Ask Lemmy

We've become too soft, and we need to get used to harsh realities. What was done was a perfectly acceptable and reasonable response. May this be the beginning of something new.

This is an age old topic and there is no right answer to it. You need to decide where you draw the line. Unpersecuted vigilantism will lead to chaos, on the other hand, we live in an unjust and structural violent system where rich people kill by signing papers and poor, desperate people die. They sometimes even vote for the elite before dying.
I glued myself to the street to protest our government not acting on our planet heating up. I knew I broke the law but I felt like I needed to. It was a rough experience, still I don't regret it because I did what felt necessary to me. The guy shooting the CEO probably feels the same, and pathetic "Proud Boys" chasing immigrants do so as well. For me, violence against other people is a line I don't see myself crossing. But I can think of scenarios where I would understand people resorting to it.

People vote for greed because schooling indoctrinates hierarchy:
https://www.quora.com/Do-you-think-public-schools-in-your-country-are-designed-to-make-kids-docile-obedient-workers-for-the-upper-class/answer/Harri-K-Hiltunen

How schools should be:
https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-one-thing-that-should-be-taught-in-school-that-isnt-already/answer/Harri-K-Hiltunen

tldr: there is the electoral system.

governments change because of who leads/ represents the people in their governments.

in the US, "the people" have little to no understanding of their government(there have been studies about this for the last 60 years), and because conservatives campaign on emotional bigotry, which is immediately hard-hitting and compelling versus waiting 2 years to receive a tax decrease(which works, but takes 2 years), undereducated and unsupported American citizens have been put into increasingly untenable situations where they are struggling to survive while working themselves to the bone and receiving lower compensation, and if an emergency arises, they are denied basic services.

when you have no other options to support yourself, murder becomes an option, since nothing else has worked and they are provided with no other options they are comfortable with.

there are some civil services, and the government can always change, regardless of what popular opinion fashions, but right now in the US you have a couple hundred million people desperate to survive in a country that provided survival wages, and now that they have reelected Trump and he's already before even taking the White House began turning against unions and civil rights, those wages will probably lower again, living cost increasing and civil benefits decreasing.

out of 200 million desperate people, some of them are willing to take the most drastic measure because maybe it'll make a difference, who knows.

i mean, lots of people know, but most Americans have been clinging to the edge of a cliff by their fingertips for years or decades, so they don't have the perspective that others may.

I’m not down with vigilante murder

Just why do you think the framers gave us the 2nd amendment?

Cook em mash em put em in a soup

not down for "vigilante" murder? so you are down for corporate murder?

I don't know when we got the idea that killing someone with a pen is better than killing someone with a sword. at least with a sword you have to look them in the eyes while you do it

i don't see violance as a first option but i'm not a pacifist, sometimes its going to be the only option. i don't think dropping a random ceo or two is anything more than revolution larping though. this kind of thing is more likely to just make insurnace campuses a target for ramdom shooting in the same way american schools are. a bunch of people just trying to make a living in an economic enviroment where picking your employer is a privilage, will get get unalived along with maybe a low level exec who has little actual power. and we'll see a whole lot of stories about why we should love insurnace companies. i'm not mourning this fucker or feeling sympathy for his family, but it's not a long term plan for improving anyones life. we find ourselves with a fewer billionaire media tycoons and i'll be less sceptical of people suggesting this practice.

OP, can you please edit your question to make it clearer. Remember, open-ended and thought provoking.

We already live in a culture that glorifies constant violence. Roughly one person gets murdered every day in New York City, and dozens have been killed across the U.S. since the CEO's death. We wait with bated breath for the next school shooting, or episode of police brutality, to fill the news with more poor bodies. I've even been personally affected, having to dive out of the way of a fleeing gunman to avoid stray bullets from his automatic.

The only thing that has happened is equality. The billionaire class that has fostered and profited from the culture of violence has had a taste of what we get to go through every day. If there is any slippery slope to slide down, it has been sloped by the bourgeoise.