that's not going to happen as a result of this. If this is a one off event it will not be enough for large scale change. We'd have to see numerous biz execs and billionaires shot to see real change.
When I look at this, I see parallels to past emotional leftist movements like Occupy Wall Street and BLM, that did garner a lot of attention and lead to a lot of discussion, but in terms of policy change were only followed by political defeats for those movements.
Occupy wall street failed because it was entirely peaceful outside of the trespassing and dealing with cops. The George Floyd/BLM protests weren't dissimilar.
Ultimately what made those fail is that neither had distinct and separate factions fighting for the same thing through violence or the threat of violence. MLK had the Black Panthers & Malcom X, Ghandi had freedom fighters in the background.
Peaceful social movements are far more successful with violent factions in the background. And the data supports that:
So now in the present we may potentially have a violent "faction" starting to form. The peaceful protests of the healthcare system are far easier to form.
This was an individual who helped make the system. Brian Thompson was directly responsible for itās creation. Bro he's been CEO since 2021... You really think he created the entire system?
His killing has overnight launched a nationwide discussion about how bullshit the current system is. There is immense value in that. It aināt a problem. Are there other ways to spark a discussion that don't involve murder? Better options that have an overall more beneficial outcome for everyone with less chaos and death? I think so.
If the public really wanted change they could've demanded it long ago. This is a democracy (even if FPTP is shitty). Why would you not vote for the party that wants to make healthcare more humane and instead vote the party and guy for president who's a public oligarch and thinks of the working class as beneath him.
Ethically the things Brian Thompson did were bad sure. But if he granted every healthcare request would the investors replace him? Most likely yes.
I believe you also cross a line when you argue that self-justice is right. Are rich people just gonna get murdered now since they're rich? Like bc the capitalistic system favours people that already have wealth? Where is the line. Can I now murder anyone I think is a bad person? I don't think this behaivor should be supported.
You don't even know the guy... you see him as a demonised person and now his family and friends have lost him for no real change to have taken effect. I just hope this discussion won't just simmer down and the public will ignore the issue again.
Edit: Originally it said:
I just hope this discussion just simmer down and the public will ignore the issue again.
Which is definitely what I wanted to say
Your comment is just boiling over with false premises. You're not (and you won't) make a compelling case that this specific person was "just a dude with a family". Hitler was a dude with a family on some level in a bad faith argument like yours, but that's not the context that matters while discussing him and the atrocities he willingly and repeatedly committed over the course of years.
If the public really wanted change they couldāve demanded it long ago.
They have been. Congress doesn't listen:
https://act.represent.us/sign/problempoll-fba/
This is a democracy (even if FPTP is shitty).
On paper, sure. But in effect it is an oligarchy.
Why would you not vote for the party that wants to make healthcare more humane and instead vote the party and guy for president whoās a public oligarch and thinks of the working class as beneath him.
Because the rulers of this country have systematically gutted the education system, they own the media, and their propaganda is wildly effective. And to top it off, as you pointed out it is a FPTP voting system, which means that the results of elections are worse.
Ethically the things Brian Thompson did were bad sure. But if he granted every healthcare request would the investors replace him? Most likely yes.
So what? Not being able to do good things in a position of power doesn't mean it is acceptable or that he had no culpability.
I believe you also cross a line when you argue that self-justice is right. Are rich people just gonna get murdered now since theyāre rich? Like bc the capitalistic system favours people that already have wealth? Where is the line. Can I now murder anyone I think is a bad person? I donāt think this behaivor should be supported.
I pretty clearly (though implicitly) defined the line already:
- an intentional and willing killing of another person.
Brian intentionally and willingly killed people through his actions, and a lot of them. Thousands at a minimum, though easily tens of thousands as he was the CEO for quite a while. When somebody like him is killed, even if through vigilante justice, it is quite clearly justified. Have you been killing tens of thousands of people through insurance denials? No? Then you have nothing to worry about.
Other people who are rich should simply be taxed out of existence as a class. Not killed, just taxed until they're at the level that would have previously been known as middle class before it was destroyed.
You donāt even know the guyā¦ you see him as a demonised person and now his family and friends have lost him
As Snapz pointed out, Hitler had family too. Having a family doesn't exclude you from having your death celebrated. If you're evil, you're evil even if you have family. And mass murderers like Brian Thompson are evil. So boo hoo. He gets his death celebrated. Maybe he shouldn't have killed tens of thousands if he didn't want this.
for no real change to have taken effect.
Then you aren't paying attention, either to the surrounding events, or to what I literally just said:
- His killing has overnight launched a nationwide discussion about how bullshit the current system is. There is immense value in that. It aināt a problem.
I just hope this discussion just simmer down and the public will ignore the issue again.
I don't. And it won't. This is a conversation that needs to and will continue until the problem is solved.
Wait sorry about the last sentence. I phrased this completely different than what I wanted to say. Thats on me. I do NOT want the discussion to simmer down. I don't want this death to have been for nothing and I do want change.
Still he became CEO 2022 and many of those denial policies have been enacted internally before that. Hitler was the dictator and above the law. He made the law and was the only instance of power. If Brian Thompsons primary objective was to kill then I'd support it. But I don't think it was. I think this system is at fault for it all the the politicians need to change it likes stated. But I don't think we'll reach a conclusion here honestly. You think self-justice is justified. I think its not. Thats the point I'll stick with.
Who do you think designed the murdering, capitalist US health care system?
Lawmakers and the voters that demanded it
Murder involves taking action IMO, denying payments is barely an action and perhaps even reduces the number of actions (depending on if it takes more steps to approve payment). The CEO was just encouraging death, a far more cowardly action.
"Officer, I didn't drive into the crowd of people, I simply took my foot off the brakes and steering wheel. That's barely an action! In fact, it reduced the number of actions."
What are you talking about?
Murder involves taking action IMO, denying payments is barely an action and perhaps even reduces the number of actions (depending on if it takes more steps to approve payment).
Bullshit. Inaction is still an action, and intentionally not providing life saving care is morally indistinguishable from killing them yourself when you have the means and ability to do so.
Especially to people who SPECIFICALLY paid you to provide life-saving care.
The people that are paid for life saving care are doctors and nurses, themselves paid by the hospitals (or independent practice) which can be paid by insurance, Medicare/Medicaid, or out of pocket.
Good job, buddy! You're getting it! Now just go one step further and think about what it means to pay for insurance. How does that change who pays the doctors and nurses out of those three options? You're so close!
the degree of separation matters in my opinion, technically the insurance cannot prevent a patient from accessing healthcare, (in practice few have the money to pay out of pocket or fight a lawsuit with megacorps) health insurance never was about healthcare it's about insurance against costs associated with it.
And yet when they don't cover "the costs associated with it", you'd still defend these insurance companies because it wasn't their responsibility to provide healthcare in the first place, right?
It doesn't though. Whether they physically block you from getting care or put up financial blocks that they know will do the same, the outcome is the same and these layers of abstraction exist to make people like you ok with social murder.
The fact that your argument is based around it being somehow not murder when they implement policies they know will lead to death by not doing their one fucking job makes me so fucking sad.
That is horseshit for a very Important reason.
The CEO took action. He accepted payment. This was an active confidence scheme.
Take their money, promise to provide care through claim fulfillment when the mark inevitably gets sick.
When the mark inevitably gets sick, reveal the con, keep the money, let them die when you actively presented yourself as their sickness preparation.
Brian was a murderer. His murder weapon was snake oil, a false agreement.
Except he promised people life saving treatment in exchange for payment up front, but when 16% of those people asked for the life saving treatment, he didn't deliver it.
false advertising and or homicide.
not murder.
"I wasn't killing people, I was simply forcing the Irish to export all of their food to us. It's their fault they starved to death".
Don't even say passive, it's plausible deniability at best - meaning a constructed, technical wall to point to and say, "whaa happened?" when shit goes bad.
Brian's job was simple, walk into a room each day and be asked a single question, "how many hammers do we make today?" His answer, without exception, was, "as many hammers as we're legally allowed to make". Then Brian goes home, well, second home as he was estranged from his wife and family and he took that drive home while drunk. He then likely ate a big ol' steak, had a massage and sex with an escort and continued drinking until he passed out, sleeping very well after a harmless day of deciding targets for hammer production.
In the meantime, those hammers were used predominately to bludgeon sick people to death while already actively suffering through the most painful, lowest moments of their lives - and the victim's families have to watch it slowly happen with nothing meaningful they can do.
But Brian was just choosing the number of hammers to make each day, right?
What a feckless, empty definition "taking action" is - you posting here was taking an action? Do you mean "pulling the trigger"?
So by your definition, Hitler and Charles Manson were not responsible for murders?
Hitler repeatedly called for the murder/extermination of others, Charles Manson shot someone resulting in their death.
Health insurance is merely a company, sure it is significantly worse and results in significant deaths when compared to a single payer system, however it is a capitalist solution to a capitalist healthcare system. Would you rather health insurance be outlawed with no replacement requiring every patient to pay out of pocket?
Health insurance accomplishes its task of making money precisely because it provides just enough value to the general public to not have riots/political action calling for its destruction.
sort of agree, but $>life gives them motive in my opinion. I'd still call it murder by definition.
@lemmy.world
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@lemmy.world
Welcome to Progressive Politics! A place for news updates and political discussion from a left perspective. Conservatives and centrists are welcome just try and keep it civil :)
(Sidebar still a work in progress post recommendations if you have them such as reading lists)
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