Luigi Mangione treated Brian Robert Thompson exactly how Brian Robert Thompson treated others. Treat others the way you want to be treated, lest others treat you the way you treat others. Luigi Mangione judged Brian Robert Thompson according to the Golden Rule. Right or wrong, Luigi Mangione’s actions were a direct and terrifying application of the Golden Rule.
Brian Robert Thompson murdered approximately 40 human beings every single day. And for that, he became a victim of murder himself. The Golden Rule put him in his grave.
Approximately 68,000 Americans die from health insurance denials of medically necessary care every year. United Healthcare’s share of that comes to about 40 people per day. And yes, it’s the company killing those people, not the CEO directly. But Brian Robert Thompson gleefully gloated and took credit for the huge profits that resulted from UHC’s industry-leading rates of care denial. If he can take credit for the profits that resulted from those deaths, it is entirely reasonable to place the moral culpability for those deaths on his head. Did he ever kill someone with his own two hands? No. But neither did Osama Bin Ladin (at least on 9/11.)
And Luigi certainly acted according to the Golden Rule, you’re just not seeing it from his perspective. His version of the Golden Rule was, “if I ever kill thousands of innocent people, feel free to kill me.” And if, in some bizarro world, Luigi somehow ends up with the blood of thousands on his hands, then by the Golden Rule someone would be justified taking him out as well.
You don’t have to agree with Luigi to understand his motives. From his perspective, his and Thompson’s situation were entirely different. Luigi killed one man, Brian Robert Thompson killed thousands. From his perspective, Luigi killed as an act of righteous vengeance against the wicked, while Thompson killed for profit. And if we judged him according to the Golden Rule, someone would be justified in killing Luigi if he ever killed thousands in the name of profit.
If his motives were genuine, which I say like that because his act has been calledintoquestion, his version of the golden rule wouldn’t be the golden rule though as much as it is classic mutual exchange, and even that would be generous to say, not just because of the fact that Healthcare, both in its public and privatized forms (with all forms having their respective issues, since they’re all made to equalize people), is a contract, everything being implied in the beginning and established to work how it does for each client (challenging the assertion it’s the scam people make it out to be, especially as it abides by the law which in our age is hard on scams), but also because he had a whole list of targets as a part of theevidence against him, with the one victim being a minor cog in his own machine, however ethically questionable he or UnitedHealth have been, going to show how premature and generalized the sympathy is towards him.
Yeah the Golden Rule didn’t work out so well for Brian Robert Thompson…
How did the golden rule come into play for him?
Luigi Mangione treated Brian Robert Thompson exactly how Brian Robert Thompson treated others. Treat others the way you want to be treated, lest others treat you the way you treat others. Luigi Mangione judged Brian Robert Thompson according to the Golden Rule. Right or wrong, Luigi Mangione’s actions were a direct and terrifying application of the Golden Rule.
Brian Robert Thompson murdered approximately 40 human beings every single day. And for that, he became a victim of murder himself. The Golden Rule put him in his grave.
Luigi: “I don’t want to be killed, so I won’t kill anyone.”
Also Luigi: kills someone
That’s not the golden rule. And where is it established either of them murdered forty humans everyday?
Approximately 68,000 Americans die from health insurance denials of medically necessary care every year. United Healthcare’s share of that comes to about 40 people per day. And yes, it’s the company killing those people, not the CEO directly. But Brian Robert Thompson gleefully gloated and took credit for the huge profits that resulted from UHC’s industry-leading rates of care denial. If he can take credit for the profits that resulted from those deaths, it is entirely reasonable to place the moral culpability for those deaths on his head. Did he ever kill someone with his own two hands? No. But neither did Osama Bin Ladin (at least on 9/11.)
And Luigi certainly acted according to the Golden Rule, you’re just not seeing it from his perspective. His version of the Golden Rule was, “if I ever kill thousands of innocent people, feel free to kill me.” And if, in some bizarro world, Luigi somehow ends up with the blood of thousands on his hands, then by the Golden Rule someone would be justified taking him out as well.
You don’t have to agree with Luigi to understand his motives. From his perspective, his and Thompson’s situation were entirely different. Luigi killed one man, Brian Robert Thompson killed thousands. From his perspective, Luigi killed as an act of righteous vengeance against the wicked, while Thompson killed for profit. And if we judged him according to the Golden Rule, someone would be justified in killing Luigi if he ever killed thousands in the name of profit.
If his motives were genuine, which I say like that because his act has been called into question, his version of the golden rule wouldn’t be the golden rule though as much as it is classic mutual exchange, and even that would be generous to say, not just because of the fact that Healthcare, both in its public and privatized forms (with all forms having their respective issues, since they’re all made to equalize people), is a contract, everything being implied in the beginning and established to work how it does for each client (challenging the assertion it’s the scam people make it out to be, especially as it abides by the law which in our age is hard on scams), but also because he had a whole list of targets as a part of the evidence against him, with the one victim being a minor cog in his own machine, however ethically questionable he or UnitedHealth have been, going to show how premature and generalized the sympathy is towards him.