Remembering History: the Era of Assassinations
Luigi Mangione is not an anarchist, but his assassination attack reminds me of the historic period of anarchist bombings and assassinations in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
Propaganda of the Deed was an ideology promoted by Mikhail Bakunin, during the mid to late 19th century, when labor and social conflict was rising, and anarchists advocated for bombings and assassinations as a way to “wake the people” and foment revolution. In 1892, anarchist Alexander Berkman attempted to assassinate industrialist Henry Clay Frick, but failed.
Internal criticisms about PotD within anarchism included Kropotkin, who preferred education, various individualists who leaned pacifist, and even Johann Most who was an advocate of PofD in text, but not in body.
V. I. Lenin and Leon Trotsky criticized from a Marxist perspective. Why Marxists Oppose Individual Terrorism by Trotsky. V. I. Lenin’s struggle against anarchism by J. Pateman.[1]
PotD ideas were revived in the late 1990s by “insurrectionary” anarchists who argued that vandalism during protests could “break the spell” of capitalist culture, which had a stranglehold on society. Unfortunately, society had neglected to read the zine where this was all explained, and capitalism continued.
From the mid to late 20th century, the peace wing of the anarchist movement redefined PotD to mean something other than bombing and assassination. They pushed the idea of individual direct action to reduce violence.
Thank you for reading so far into what is probably the driest take on the Luigi Mangione assassination of United Healthcare’s CEO Brian Thompson. The “manifesto” is below, copied from here.
Luigi Mangione’s note
This is copied from Ken Klippenstein.
“To the Feds, I’ll keep this short, because I do respect what you do for our country. To save you a lengthy investigation, I state plainly that I wasn’t working with anyone. This was fairly trivial: some elementary social engineering, basic CAD, a lot of patience. The spiral notebook, if present, has some straggling notes and To Do lists that illuminate the gist of it. My tech is pretty locked down because I work in engineering so probably not much info there. I do apologize for any strife of traumas but it had to be done. Frankly, these parasites simply had it coming. A reminder: the US has the #1 most expensive healthcare system in the world, yet we rank roughly #42 in life expectancy. United is the [indecipherable] largest company in the US by market cap, behind only Apple, Google, Walmart. It has grown and grown, but as our life expectancy? No the reality is, these [indecipherable] have simply gotten too powerful, and they continue to abuse our country for immense profit because the American public has allwed them to get away with it. Obviously the problem is more complex, but I do not have space, and frankly I do not pretend to be the most qualified person to lay out the full argument. But many have illuminated the corruption and greed (e.g.: Rosenthal, Moore), decades ago and the problems simply remain. It is not an issue of awareness at this point, but clearly power games at play. Evidently I am the first to face it with such brutal honesty.”
Ideology?
I really don’t know, but people are saying he’s like the TPOTs, a loose network of friends who started out as part of the “rationalist movement” of the 2010s, which was popular with techbros. My impression was that it intersected with “ancaps”, so I didn’t pay attention.
This one internet subculture explains murder suspect Luigi Mangione’s odd politics by Emily Shugerman
The very online ‘gray tribe’ philosophy of alleged UnitedHealthcare killer Luigi Mangione by Io Dodds
what the hell is this “tpot” thing by Crystal Duan
Lindy Effect on Wikipedia
How to Use Epistemic Tribal Theory: TPOT on Twitter by David Shapiro
Effective Altruism (part of the Rationalist Movement)
Now, I talk some shit
Of the links above, Duan and Shapiro are explanations by people involved in scenes in TPOT or adjacent to it.
I’m still pretty baffled. They sound like classical liberals or centrist liberals to me. Most of their influences are considered conservative, or at least outre (consider using the Lindy Effect as an argument to conform to historic norms, versus Judith Butler’s theories of gender performativity).
Historically, this centrist tendency has been supportive of cops, and opposed to using violence. I wonder if cops have shifted so far to the right, that young people in the center-right feel desperate.
Criticisms of Luigi-worship: Lookism? White Privilege? Wealth? Maleness?
Yes, yes, yes, and yes.
We exist in a country that constructs hierarchies of power based on appearance, whiteness, wealth, and gender. These hierarchies are oppressive. In a much better country, appearance, race, gender, and wealth wouldn’t be hierarchies of power. They’d be differences with no meaning.
Are these hierarchies unfair? Yes, yes, yes, and yes.
That he can get away with more is unfair and inescapable. The fact he’s more popular is unfair, and inescapable. That someone ranks high on all of these, and is, thus, adored, is offensive to some of us.
Despite these “bad things”, we shouldn’t dismiss Luigi’s usefulness.
His privileges work to his advantage, because he elicits sympathy across all people, because we have been brainwashed to have empathy for people like him, and it could work to the advantage of healthcare justice organizers, like Medicare for All for California.
Rather than “break the spell” of these four qualities, use them to our advantage.
A much better country where appearance, race, gender, and wealth weren’t hierarchies of power, would probably have a better healthcare system.
Conversely, a better healthcare system where these hierarchies of power do not matter, is possible, and would help create a less oppressive, more caring society.
So, in the healthcare matchup, we have folk-hero Luigi Mangione, and it looks like the healthcare insurance companies have Governor of California Gavin Newsom. The two guys cancel each other out on physical attributes, and we’re left with dueling policies: elimination of for-profit health insurance, versus continuation of for-profit health insurance.
Notes
- Lenin also criticized “bowing to spontaneity” in “What is to be done?” chapter 2, about the tendency for the working class to focus on union organizing and strikes, rather than the larger political struggle of replacing capitalism, rooted in Marxist philosophy. While valorizing this assassination of the CEO sounds like “bowing to spontaneity”, the shooter was not part of a union, or any organization.
He has no organization, at all, it appears. He has fewer organizational ties than even the anarchists who were criticized for their bombings and assassination attempts.
Praise or criticism of the action is about his individual act.
The online discussion is largely about whether this attack was good, or not, within the context of individual behaviors.