| > Instead we should invest time in understanding why our laws and society structure allows (even promotes) the kind of corporate exploitation of the public that is enough to drive someone to murder. What are you talking about? Isn't blatant corporate greed simply the product of the societal and financial culture that the country is practically built upon? If you insist on playing naive, let me spell it out for you. 1. A corporation's main aim is shareholder value increase, at any cost that is a) legally permissible b) doesn't kill the company. For what its worth, #1.a is also negotiable now, see 2.2 below. 2. In order to ensure this: 2.1 They pay political campaigns to get the politicians in power so that those politicians can shape the laws in their favor. 2.2 They employ ex-government officials to incentivize them to be not too harsh with the corporations during their tenure at the government - you don't bite the hand that will feed you once you retire from your current government job. 2.3 They pay lobbying groups to influence the laws the politicians will make (most are already bought (see #2.1) but it is so much cheaper to lobby compared to the outsized payout that spending a bit more for maximum support is a no-brainer). 3. In order to maximize shareholder value, they need to maximize their profits. If denying claims helps them do it, they will do so. Who will stop them? Politicians? See #2 above. 4. How do politicians ensure they can enable #1? 5.1 By making it legal for corporations to pump cash via PACs and super PACs so that #2.1 can continue. 5.2 By pushing extremism (left or right) and polarize people into groups. It is easy for sharks to feed if the herring move as a group. How can they do it easily? Technology companies with the power of internet enable it greatly (they are also companies after all, see #1). 6. The cycle continues and worsens and people keep getting squeezed until someone says fuck it and does something like the event this thread is about. PS: people get all worked up about Roe vs. Wade. The real cancer was Citizens United (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Citizens_United_v._FEC). |