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It’s funny how we treat these things. Kill a bunch of people by putting lead in their drinking water and it’s a shrug. Occasionally you might lose your job over

It’s funny how we treat these things. Kill a bunch of people by putting lead in their drinking water and it’s a shrug. Occasionally you might lose your job over it. In extremely rare and egregious cases you might end up with a minor criminal conviction. Kill one person by putting lead in their heart at high speed and now it’s a serious crime. If the victim is Important then you get a massive manhunt and national news coverage.

hollerith 2y ago
>Kill one person by putting lead in their heart at high speed and now it’s a serious crime. I wish this was an attempt at a joke.
- wat10000 2y ago
  Me too. I’m describing it flippantly for effect, but I’m deadly serious. There are ways to kill people that get the attention of law enforcement, and ways to kill people that are de facto (and often de jure) legal. And wouldn’t you know, the latter category tends to include the methods used by the rich and powerful.
  - hollerith 2y ago
    >I’m deadly serious I figured that. It feels a little like the country is going crazy.
    - wat10000 2y ago
      How could we not, when the rich and powerful kill with impunity?
    - merrywhether 2y ago
      Or coming to temporary clarity? Things like the “culture wars” are distractions pushed by the elites to keep the lower classes fighting amongst themselves and not their true enemy. But extractive robber barons are the real problem behind everyone’s life getting worse all the time, and for a brief moment everyone has seen that and been in alignment.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - gosub100 2y ago
      If we have a functioning democracy, you know, where we vote for what we want, how do we end up with the healthcare situation in this country? (For god's sake I'm NOT inviting a right-vs-left debate here!) Nobody wants this, and yet we haven't solved it by any legislative actions. That tells you clearly there is an invisible 4th arm of government (not "shadow government", corporate government) going on here that we are just beginning to shed light on.
      - wat10000 2y ago
        It’s not even subtle. The deciding vote which kept Obamacare from having a public option was Joe Lieberman, commonly referred to as “the Senator from Aetna.”
    - feoren 2y ago
      The country has been going crazy yelling about trans people and gay people and black people and Irish people and "Ingins" for hundreds of years. Suddenly we stop worrying about 7 trans athletes and pay actual attention to what's actually going on and you say we're going crazy? I say we, just for a few days, collectively woke from a delusional nightmare to see the world as it really is. Don't worry. We're already drifting back to sleep.
  - klez 2y ago
    There's a barely-known Italian song from 2006 by Italian rapper Caparezza that deals with this exact theme. It's about a guy trying to "legally" kill his wife. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxhmOfk-L5Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxhmOfk-L5Q Lyrics here https://www.angolotesti.it/C/testi_canzoni_caparezza_1135/testo_canzone_sono_troppo_stitico_288387.html https://www.angolotesti.it/C/testi_canzoni_caparezza_1135/te...
edanm 2y ago
That's not funny; that's just not how things actually work.
- wat10000 2y ago
  It’s not? Air pollution alone kills tens of thousands of Americans a year. More die from air pollution than die from what’s legally defined as murder, by a substantial margin. How many people are in prison for it? Most of that pollution it outright legal. The illegal parts are rarely punished and never on the level meted out to “murderers.” And that’s just one example. It’s totally legal to deliberately kill innocent people, as long as you do it in certain ways.
  - edanm 2y ago
    You're using the word "deliberately" wrong when talking about things like air pollution. Pointing a gun and shooting at someone is quiet a different thing than is causing air pollution. Are people who smoked next to other people deliberately killing them? After all, second hand smoke was quite dangerous.
    - wat10000 2y ago
      Please explain the difference, in terms of how it should affect my opinion of the person who carries out the act. Pretend, for the sake of argument (and because it’s true) that I don’t see it. A factory boss decides to release some toxic pollutant. They know that it will result in some number of deaths over the next years. They choose to go through with it anyway, because they make more profit than if they disposed of the stuff properly, and that money matters more to them than the lives they’re ending. What’s the difference between that and some petty criminal shooting someone in the street so they can take the victim’s wallet? And yeah, smoking counts too, why not? The saving grace there is that the harm from an individual smoker isn’t very large. Even over a period of years, someone who habitually smokes near people who don’t consent to it only takes a tiny fraction of a life. That’s why I think smoking bans should be enforced with reasonable fines rather than life in prison.
dennis_jeeves2 2y ago
>putting lead in their drinking water Flint, Michigan
- wat10000 2y ago
  Yep. Guess how many people went to prison for that one.
throwaway48476 2y ago
Accidentally kill someone with your car because you're distracted, no problem. But if you're drunk? Crime.
- wat10000 2y ago
  Good example, distracted driving that ends in death should be treated much more harshly than it is.

hollerith 2y ago

>Kill one person by putting lead in their heart at high speed and now it’s a serious crime. I wish this was an attempt at a joke.

wat10000 2y ago
Me too. I’m describing it flippantly for effect, but I’m deadly serious. There are ways to kill people that get the attention of law enforcement, and ways to kill people that are de facto (and often de jure) legal. And wouldn’t you know, the latter category tends to include the methods used by the rich and powerful.
- hollerith 2y ago
  >I’m deadly serious I figured that. It feels a little like the country is going crazy.
  - wat10000 2y ago
    How could we not, when the rich and powerful kill with impunity?
  - merrywhether 2y ago
    Or coming to temporary clarity? Things like the “culture wars” are distractions pushed by the elites to keep the lower classes fighting amongst themselves and not their true enemy. But extractive robber barons are the real problem behind everyone’s life getting worse all the time, and for a brief moment everyone has seen that and been in alignment.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - gosub100 2y ago
    If we have a functioning democracy, you know, where we vote for what we want, how do we end up with the healthcare situation in this country? (For god's sake I'm NOT inviting a right-vs-left debate here!) Nobody wants this, and yet we haven't solved it by any legislative actions. That tells you clearly there is an invisible 4th arm of government (not "shadow government", corporate government) going on here that we are just beginning to shed light on.
    - wat10000 2y ago
      It’s not even subtle. The deciding vote which kept Obamacare from having a public option was Joe Lieberman, commonly referred to as “the Senator from Aetna.”
  - feoren 2y ago
    The country has been going crazy yelling about trans people and gay people and black people and Irish people and "Ingins" for hundreds of years. Suddenly we stop worrying about 7 trans athletes and pay actual attention to what's actually going on and you say we're going crazy? I say we, just for a few days, collectively woke from a delusional nightmare to see the world as it really is. Don't worry. We're already drifting back to sleep.
- klez 2y ago
  There's a barely-known Italian song from 2006 by Italian rapper Caparezza that deals with this exact theme. It's about a guy trying to "legally" kill his wife. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxhmOfk-L5Q https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bxhmOfk-L5Q Lyrics here https://www.angolotesti.it/C/testi_canzoni_caparezza_1135/testo_canzone_sono_troppo_stitico_288387.html https://www.angolotesti.it/C/testi_canzoni_caparezza_1135/te...

edanm 2y ago

That's not funny; that's just not how things actually work.

wat10000 2y ago
It’s not? Air pollution alone kills tens of thousands of Americans a year. More die from air pollution than die from what’s legally defined as murder, by a substantial margin. How many people are in prison for it? Most of that pollution it outright legal. The illegal parts are rarely punished and never on the level meted out to “murderers.” And that’s just one example. It’s totally legal to deliberately kill innocent people, as long as you do it in certain ways.
- edanm 2y ago
  You're using the word "deliberately" wrong when talking about things like air pollution. Pointing a gun and shooting at someone is quiet a different thing than is causing air pollution. Are people who smoked next to other people deliberately killing them? After all, second hand smoke was quite dangerous.
  - wat10000 2y ago
    Please explain the difference, in terms of how it should affect my opinion of the person who carries out the act. Pretend, for the sake of argument (and because it’s true) that I don’t see it. A factory boss decides to release some toxic pollutant. They know that it will result in some number of deaths over the next years. They choose to go through with it anyway, because they make more profit than if they disposed of the stuff properly, and that money matters more to them than the lives they’re ending. What’s the difference between that and some petty criminal shooting someone in the street so they can take the victim’s wallet? And yeah, smoking counts too, why not? The saving grace there is that the harm from an individual smoker isn’t very large. Even over a period of years, someone who habitually smokes near people who don’t consent to it only takes a tiny fraction of a life. That’s why I think smoking bans should be enforced with reasonable fines rather than life in prison.

dennis_jeeves2 2y ago

>putting lead in their drinking water Flint, Michigan

wat10000 2y ago
Yep. Guess how many people went to prison for that one.

throwaway48476 2y ago

Accidentally kill someone with your car because you're distracted, no problem. But if you're drunk? Crime.

wat10000 2y ago
Good example, distracted driving that ends in death should be treated much more harshly than it is.