If violence isn't a solution why does the government use it?
The state is nothing but a monopoly on the legitimate use of violence. To a hammer, everything is a nail. To a state, everything is a target for violence.
When you crush folks into the ground for decades, ensure there's no legal recourse, and bleed them for every dollar until the money runs red. It's hardly a surprising outcome.
Here's the song that's been playing in my head last couple days, for no related reason: https://youtu.be/o9mJ82x_l-E?si=y7r9kDydchPhNPAp
Not sure if you know the reason for the song, but here is the info behind it... the actual footage was brutal as well.
A Song Inspired by an Infamous Suicide
Patrick found the lyrical inspiration for “Hey Man Nice Shot” from the January 1987 suicide of Pennsylvania State Treasurer R. Budd Dwyer. It occurred on the day Dwyer was to be sentenced for 11 counts of bribery for which he had faced up to 55 years in prison and a $305,000 fine, according to an Associated Press article from the time. No money was said to have exchanged hands. The public official spent 20 minutes on live television proclaiming his innocence, then shot himself to death. The incident shocked family, friends, and political associates, not to mention the viewing audience.
Seriously though, don't do violence.
Why not? It's a perfectly fair response to the violence perpetuated upon millions of "customers" annually, made "legitimate" by paid off lawmakers. Why should we not be allowed to respond in kind when they're allowed to kill us - just because it's in a more roundabout method? Fuck 'em. I've never been a gun type, but right-wingers have really been getting me to rethink that stance.
I'm mostly saying it because I don't know the mods on this sub or if/when they're gonna start nuking posts and comments like the News mods did. But also, I don't want to be responsible (or at least feel responsible) in the unlikely event that an unhinged person sees this and does something stupid.
Like...look, am I weeping because a man who profited by denying people healthcare is dead? No. Am I happy to see billionaires suddenly afraid of the people they're exploiting? Yes. But does that mean I want people who see this meme to start gunning people down in the street? In all seriousness, no, don't take this as a call to violence.
I know there's some hypocrisy in that statement, but that's kinda the point I was getting at with the post: "I can't condone this action, but damn, it appears to have been very effective at enacting change."
murder is in general bad, fed-posting is inadvisable
also there's a broader boring argument about the dangers of violence being normalized as means of political change, but those arguments are boring
Self-defense (or defense of others) is not murder.
Brian Thompson killed thousands, and contributed to the suffering of millions more. The judicial system was both unwilling and unable to stop him.
What choice was there? What alternative to stop him?
Violence towards the evil power can be good. See the French Revolution.
The French Revolution ate the nobles, sure, but then it ate itself, then went on to try to eat the rest of Europe. It was a loooong time before it had positive results.
Denying healthcare = violence
"Violence is bad"
-Sincerely, every country that came into existence from the violent overthrow of the country that existed before it.
I was really hoping we would avoid violence by electing people like Bernie Sanders. Instead it looks like the class warfare will come to violence.
We really have no other option left
violence is bad
It is bad if used as the first approach.
It is fine when used in self defense or when all peaceful approaches have been exhausted in response to oppression and other malicious actions. It does matter when and why it is used.
Agreed. This happened because both parties are bought and paid for by big corpo. Our vote is only on how to address some of the social issue symptoms, if at all, of our crony capitalist economy, and only if they don't meaningfully effect corpo profits.
Example "please leftwing Obama, save us from this for profit healthcare hell!" proceeds to further enshrine for profit insurer leeches in a plan made from the heritage foundation because big corpo demand line go up.
The people don't get a vote on the crony capitalist economy.
When we wish to protest, we're now sent to designated protest zones out of the eyelines and profit operations of those we protest, making such "protests" as effective as masturbation in creating change.
This is happening because they have made us this desperate,and taken away/castrated our non-violent options. Some are apparently finally realizing that our votes and our protest have been manipulated by the capitalists that know they're doing us harm into still technically existing, but no longer mattering.
Gotta hand it to them, it's far more insidious than overt slavery with chains.
The legislature and violence monopoly are there to ensure all people have legal recourse instead of needing to turn to violence. If you corrupt that system and use it to oppress the masses, they become violent.
I neither agree with, nor condone violence, but it does not surprise me at all. Just surprised that it took so long.
If it works it works. Humans have been using as an effective way to accomplish things for millennia.
The current capitalism overlords may not be happy when it's used the other way around to what they are used to.
"Violence is a precipitation of two sides unwilling to compromise."
Violence gave us (the US) freedom from being a colony, freedom from slavery, workers rights, women's rights.....wait a minute.
Why do we get told to not do violence again? Seems like we just need a little bit of organized violence and we can solve problems.
Because violence is a tragedy and in an ideal world there would be no need for it. However, fewer and fewer people these days can pretend we live in an ideal world.
For legal reason I wish to say that I don't advocate violence. I also say that, I really think this was the only way this was going to happen.
Billionaires only do the right thing if it's profitable or if they're afraid.
Maybe if several more CEOs and C Suite suits are murdered in the street, then my insurance rates will only rise by single digits next year.
Violence is neutral.
Human nature is bad.
When someone is violent to someone else and doesn't need to be violent, they are bad.
When someone unintentionally wrongs someone, you try to settle the situation without violence in a way that is fair to both parties.
When they don't settle or they keep wronging people, you need to escalate.
When the person wronging the people is in a place of money and power, and you cannot escalate, there should be consequences.
I'm not a big fan of vigilantism, If the world ran that way, we'd have a lot of innocent deaths. But if the government and laws don't protect the people, stuff like this happens, or at least it logically should. If anything, I'm kind of shocked this isn't more commonplace.
“Your health insurance doesn’t want you to know this one cool trick!”
Ah, good. So the corrupt, evil, and greedy tactics of health insurers are finally mitigated to... checks notes oh, to what they were last week.
You know they're sitting on a wish list of awful policies while they're waiting for this to blow over so they can implement them when we aren't looking. Fuck that.
Don't do violence
This wasn't violent. It was calm and deliberate and it really seems like what Brian wanted with how he led his life. Seems like a lot of other CEOs of insurance companies and other hyper predatory industries are likely a bit jealous of Brian getting the result they all seem to be aiming for with their own calm, deliberate actions in life.
Also, the stock went up, so weird that we aren't really celebrating the boost to shareholder value - again, this was the endeavor that Brian committed his life to. He'd be overjoyed to have made an additional $7million on paper for man also worth $14 billion in family wealth.
Did you think it was easy for Brian to sign the death warrants of tens/hundreds of thousands of people? Through a lot of indirect action and often while enjoying a very lovely omikase sushi lunch with a different chef flown in from Kyoto each day to prepare? No. It wasn't easy. But you know what, he rolled his sleeves up and he did it, because that's just the kind of man he was until he was shot in the back of the head.
Hope you all have a good day at work today with your own decisions, remaining CEOs, board members of predatory industries and random billionaires. We know you'll stay focused on doing the most valuable thing with your time today
"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent"
~ Asimov
And here we are, nailed to the fucking wall. I'm fine with expanding this "incompetence".
I feel like Asimov's statement has to be couched in some larger discussion. Taken in a vacuum, I can see some merit, but I can't say that I completely agree with it. Incompetent in what aspect? I feel that his quote ignores intention. For some, violence isn't something that they're resorting to due to a failure to communicate through conflict, it is the preferred tool for the job. He comes off a little condescending and armchair intellectual-y here. I prefer the Sun Tzu quote someone mentioned earlier in the thread, "Violence is a precipitation of two sides unwilling to compromise."
This was self defence. Insurance companies conduct violence on a grand scale. The adjuster just defended himself.
Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield reverses decision… for now. They’ll wait a month and then introduce it again.
Except when it isn't.
Well, I definitely can't agree with that...in writing.
It's self-defence.
It goes to show how morally bankrupt these people are that it takes the fear of death being out into them to get them to do something even remotely good/ethical.
It also unfortunately proves, once more, that violence can absolutely be the solution.
I wouldn't call it violence, I would call it a justified use of force.
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