Tbh this is the logical end-state of a poorly-regulated for-profit healthcare system

I'd encourage everyone to be careful with this type of thinking, because I'm seeing it a lot. Characterizing situations as having only two unpleasant options ("two tracks" in this case) is a classic strategy to rationalize violence. Gangs use it, terrorist groups use it, and even governments trying to justify wars use it (e.g. remember Bush's "You're either with us or against us").

It's a textbook false dichotomy, and it's meant to make the least unpleasant option presented seem more palatable. This situation is not as simple as "either you're in favor of insurance companies profiting off of denied healthcare of millions or you're ok with murdering a CEO"

I see what you're getting at, but this isn't the trolly problem. The trolly problem is predicated on the idea that killing one will save many, but it's assumed that everyone involved is innocent. It's a philosophical question about moral choice; is inaction that allows many to die more moral than an action that directly kills one? If the one person being killed is somehow culpable for the deaths of the other people, that changes the entire equation.

Also, that's not even what happened here. One person was killed, but just as many people are going to die today because United Healthcare. No one was saved. Maybe if dozens of CEOs were gunned down in the streets, that would change something, but one dead CEO isn't going to do anything.

(And, to any moderators or FBI agents reading this, I'm of course not advocating for that. Can you even imagine? The ruling class that has been crushing the American working class for decades suddenly getting put down like rabid dogs? With the very weapons that the gun manufacturers allowed to flood our streets in order to maximize their profits? Makes me sick just to ~~fantasize~~ think about it.)

Oh so this will save thousands of lives then? And here I thought they just hire a new CEO while making their services worse to fund the bonuses for the new one. Silly me.

This is America, so unfortunately gun crime is just something there's no fix for. 🤷

The problem with the trolley problem is that this event isn't a trolley problem. Killing one CEO doesn't save lives, hell just be replaced and more guarded now.

We need proper reform and regulation.

1. this will save precisely zero lives
2. you ignore the broader impact of allowing brazen broad-daylight murder to be endorsed by the public under any conditions. It is not just this one life
3. insurance is a mess and I am sure this guy was a dick, and that UHC denies plenty of claims that should be accepted. But at risk of pointing out the obvious, an insurance company that never denies any claims will go bankrupt immediately, and would therefore result in many more deaths since nobody would be covered.

It really is a real life trolley problem

People in the comments seem to be arguing if this will or will not save lives. I don't really care if it does. I think it's ironic that there's a crowd of people arguing that human life is precious and we can't celebrate this guy's death when the guy in question is the antithesis of that philosophy; he dedicated his life to profiting off of the suffering of others. I'm glad to see him go. There are many more I wish would follow.

It's more like "We found the guy pulling the lever on the trolley problem, only his trolley problem is 'people die or I get less money', and he has the trolley run over the people every time"

Unfortunately, there's a long line of twats behind him drooling over their chance to make the trolley run over human beings in exchange for money, so killing him doesn't really have the 'trolley running over people averted' effect that the trolley problem is usually based around. You're just punishing a shithead killer by killing him. Which, while hilarious, lacks the moral quandary that the trolley problem is meant to highlight, since no one is actually saved.

It's one of those things where the institutions of society can and must genuinely pursue the killer (albeit not at the level they actually are, expending a disproportionate amount of resources compared to if one of us commoners was killed), but if I saw the person who killed the CEO, I didn't.

I mean, if this was some dictator of a poor country slowly squeezing his citizens for money so they were hungry, some dying of starvation, and had shitty infrastructure so he can jaunt off to holidays in his private jet and live in a mansion with private guards, nobody would be saying this guy deserved to live. But a CEO squeezing sick people and their families for money, actively shortening lifespans and QoL... he's fine, let him off the hook?

[off topic]

Back in the day, I heard a lecture on the tactics of terrorist groups.

The IRA was particularly effective in assassinations. People thought they had an vast army of trained killers on hand.

Actually, the number of shooters was small, maybe fifty in all.

What made them so dangerous was that they had a powerful 'rear echelon.'

When the shooter arrived in town, he'd have three or four drivers waiting for him, a choice of safe houses, and more than one doctor to go to if he were to be injured.

It’s not a real life trolley problem, because there is no mechanism by which killing this CEO saves lives.

The patterns of behavior between shareholders, boards of directors, and executives is what's killing people. The same role can be re-cast with different actors.

It's not that CEOs need to die, it's that that larger pattern of behavior that gets rich by killing people needs to end. Maybe this spooks other people who are part of that larger pattern into stopping, maybe it makes them do it more, stealthier, and with bodyguards. It's hard to say.

At the very least, we should all jump at every chance to help things without hurting anybody, wherever we do find it. "Necessary violence" comes with a big ol heap of plausible deniability, and it's a pretty big ask for somebody to handle it responsibly.

The justification will be alluring even in circumstances where it is not legitimate.

I’m of the opinion that shooting CEO’s that make decisions to deny insurance claims that cost peoples’ lives is the moral high ground.

Multitrack drifting? I'm sorry someone had to say it. Eat the rich.

What do you call an American health care CEO dead on the street in Manhattan?

No, they could stack the bodies of executives high enough to build a retaining wall, and the current system will still refuse to learn any fucking lessons. Our country has an extreme addiction to profits over people.

The solution is single-payer not-for-profit nationalized health care. The stuff that mature, rational nations do as a matter of daily routine.

Socialism is not a dirty word. We need to learn that lesson, first.

Unfortunately, the new administration will make things much worse. And the incompetent reality show cast of an administration will blame Biden and the "deep state" for all the misery and suffering they cause. And the morons in the Cult of 47 will believe them.

The USA is more broken than a folk hero with a gun can fix. Though, at least he has us all talking about it.