Brian Thompson’s killing sparks outrage over state of US healthcare
Brian Thompson’s killing sparks outrage over state of US healthcare
Americans turn to social media to discuss dire experiences at hands of health insurance companies
Summary
The killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson has ignited outrage over the state of U.S. healthcare.
While his murder shocked many, online reactions highlighted public frustration with private insurers, citing denied care, high costs, and systemic bureaucracy.
UnitedHealthcare, a major industry player, has faced scrutiny for practices perceived as prioritizing profit over patients.
The attack, which appears premeditated, underscores rising tensions around healthcare inequality.
Experts see this as part of a broader trend toward violence over societal disputes, reflecting deep dissatisfaction with the American healthcare system.
lol .... Private health care sends thousands or even millions to an early death and no one says anything or cares for a moment
One CEO gets killed and now we start asking questions about the state of private health care
Soon private is all we have with Trump coming into office. Goodbye ACTA/ObamaCare
Experts see this as part of a broader trend toward violence over societal disputes, reflecting
deep dissatisfaction withanger at the blatant corruption of the American healthcare system.FTFY
That belies the shock also generated by the brutality of Thompson’s death.
It wasn't brutal. He died with no fear and very quickly. That's a lot better than many of the patients his company denied coverage for can say.
People aren't shocked by his death. We're at the very least unsympathetic. And many of us are positively giddy.
As much as I share the majority's sentiment about this situation, I think he may have died with fear. If you see the uncensored video, he turns around and faces the shooter after the first shot. That explains why they say he was shot in the chest even though he appeared to be shot from behind. I guess the first shot was to the leg and the second to the chest. It's also possible that he died too quickly to experience fear, even though he got to face his assassin.
Wait, let's see... I have to spend hundreds of dollars a month so when I get sick or injured, I have to pay hundreds of dollars upfront to meet a requirement to still pay a large portion of the bill. All so some mediocre guy with excessive wealth can buy another yacht. My health is a commodity to them. And I'm supposed to give ANY fucks when it all goes wrong for them? Did that dude spare even a moment to think about the people choosing a slow agonizing death to spare their family a life of medical debt? This man ran a racket that paid for his vacations with people's lives, and now it's come back to bite him (to death). I ain't mad.
UnitedHealthcare, a major industry player, has faced scrutiny for practices perceived as prioritizing profit over patients.
Perceived? Of course they prioritize profit over patients. They, along with every other capitalist firm, must prioritize profit over every other consideration. Everything is secondary to maximum, ever increasing profits.
Disgusting narrative. The violence in this story was mostly committed by the CEO. Its his violence that we must be talking about
While his murder shocked many
His murder shocked literally nobody.
The shocking thing is it doesn't happen more often tbh.
It’s like that scene in Fight Club that discusses the homework of starting a fight. It’s difficult because the majority of people, are not wired that way. And that is a good thing.
Maybe the would-be school shooters will see this response online and find a healthier outlet for their angst.
It shocked people like him
We're still waiting on his word as to how shocked he was at the time.
Maybe you shouldn't have an accountant in charge of a "healthcare" company.
I'm sorry for the multiple comments. I have a lot of background and trauma related to dealing with health insurance companies. They are parasites sucking out the blood of those who can least afford it and ruining their lives when they can't pay the bills left over after they deny claims.
Healthcare companies should only be allowed to operate under non-profit rules.
There should be no incentive for profit on people's health.
And forced to publicly report every thousandth of a cent. And their current administrators charged with crimes against humanity.
And the thing is, the "trade" they inflict is just so amazingly unreasonable. The incredible misery they cause, replicated over so many people, and for truly no greater purpose than keeping up with the perverse status symbol competition amongst their hideous peers. Absolutely wild, unhinged, clearly malignant behavior.
Parasites at least play an important role in their ecosystems. I have no (or too many) words to describe my hatred for people like this that commit social murder all the time.
This isn't reddit. Its not an issue to segment comments logicly
Curiously, successive governments in the UK (where The Guardian is based) have been slowly destroying the National Health Service.
The same thing has been happening in some Canadian provinces where there are conservative governments.
Oh, I see the same think in my native Portugal.
As I see it (having left it a year or so before Brexit came into effect) Britain is maybe 10 years ahead of the rest of Europe on the path towards Neoliberal Dystopia (you see it too in other things like Press capture, surveillance society and even the house price inflation.), so some of the social, economic and political problems I see now unfolding in Portugal, I saw in Britain years ago when I lived there.
Britain seem to be trying hard to converge with the US, but only on the bad things rather than the good ones.
Yes, the Tory plan for the NHS is a sibling of the American "starve the beast" model where you make it hard for a public service to function effectively then go "see it doesn't work, it needs to be got rid of" when it inevitably has issues.
The end game is to privatise it, making money for tory mates in the process and removing yet another social benefit paid out of tax revenue.
The problem for the Tories is that even Tory voters love the NHS, so they can't just privatise straight out it like they did everything else. They need to make a case for why, they need to break the British attachment, or at least get people to care less.
Be aware, if you're not, that stealth privatisation has already been done through outsourcing mandates. This increases costs (because the outsourcer wants to make profits) rather than saving it, helping accelerate their case.
Experts see this as part of a broader trend toward violence over societal disputes
If you take away everything, at some point, people have nothing to lose
So far, i cant afford a house or a family. If i lost my partner, my only stability, to a treatable illness..
I wonder how many people in this country feel just like me
I'm guessing a lot of them.
From FDR to ~1981 we invested in the creation of a middle class. Oh yes, the middle class was created by government subsidy. The 1950s was unique because the prosperous creation blasted into the American scene for the first time. It evolved from there, in part, because it was also being built on the backs of women being crushed into singular stifling roles. Go ahead, ask your boomer mom about her mom, how happy and sane and unmedicated she was. Outliers exist. But that piece is for another thread.
Subsidizing middle class began to be peeled away ~1981. Basically, the theory was, investing in the investors and corporate is simply more efficient, financially, and will trickle down to the rest of society. We’ve all felt the long term impact of that experiment and it’s not making anyone working class very happy.
2021, yea GramPOTUS started to peel back up pre1981. Have we felt it? Teamsters maybe in knowing they still have a retirement, but the truth of it is, breaking shit has lasting impact and turning it around will not be felt for a while.
I highly doubt 2025 will subsidize the middle class and try to get us back to pre-1981. But we will see.
My point is, this financial squeeze is the culmination of 40yrs of government policy. Bezos gets a penis rocket, we get lack of homes, healthcare debt, the inability to raise children due to costs, and a wonderful feeling of anxiety and anger.
Either way. 1950s or the present crushing situation: government created.
They shouldn't be surprised at the reaction when they are actively doing this to THE WORLDS MOST WELL-ARMED POPULATION. What the fuck did they think would happen?
That thing about asking my mom about her mom. She wouldn’t be able to tell me much. My aunts and uncle are boomers, my mom is gen x. She was born 10 years after her youngest sibling so obviously a total accident.
Her mom shot herself when my mom was only 4 years old. So, yeah. You got it right.
Option 1: Vote for Democrats / vote for a woman for president to get incremental improvements to healthcare and society.
Americans: yawnOption 2: Start murdering the powerful capitalist oligarchs which will lead to zero improvements in healthcare and society but fuels fantasies of revenge and temporarily feels good.
Americans: “Yay!”Edit: I’m not even saying we need to pick just one option. But shouldn’t Option 1 also be “yay” if Option 2 is? Why limit how pressure is applied to just picking the violent option? It’s weird how even marches and unions get a lukewarm response compared to vigilantism.
And these replies I’m getting are interesting. I didn’t expect so many attempts to justify that only a violent option ever would do any good. Let’s say that violence is the most effective option. Does that really mean we don’t try any other options? If I was this inflexible in my day-to-day life, I’d never get anything done.
It's like Richard Pryor said about crack:
Old white women see addicted kids in the ghetto and shrug "Well isn't that terrible?"
Then crack arrives at their suburbs and they're "OH MY GOD IT'S AN EPIDEMIC!"What improvements did Democrats make in the past 4 years?
The last time a president made marginal improvements they introduced term limits to stop it happening again.
You couldn’t find anything?
- all-time low for uninsured
- unemployment has held below 4% for the longest stretch since the 1960s
- income increases began to outpace price increases
- cost of living is returning to its pre-pandemic level this year
- energy transition spending was $303 billion last year, a record and two-thirds higher than before Biden
- rise in real wages for lower-income workers lowers inequality
- violent crime is down
- $1.2 trillion infrastructure package to increase investment in the national network of bridges and roads, airports, public transport and national broadband internet, as well as waterways and energy systems
- signed the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act that created enhanced background checks, closed the “boyfriend” loophole and provided funds for youth mental health
- $369 billion investment in climate change, the largest in American history, through the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022
- college debt relief to Americans with loans who make under $125,000 a year
- cut child poverty in half through the American Rescue Plan
- capped prescription drug prices at $2,000 per year for seniors on Medicare through the Inflation Reduction Act
- imposed a 15% minimum corporate tax on some of the largest corporations in the country, ensuring that they pay their fair share, as part of the Inflation Reduction Act
- rejoined the Paris Agreement
- gave Medicare the power to negotiate prescription drug prices through the Inflation Reduction Act while also reducing government health spending
- reduced healthcare premiums under the Affordable Care Act by $800 a year
- signed the PACT Act to address service members’ exposure to burn pits and other toxins
- reauthorized the Violence Against Women Act through 2027
- halted all federal executions after the previous administration reinstated them after a 17-year freeze
- signed the Respect for Marriage Act, requiring the U.S. federal government and all U.S. states and territories (though not tribes) to recognize the validity of same-sex and interracial civil marriages in the United States
I didn’t expect so many attempts to justify that only a violent option ever would do any good
USAmericans love violence. Look at their media, it's full of it. They'd rather see a gun advert or a story of some school children getting shot than a naked boob.
Start murdering the powerful capitalist oligarchs which will lead to zero improvements in healthcare and society
That implies a trend instead of a one off like this. A trend would absolutely ultimately lead to improvements. The oligarchy that rules us isn't listening to polite letters and protests asking them to change.
But if they discover that their actions lead to great personal risk, they'll quickly change their actions to avoid the risk. That means lower (fair) pay for the CEOs/stockholders. That means an end to the scamming they do through insurance. That means an end to price gouging in the grocery store.
The reason everything is shit (aside from the destruction of the middle class and housing crisis, which is itself caused by the oligarchy), is that the oligarchy is brazen and unafraid of risk in their wealth extraction.
Does that really mean we don’t try any other options?
That's what we've been doing for the last two decades, and it's got us basically nowhere.
I'll allow it.
Sympathy out of network
There is no other way this ends. The corpos are so moneyblind that they don't see it.
I like this headline because for once the “sparks outrage” cliche has some real meaning to it.
People have been mad about healthcare for ages. But it hasn’t lit up, it’s just sort of passively lingering like a gas leak. All it took was one snap to light the flames.
Anyway, I don’t condone violence but this shouldn’t come as a surprise. The rotten egg smell is everywhere and we’ve tried calling the gas department for decades and no one has come to help. If there are further victims of violence, the majority of the blood will be on the hands of the oppressive class who failed to protect themselves by treating their subordinates as human.
Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. -JF damn K
> Don't vote in local elections
> Don't vote in county elections
> Don't vote in state elections
> Don't vote in federal elections
> Maybe votes in presidential election
> If vote is cast in election, it's for own interest or for the rich, not for the common good
> "Why isn't America getting better chat?"
Outrage? Bruh its sparking blackfriday sales on https://www.omahaoutdoors.com
Okay I was trying to do a "citation needed" joke but superscripts don't seem to work.
WHo was "shocked" by this?
Mostly other CEOs and a lot of the media.
Headline scared me. Can't do the alien bounty hunter dirty like that.
🍽🍽🍽🍽🍽🍽🍽
I'm not noticing much follow up action. I'd like to be proud of you people for once, show the world you aren't COMPLETELY incapable of citizen led change. If you want to be free the establishment needs to change, not just billionaires sharing a TINY bit more, hoping that's enough to not be shot.
Good.