Luigi didn’t change anything. He just killed a guy, who will be shortly and largely painlessly replaced by another stooge to do the bidding of the owners of society.
Real resistance must be organized to achieve anything. This Rambo shit is a Hollywood fantasy. And yes, organized nonviolent resistance can work and has worked many times, including in regimes far more repressive than the US.
I recommend reading Civil Resistance: What Everyone Needs to Know for those interested in how resistance movements an actually win real change.
Overnight sense of fraternity and class solidarity amongst the working class
Billionaires and execs are already second guessing their safety
Would be school shooters types were taught there is a better outlet for their anger that will get them national love, attention, and legal donations
Reinvigorated interest in gun ownership amongst everyone
Started a national conversation about how the rich are robbing us blind and killing us in mass, a conversation that is still going a full month later despite the media’s constant distractions
I think you are way overestimating the reach of these changes due to echo chambers. Most people don’t support Luigi outside of terminally online political radicals (no hate, that’s me as well). Loud but small in numbers.
It’s possible his action will take on a symbolic importance that leads to bigger changes in the future. But that remains to be seen, and I think ordinary people are already forgetting about this story. Again, without sustained organization this leads nowhere.
My 80-year-old Trump voter MIL recently told my wife we need more Luigis in the world. Anecdotal but I think it’s probably more commonplace than you’re imagining.
Most people don’t support Luigi outside of terminally online political radicals (no hate, that’s me as well). Loud but small in numbers.
They don’t need to support him for the above changes. But now that you mention it, a rather significant number of people support him even if they’re in the minority:
But that remains to be seen, and I think ordinary people are already forgetting about this story.
I’m not even in the USA and that’s not the case here.
Again, without sustained organization this leads nowhere.
Yes, but this is very different from saying it didn’t change anything. It evidently has. We’re not pretending this is the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, the flashpoint of a new era. No, this is one of the small little steps where organizing becomes more viable, when the “”“public debate”“” shifts from ‘is it ok to punch nazis?’ to ‘is it ok to assassinate the worst capitalists?’. For many, it’s provided a real window into the corporate mass media’s alienation from the people on the ground.
I mean, if actually meeting your end at the hands of a customer your company fucked over becomes a perceived risk to the job, C-suites might think twice about anti-human profit-seeking decisions for their companies
Maybe, but that’s only going to happen through a broader movement and not through a single killing. And organizing a movement to kill enough people will be difficult or impossible (and I believe unethical but I understand I’m in the minority there). OP had it backwards—nonviolent resistance is actually much easier because of state repression, not in spite of it.
Also, I think without deconstructing the structures that produce such outcomes, it would be at best a temporary improvement.
Luigi wasn’t working in an organised group though… he was a disgruntled citizen fucked over by our healthcare system like many, many others in this country. You don’t need to organise shit when you’re denied life-saving treatment and have nothing to lose by offing another greedy billionaire. Wouldn’t surprise me if we start seeing more Luigi’s until our government and the billionaires who control it start listening.
It’s unclear if this is related to the assassination. There were a lot of efforts pushing back against this horrible policy so attribution is difficult without knowledge of their internal deliberations.
Given the timing, and the general apathy and march towards even more malice towards their customers, that would be an unbelievable coincidence.
The day before, they simply had no fear to rescind a profitable new policy. It also happened at the same time BCBS took down all their executive profiles from their website. Was that also just coincidence? Or do you concede that was because of the shooting?
No I think that clearly was. But you are ignoring pressures by various elected officials and civil society on the anesthesia policy. Luigi may have been a factor but he clearly wasn’t the only factor.
I don’t think most of these decision-makers really understood why Luigi did what he did, or why so many people supported him. They think they’re the good guys. And it’s not at all clear that this policy change will protect them from the kind of person who does this anyway. So the causal link is not as clear as you imply.
That said, I’d be interested to hear health care execs talk about how this made them feel or behave, if any are willing to be honest. Maybe I am wrong, it’s difficult to know.
If there were elected officials working against them, there were a hundred elected officials being called by the companies telling the parties to get their spoiler members, because the DNC and RNC only promote on your ability to get the bribe money aka “fundraise,” back in line.
Accepting bribes doesn’t mean they are slaves to industry. Politics is never that simple. They still have their own agenda and different constituencies to keep happy and are subject to public pressure as well. The weight of each of these factors differs in each particular case, such that some elected officials still work to limit corporate power some of the time.
The article you posted outlines many such actions. They objectively happened, so I’m not sure where your incredulity is coming from.
I don’t accept that taking the money of an industry doesn’t mean you aren’t a beholden slave to it. It is the very basis of promotion in both parties. You must be a spoiler candidate that both parties loudly hate more than one another to not accept corporate bribe money and be elected.
This whole idea of “well when they took the money, herp derp, did they get caught on 4k hdr with atmos audio saying ‘thank you for the bribe, I will do your bidding in exchange for this bribe that Im taking here, officially, I’m taking bribes for favors up in here!’ then it isn’t acktually a bribe” is lunacy. No bribe ever has happened that way, and money in the sums they bribe aren’t given for nothing.
Corporations aren’t charities, the opposite in fact, when they “donate” 50k to sick kids, it’s marketing. They always then spend millions marketing they donated 50k to sick kids so buy our product. They never spend money they don’t expect return on.
It is intentionally obtuse to make the claim that you can accept corporate money as an elected official and not be their lackey. It’s the reason in our dystopic money in politics nation many go into politics explicitly, they’d like to be bought please and thank you, look how good I am at “fundraising!” promote me and I’ll get even bigger “donations!”
This seems to be more of an argument against a point you imagine someone like me would make than the one I actually made. Yes, bribery is commonplace, that’s not what I’m disputing. But politicians also do sometimes go against corporate interests for various reasons. This is an observable fact and your own source proves it. So you are just wrong about this one, sorry, it’s not really debatable.
This is not to say it never has influence or isn’t harmful. But this kind of black and white thinking is part of why the left is so ineffective. Most people have a very poor understanding of the way politics actually works. It’s all about bargaining power. Bribery is a powerful bargaining chip but it’s not the only currency in the game and it can be outplayed with the right strategies, especially organized actions by the public and civil society. The capitalists have all of the money, but money is only powerful because it makes people do things. We can do equally or more impactful things without money if we seize the real power of mass movements.
And fundamentally, I don’t think murdering people is a very effective way to build mass movements because it’s chaotic, morally questionable, and it scares people. Sure, it gets already existing radicals fired up but there are other ways to do that and it’s not the most important aspect of why a movement succeeds or fails which is effective strategy and massive public support.
Luigi didn’t change anything. He just killed a guy, who will be shortly and largely painlessly replaced by another stooge to do the bidding of the owners of society.
Real resistance must be organized to achieve anything. This Rambo shit is a Hollywood fantasy. And yes, organized nonviolent resistance can work and has worked many times, including in regimes far more repressive than the US.
I recommend reading Civil Resistance: What Everyone Needs to Know for those interested in how resistance movements an actually win real change.
Yeah, absolutely nothing changed. 🙄
I think you are way overestimating the reach of these changes due to echo chambers. Most people don’t support Luigi outside of terminally online political radicals (no hate, that’s me as well). Loud but small in numbers.
It’s possible his action will take on a symbolic importance that leads to bigger changes in the future. But that remains to be seen, and I think ordinary people are already forgetting about this story. Again, without sustained organization this leads nowhere.
My 80-year-old Trump voter MIL recently told my wife we need more Luigis in the world. Anecdotal but I think it’s probably more commonplace than you’re imagining.
There was a poll posted indicating 70% of those surveyed view united health care’s CEO as “kind of asking for it”, not that uncommon.
They don’t need to support him for the above changes. But now that you mention it, a rather significant number of people support him even if they’re in the minority:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/young-voters-more-likely-to-support-ceo-murder-suspect-luigi-mangione-poll/
I agree. But it’s absolutely silly to think nothing changed.
I’m not even in the USA and that’s not the case here.
Yes, but this is very different from saying it didn’t change anything. It evidently has. We’re not pretending this is the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand, the flashpoint of a new era. No, this is one of the small little steps where organizing becomes more viable, when the “”“public debate”“” shifts from ‘is it ok to punch nazis?’ to ‘is it ok to assassinate the worst capitalists?’. For many, it’s provided a real window into the corporate mass media’s alienation from the people on the ground.
I mean, if actually meeting your end at the hands of a customer your company fucked over becomes a perceived risk to the job, C-suites might think twice about anti-human profit-seeking decisions for their companies
Maybe, but that’s only going to happen through a broader movement and not through a single killing. And organizing a movement to kill enough people will be difficult or impossible (and I believe unethical but I understand I’m in the minority there). OP had it backwards—nonviolent resistance is actually much easier because of state repression, not in spite of it.
Also, I think without deconstructing the structures that produce such outcomes, it would be at best a temporary improvement.
Luigi wasn’t working in an organised group though… he was a disgruntled citizen fucked over by our healthcare system like many, many others in this country. You don’t need to organise shit when you’re denied life-saving treatment and have nothing to lose by offing another greedy billionaire. Wouldn’t surprise me if we start seeing more Luigi’s until our government and the billionaires who control it start listening.
https://www.npr.org/2024/12/05/nx-s1-5217617/blue-cross-blue-shield-anesthesia-anthem
To those patients… it matters.
It’s unclear if this is related to the assassination. There were a lot of efforts pushing back against this horrible policy so attribution is difficult without knowledge of their internal deliberations.
Given the timing, and the general apathy and march towards even more malice towards their customers, that would be an unbelievable coincidence.
The day before, they simply had no fear to rescind a profitable new policy. It also happened at the same time BCBS took down all their executive profiles from their website. Was that also just coincidence? Or do you concede that was because of the shooting?
No I think that clearly was. But you are ignoring pressures by various elected officials and civil society on the anesthesia policy. Luigi may have been a factor but he clearly wasn’t the only factor.
I don’t think most of these decision-makers really understood why Luigi did what he did, or why so many people supported him. They think they’re the good guys. And it’s not at all clear that this policy change will protect them from the kind of person who does this anyway. So the causal link is not as clear as you imply.
That said, I’d be interested to hear health care execs talk about how this made them feel or behave, if any are willing to be honest. Maybe I am wrong, it’s difficult to know.
Seriously? Both parties are very well bribed to protect their sociopathic corporate greed from civil society.
https://www.opensecrets.org/political-action-committees-pacs/industry-detail/F09/2024 https://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/unitedhealth-group/summary?id=D000000348
If there were elected officials working against them, there were a hundred elected officials being called by the companies telling the parties to get their spoiler members, because the DNC and RNC only promote on your ability to get the bribe money aka “fundraise,” back in line.
Accepting bribes doesn’t mean they are slaves to industry. Politics is never that simple. They still have their own agenda and different constituencies to keep happy and are subject to public pressure as well. The weight of each of these factors differs in each particular case, such that some elected officials still work to limit corporate power some of the time.
The article you posted outlines many such actions. They objectively happened, so I’m not sure where your incredulity is coming from.
I don’t accept that taking the money of an industry doesn’t mean you aren’t a beholden slave to it. It is the very basis of promotion in both parties. You must be a spoiler candidate that both parties loudly hate more than one another to not accept corporate bribe money and be elected.
This whole idea of “well when they took the money, herp derp, did they get caught on 4k hdr with atmos audio saying ‘thank you for the bribe, I will do your bidding in exchange for this bribe that Im taking here, officially, I’m taking bribes for favors up in here!’ then it isn’t acktually a bribe” is lunacy. No bribe ever has happened that way, and money in the sums they bribe aren’t given for nothing.
Corporations aren’t charities, the opposite in fact, when they “donate” 50k to sick kids, it’s marketing. They always then spend millions marketing they donated 50k to sick kids so buy our product. They never spend money they don’t expect return on.
It is intentionally obtuse to make the claim that you can accept corporate money as an elected official and not be their lackey. It’s the reason in our dystopic money in politics nation many go into politics explicitly, they’d like to be bought please and thank you, look how good I am at “fundraising!” promote me and I’ll get even bigger “donations!”
This seems to be more of an argument against a point you imagine someone like me would make than the one I actually made. Yes, bribery is commonplace, that’s not what I’m disputing. But politicians also do sometimes go against corporate interests for various reasons. This is an observable fact and your own source proves it. So you are just wrong about this one, sorry, it’s not really debatable.
This is not to say it never has influence or isn’t harmful. But this kind of black and white thinking is part of why the left is so ineffective. Most people have a very poor understanding of the way politics actually works. It’s all about bargaining power. Bribery is a powerful bargaining chip but it’s not the only currency in the game and it can be outplayed with the right strategies, especially organized actions by the public and civil society. The capitalists have all of the money, but money is only powerful because it makes people do things. We can do equally or more impactful things without money if we seize the real power of mass movements.
And fundamentally, I don’t think murdering people is a very effective way to build mass movements because it’s chaotic, morally questionable, and it scares people. Sure, it gets already existing radicals fired up but there are other ways to do that and it’s not the most important aspect of why a movement succeeds or fails which is effective strategy and massive public support.