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The CEO of UnitedHealthcare (insurance company) has been assassinated in NYC
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- Title
- The UnitedHealthcare CEO has been shot and killed outside a New York City hotel, AP source says
- Published
- Dec 4 2024
- Word count
- 434 words
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I won't speculate as to the specific reason the shooter had, and assassination is not the stable way to make change happen in a civilized society.
That said, his company was notorious for over billing for the services they provided and simultaneously rejecting valid claims. There is no question that many, many people have suffered due to that man's actions. Did he deserve to be shot in the street like a dog? No. Does he have the blood of thousands on his hands? Absolutely.
Disclaimer: I do not endorse violence!
Devil's advocate: Historically, people who live under broken systems have resorted to violence in an attempt to be heard by those who benefit from the broken systems. With our system increasingly benefiting the extremely wealthy at the expense of all others, surely there's a breaking point where the desperate underclass resorts to violence?
I mean, did the 1% think "eat the rich" actually meant literally cannibalizing rich people? (I guess eventually if things get thatttttt desperate)
Note: not endorsing cannibalism
Who determines who is at fault? When a gunman shoots at retired Joe Biden or Harris because they ruined them financially (a belief, which is not particularly factual but evidently held by MANY Americans), is that still “well, is what it is”?
Mob justice is never justice, just violence.
Who called it justice? Rather it's a failure state of an unjust system.
Marxists have been saying this for the last century and a half, and yet there have been maybe 3 attempts at revolutions in the developed world since then, and not even a single successful one. In general, history tells us that any violent attempts will be crushed, and that the only successes happen through working inside the system
That's a fairly shallow view and one that leaves out the incredibly heavy handed impact the US and the CIA had on prospective communist/socialist revolutions.
If an ideological position is unable to outcompete an adversarial ideology then what good is it? Like part of the job of a political/state system is to protect the people under it and advance its state/national interests.
Put another way, if I’m a regular dude in a country deciding what kind of political and economic system I want to run. I see the ones that have been tried and notice that one set seems to keep collapsing into narco-terrorist guerrilla movements and autocracies, and another tends to equilibrate into relatively stable, but unequal, institutions. What am I supposed to pick out? It’s not as if the PRC and the USSR weren’t also trying to throw their weight around. Do we imagine North Korea could have just stayed that way on its own?
I suppose, but you can say the same thing with democracy and fascism. If we end up moving to a normalized state of fascism within many of the world democracies would you still hold this perspective. It seems like a bit of a cold world view to say "non dominant political ideologies are mute". The dominant ideology doesn't have to be a particularly good, beneficial, or just ideology.
Yes, specifically because they are continually undermined and have excessive violent dictators placed at their helms by the US.
I actually do think fascism should be considered a sort of “failure state” for a democracy whose institutions have broken down, and this theory is at least as old as Plato. The thing is though, that it’s a consequence of a breakdown of the core democratic institutions due to lack of maintenance/stress. Everything succumbs to entropy eventually, but it’s a question of how resilient and capable of renewal it is.
Like I said though, it’s not as if the USSR and PRC weren’t also throwing their weight around to prop up violent and bloody dictators. North Korea wasn’t propped up by the US. The various Maoist guerrilla militias throughout the Global South weren’t either. This just seems to a straightforward consequence of great power conflict more than anything else, and I don’t see the Maoist/Marxist paramilitary units being appreciably better or worse for society than the ultranationalist ones. The only consistent pattern seems to be that they both tend to be better than the religious fundamentalists (that other, underappreciated, variety of high-modernist extremism).
I'm not saying that communism or socialism are better than democracy. I agree that Russia and China have a long history of their our politucal fuckery. The original comment I replied to was saying violent revolutions don't work, and I'm just saying that they can if given the chance without external intervention. But we'll likely never see that for the US foreign policy as I pointed out, or Chinese/Russian foreign policy as you have.
I'm poking at the idea that we're arguing this from a very American perspective. Should we say capitalist democracies don't work because we failed to maintain them in Afghanistan, Iran, or any of the countries that @saturnV posted? No, we just point at the ones that do work.
like there isn't symmetry?
I'm not arguing for communism or trying to say that Russia and China aren't culpable for their own political coup fuckery.
You said that there weren't revolutions and referenced Marxists, I was arguing that if you're looking for successful socialist or communist revolutions you won't find many because the US actively suppresses, destabilizes, and funds opposition to them. If we were able to see collective reform and revolution without outside influence we might actually get to experience better, more just forms of government. But I don't see anything like that happening in the near future.
But AFAIK those were "reverse" revolutions, i.e. the goal was the opposite of democracy and equality.
I'm not quite sure I'm conveying what I mean well. I'm saying that there were revolutions that took place and were toppled and ones that were taking place and stopped due to US financing.
I might be misunderstanding you, but even if you don't agree with the politics of a mass uprising it is still a revolution. If it's a groundswell of popular support, it's a revolution. I'd say the vast majority of the socialist revolutions were looking for democracy and equality.
Even successful revolutions have tended to collapse into autarkies that only vaguely grope towards their ostensible ideological moorings. This is because the key element in a “violent revolution” is the violence and what determines success is your effectiveness at applying violence rather than how well you adhere to your moral or ideological objectives. It just ends up collapsing into an amoral situation where justice is the will of the stronger and wisdom or compassion don’t enter into discussions about how things ought to work.
Not all violence is a revolution, though. If you think of violence as a very loud form of communication (we all tend to pay attention when we think our lives might be in danger), it makes sense that people who feel utterly powerless and unheard turn to it. Whether this "works" or not, and to what degree, isn't something I'm qualified to argue, and I don't advocate violence, but it's pretty clear that violence becomes an attractive option when people feel they've hit "rock bottom".
Yeah I agree with this specific point, this goes hand-in-hand with the rise of populism
He didn't deserve to die, but I certainly won't shed a tear over the fact that he did. People like him belong in prison.
Problem is, another CEO will take his place. The man died but the idea of extracting maximum profit lives on.
Violence is excellent at killing people, but terrible at killing ideas.
more detail about the deceased executive and UHC
Yeah, like he probably didn't deserves this specifically, but I don't really feel bad about it...
I think he deserved a trial and a prison sentence, as someone whose actions led to untold suffering. I'm not sad he's dead, but gunning people down in the street is really not the basis for an orderly system.
I won't say specifically that I endorse or condemn this, because I understand the argument that things get ugly when people take things into their own hands, especially when it comes to single actors like this vs. organized efforts, but I will say that I'm not exactly shedding any tears when the powerful (whether the rich or the state) no longer have a monopoly on violence.
So many cry out when something like this happens while simultaneously turning a blind eye to the violence these industries, and the state, commit on a daily basis. We are urged to see the humanity in a monster, while ignoring the humanity of all those who suffered because of them.
The real victims here are the customers of UHC which had one of, if not, the highest rates of denied claims (32%) . I'm not specifically saying this is the way things should happen, but I'm not exactly upset when they do happen.
CEO's are all going to be worried about "being next."
It is a legitimate concern, as if this gets a significant amount of press, it increases the risk of a copy cat.
I wonder if there will be a change in the divisiveness that gets pushed in the media, or if the CEOs will simply ramp up security, and create increasingly isolated wealth enclaves.
My money is on extra security and seclusion from the rest of society. Musk and his cronies are probably going to demand a fleet of secret service now.
Musk is already staffed up with security
Musk already having something has not stopped him from wanting more.
Particularly if taxpayers pay for it instead of him.
Well, much like the Black Panthers, I think we'll see more serious attempts at gun control.
Doubtful, unfortunately. They're not gonna take money away from other Fortune 500 CEOs, just because one of their own was shot.
As far as I'm aware, the media hasn't released the name of the shooter or mentioned any motive. So there's also no real "boogieman" to attach this all to, yet.
As far as I can tell, they haven't released the name because they haven't caught him.
Unless I've missed something that's come out recently.
This is a very naive view of how these things worked. Again they did exactly that with the black panthers if you want to frame it in the same light. These issues are complex and the fact that this was someone wealthy/powerful, shot in one of the strictest gun law states in the nation, using a silencer (which makes very little sense but is going to be a gun violence MAGNET) absolutely means there's going to be discussion about this. And probably more than "thoughts and prayers/what about mental health care"
I mean, if you're gonna try to assassinate someone and not get caught, minimizing your noise profile is a pretty damn good idea.
Anyone not condemning this is a fucking idiot without strong morals convictions. Murder is wrong, this is wrong. If you think this CEO had any more blood on his hands than any other CEO, or anywhere close to any US president.
Does UHC deny claims? Yes, is that bad? Maybe, we don't have single payer, coverage is plan specific. The median person is being denied more based on the plan their employer bought, it's not like UHC just up and decides on their own.
Is tildes such a left wing echo chamber that everyone here is basically saying "I won't condemn this"???? Billionaires don't get there without a system that enables them, this won't change anything, it won't change the denial rates, it won't even have a material impact on UHCs business, all it accomplishes is killing one man. Two kids are without a father, do you think they feel safe? What in the everloving fuck have your moral compasses gone
Morals are not absolutes. There are plenty of perfectly just reasons to kill somebody.
Was this a good idea? Probably not. But if the shooter had a loved one who died courtesy of UHC's actions, I can understand how the growth of that murder/suicide urge goes.
How do we change a system that prevents change?
Its still early so I expect information to be unreliable, but there's at least a picture of the shooter firing the weapon and they reportedly escaped on an E bike. My first impression was this was going to be someone more...unstable or emotional, and thus caught/killed shortly after. Instead this clearly looks planned.
This...this might change things. Those little catalyst points and what not. I'm very against political violence, but at the same time I do understand that it's very often a failure state of a system and people sure as shit have a reason to feel failed.
The fact that this was a VERY targeted murder of someone powerful in such a brazen and clearly thought out manner means there's actually going to be movement on it. "People who matter" are going to be yelling about this, and I would not be surprised if there's major shifts because of it. Not nearly the magnitude of pre/post 9/11, but possibly the same kind of event. Couple with the Trump assassination attempts and I think we're looking at the start of a very ugly shift.
I'm also feeling pretty pessimistic and worn out today, so I hope it's more just that, but god this just feels like the start of things getting really really ugly.
Edit-
I've seen the footage now. Gun appears to jam on every fire and he's ready to clear it. Seen some stuff about how a silencer and certain ammo's can cause that, but either way he either knew it was going to jam after every shot or was extremely ready. Looks like 3 or so shots, so yeah, again someone who at the very least was extremely prepared.
Unfortunately you're not wrong. There is so much tension going on in this world, and social media has been both a catalyst for many things. While I don't think the situation is nearly as bad as say, the 1930s, it's difficult to not see the parallels.
sigh I just want to live in a cottage in the far north of the Nordic now.
It's kinda mindblowing glancing at reddit and just seeing sooo many front page posts that are just straight up celebrating this.
I get having a link to the news article and some views of that nature in the discussion, but just straight up topics celebrating his death is...concerning.
People are more generous, concerned, caring, when they're not desperate.
How many people really don't know anyone who hasn't been fucked over by health insurance? Seen their premiums just spiral up and up and up? Seen coverage shrink? Seen procedures be denied? Been forced to batter their way through labyrinth bureaucracy designed specifically to wear them down and get them to give up. When giving up saves the company money they then turn around and hand over to shareholders (read: executives since executive pay has a lot of stock involved).
I'm struggling to think of a good example, but maybe someone like Walt Disney back in the day? If ole Walt had been gunned down on the street, you'd see people upset. Why? Because Walt didn't make it his business to screw over the common masses.
Modern CEOs do. Especially those who work in 'medicine.' It should not be, at all, a surprise there's a lack of empathy for this event.
Not when there's no empathy for the millions of people forced to wage war just to get healthcare through the Byzantine systems insurance companies have constructed to avoid paying out as much as possible. It'd be one thing if insurers leaned on providers to be more efficient, to give better care and so on. Which they do, and doctors hate insurers too. But insurers lean on all the little people, who are disadvantaged and that's what the insurers are counting on.
Who was Mr Incredible's boss in The Incredibles? An insurer. What made Bob snap and grab with both hands without a second look back when Mirage and Syndrome offered him the chance to be a hero again? The soul sucking requirement of his job to let people without anywhere else to turn cry before having to tell them to fuck off and cry somewhere else because "it's our policy to not help you."
You hit the nail on the head. The only surprising part to me is it took this long to happen. For insurance specifically, they're killing people and ruining lives to make themselves richer, and they shouldn't be surprised when people have had enough of that.
UHC is even worse than other US health insurance companies too. And not because the competition isn't stiff.
That's concerning... could you elaborate a bit? I know they've used AI to deny claims before. My company is switching to them next year from Blue Cross Blue Shield. I've only used BCBS and Kaiser before and they were both horrible in their own ways, so I'm having trouble imagining how it can get even worse.
Just saw this Mastodon post trending. From that post’s image alt text:
I don't know much about the industry--is that a fair metric? Do companies compete against each other directly?
For example, an article listed in the comments notes that UHC covers 30% of senior citizens. If 50% of them put in claims for surgery to make them 30' tall and install wings of shadow, those are all going to be denied and their rate is going to increase more than their competitors'.
Not saying we should ignore this; I'm genuinely asking.
Regarding the fairness of the denials, there are a couple of threads on r/nursing linked on r/subredditdrama.
Health care professionals represented on reddit are at best indifferent to this guy's murder
Not exactly. What generally happens is that the insurance companies lock in deals with employers via some semblance of negotiating process, and that generally means lowest bidder wins. Nasty details like "actually providing the benefits at face value" are often ignored. All of that company's employees tend to be beholden to the 1-3 options within that contract, and then the only option for the employees to change insurer is to change jobs.
I'm not disagreeing with any of this.
It's more a comment that violence seems to be spreading to, for lack of a better word, possibly "rational" actors.
This, so far, does not appear to be some enraged edge case. LOTS of people are screwed over every single day to extremes, sometimes for their entire lives. Many do not resort to violence. Of those that do, they are usually outliers and it tends to show early.
This feels different. It's very clear, concise, planned, and if current reports are to be believed, they even cleared a jam before firing a second shot.
Once "average" or "rational" people are resorting to violence, things often get ugly, fast. Everyone has this weird romanticized "we'll get em" mindset when it comes to these things. History shows that it's far far from that.
I totally agree with you that this feels different than before. I think Trump's recent election victory and escape from prosecution changed something in a lot of people - we (on a societal level) haven't been able to fix things through the normal "rational" means, and we probably just made it much much worse. The ultra wealthy are now more powerful than any time in history, and are largely unaffected by anything a normal person can do - except this. They're still only human, to their dismay.
(Note: this is not an endorsement of political violence or any other kind)
As far as the average rational person goes, I believe we all know political violence is justified in certain cases - we're taught to celebrate the American revolution and the allied victory in WW2 in school, and our media celebrates the overthrowing of oppressive forces all the time - Star Wars is a billion dollar franchise based off of that premise. The only question is when it's justified. If my wife or (hypothetical) child died or had their life ruined for no other reason than the insurance company wanted to save a few bucks, I would have nothing left to lose, and only one real way to get revenge of any kind. I wouldn't be surprised if the shooter was in a position like that.
For a person whom is at the end of their rope, its trivially easy to kill themselves. We can see the suicide rates skyrocketing across the board.
A non-zero amount of them are probably gonna try to take out perceived enemies with them. That's a nasty proposition, because for every human dumpsterfire that deserves to be 6 foot under, there is going to be dozens of innocents.
This is an ugly time.
The wannabe Florida assassin also seems to be an example of a more rational actor choosing violence. In that case, the ax to grind was over Ukraine policy.
Contrast with the Pennsylvania assassination attempt. That shooter, if he had existed and been similarly radicalized 10 years ago, probably would’ve a generic school shooter rather than have taken a shot at Obama.
I guarantee you that CEO and other insurance CEOs have already celebrated the deaths of thousands, if not more, with glee. The millions they're raking in from allowing people to die and suffer were certainly celebrated by them.
I get what you're saying but I'd argue they don't celebrate those deaths, because that implies they're keeping track of the deaths. They're indifferent to the deaths and pain they cause. They only see and care about the money, not the people. And indifference and apathy on that level can be much worse than malice.
Good point! I agree that it's worse, and if anything, it makes the people celebrating this even more justified.
As I said elsewhere that's not really the point i'm trying to make. I've no doubt they're apathetic at best to the suffering of their "clients"
Wow, he knew exactly where and when he needed to be. Sounds very organised. Did they have insider info?
EDIT: nope, see replies
He was there to speak for an investor conference. It was essentially public info.
Best case scenario nothing good comes from this. Worst case scenario things get worse for people like the shooter. If this is class war violence I wouldn’t be surprised, though I imagine it’s not going to have the impact they wanted.
I don’t feel particularly less safe than I did yesterday. I wonder what insurance CEOs are feeling.
I would very much prefer to be living in Walkaway world rather than Radicalized one, but maybe I just have to wait a bit.
Have you read both of these books? Did you enjoy them? My interest is piqued but would love to know a little more before diving in.
Edit: peaked to piqued
I did. I did.
Unauthorized Bread is completely realistic and reflects actual trends and a lot of what's already here. Very well researched. My favorite short story in recent years. Might have spurred me to learn more about electronics.
Walkaway is fun. And it has a point. Capitalism will leave many people behind. Billionaires will chase immortality and the system will slowly decay as robots and AI replace humans. So why not build something for ourselves?
Rest are interesting, but more like frozen moments, crystalized failures of contemporary society. Not as dynamic. Also, search for Billionaire Bunkers online for some extra hilarity when you finish.
Library Genesis has them both, so maybe try them out and see for yourself.
*piqued
I agree as well... Interested to learn more!
Thank you for the correction. I’ve likely been typing this word wrong for a very long time.
As someone who has learned many many words by reading, I am always interested when I see a spelling error online that suggests someone learned the word by hearing it spoken out loud.
I have had many experiences where I have tried to use a word I learned from reading and ended up pronouncing it ridiculously wrong.
English is hard and idiosyncratic and it is my native language.
I also just checked the definition and it feels like saying ‘my interest is piqued’ is a slight misunderstanding of the definition; as ‘piqued’ means that you’re slightly angry.
I wouldn’t say my interest was slightly angry. I really meant that my interest was at a high (or at a peak?) after reading about the two books aforementioned on Wikipedia.
So maybe I did mean ‘peaked’ after all? I actually don’t know now, haha
Edit: currently enjoying an article on dictionary.com about this common misspelling. It’s definitely ’Piqued’. I’ve quite enjoyed this whole thing.
Piqued can mean some combination or agitated, irritated, or stimulated. The phrase you originally used is quite common.