No, I will not clutch my pearls
I don’t own any because even eggs are too expensive
Perhaps if I lived a different life, I would feel remorse. I would be shocked by the senseless murder of a man who reminded me of my best friend’s husband. What a catch. I would worry about my safety. What is this country coming to? Over drinks, after morning pilates, I would wring my hands over my disgust for the American appetite for violence. I would read articles skimming over the inconvenient truth that the deceased robbed people of their best lives, written by the same people trying to explain to us why Kamala didn’t win.
Instead, I scrawled my credit card info on an overdue bill for yet another doctor-ordered appointment I can’t afford even though I have insurance. I asked myself questions I do not have answers to and I might get in trouble for asking:
What will it take for us to shift our perception of what it means to be radicalized?
Are we willing to peer deeper into the cracks they try to fill with empty promises?
When will we refuse to abide by a system of suffering made legal by shareholders, boards of directors, and articles of incorporation?
Will this event become a catalyst for people like me to find common ground with people like them?
"If not us, then who? If not now, then when?" ~ John Lewis
We cannot turn away from the great unraveling we are witnessing. The election of Donald Trump, an insurrection at our nation’s capital, the killing of a corporate executive—it’s all connected. They all are symptoms of desperation.
What corporations and the government seem not to understand is the social contracts between employer and worker, government and citizen have been the glue that has held their neat little society together. The simple luxuries of middle-class life—job security, reliable healthcare, reading at a high school level, a retirement to look forward to, and owning a single-family home—are out of reach for more and more people. And for a long time, we, the white majority, tolerated this because we were able to squeak by. But now white men don’t have what they think they’re owed and most women reading this have experience with what that’s like so…
We now must navigate this dystopian reality because those with extreme wealth have yet to settle into a place of “having enough.” They created the systems that justify and uphold their acquisition of money and power at any cost, and we’ve allowed it because we idolize wealth. Case in point: The average American thinks a salary of just over $270,000 a year qualifies them as "financially successful."
Brian Thompson made $10 million a year and he increased the annual profits of UnitedHealthcare from twelve billion dollars to sixteen billion dollars in three years. UnitedHealthcare provides no real service to its paying customers; they simply make money off their suffering. It defies the basic fundamentals of businesses—create something that solves a problem. UnitedHealthcare is a shitty middleman that exists solely to benefit shareholders. If I—or any small business—fucked over my customers I’d have no business, but these assholes become millionaires? SMFH.
You can be driven into homelessness by someone like Brian Thompson, then legally murdered by someone like Daniel Penny, while the money that could have saved you is spent on murdering children in Gaza. This is called the rule of law. ~ Jamie Dyer
What is the difference between Daniel Penny who was “protecting” fellow subway riders and Luigi Mangione who was protecting fellow UnitedHealthcare insurance customers? Daniel upheld the class system and Luigi attempted to erode it. One was acquitted and the other is in prison awaiting trial. I imagine the court will not be as kind to Luigi as they were to Daniel, but a girl can dream.
As much as I’m not mad at Luigi, I also would prefer to live in a country where people don’t feel like they have to go to such extremes to change the system. Most of this country is betting on Trump to change that for them. I have different ideas about what it’s going to take, and I’m sure you do too. But if we don’t claw open those cracks, who will?
December’s Offering for Paid Subscribers
I’d love to explore these questions—and whatever is top of mind for you— in December’s gathering for paid subscribers. Since it’s that time of year and I’m into experimenting, I will be opening up the chat on Thursday, December 19th, for a day of asynchronous communication. Subscribers can come and go as they please, posting questions and comments and chatting with others. I’ll send out a reminder next week and I’ll post the first comment next week to kick us off. DM with any questions or ideas!
What I’m Reading & Watching
I am finding more and more that anything worth reading about the world around us is not coming from the mainstream media. I am enraged that the people who cannot figure out that the real story isn’t about the murder of the CEO but what’s happening in the comments are the same people trying to explain to us what happened with the election. They are so disconnected from what really matters. It’s like the fucking Titan all over again. So here’s what I read this week about the current state of affairs that I found newsworthy and full of perspective.
A Man Was Murdered In Cold Blood and You’re Laughing? If one were to, hypothetically, blow up an unoccupied private jet in protest of the fact that the wealthiest one percent of the global population accounts for more carbon emissions than the poorest sixty-six percent, this would be seen by many people—like Thompson’s murder, and unlike the tens of thousands of human deaths per year already caused by climate change—as a sign of profoundly alarming social decay.
This Was Never About One CEO: I’m not out here championing violence. I’m not waxing lyrical about the Second Amendment. I’m not ‘celebrating death’ (I’ll leave that up to corporate and white America at large). But I am acknowledging literal decades of pent-up rage at a system that’s been commodifying human suffering on an industrial scale.
Holding Space for the Hot Assasin: Maybe people aren’t frothing at the mouth over murder—they’re just relieved to finally have an outlet for their indignation. In a year as divisive as this one, there’s a grim, collective acknowledgment that whether you’re working class or middle class, it all just sucks right now. Sure, pundits had plenty to say about $12 eggs—eggs they could easily afford—but maybe people also wanted to hear them express the same outrage about how expensive it’s become to simply stay alive.
And this, full of some very uncomfortable truths. And this too.
Random Poll Because You Made It This Far
Come to find out Burger King didn’t post “We Don’t Snitch” to their Twitter account, which is a shame because I thought we might be heading into more unhinged fast food social territory.
Your willingness to grapple with and confront head on what so many are feeling, even as an employer or face of a small business, are why we’re here. Keep unapologetically sharing what you feel!