Luigi Mangione has been characterized as both a cold blooded killer and as a Robin Hood, a David to the health denial industry's Goliath.
There must be some very interesting conversations going on in Ivy League ethics classes right now:
Is it probable that Luigi Mangione's actions, which have taken one life, will also save hundreds or thousands of other lives, due to the conversation he started?
The fact that the life he ended was involved in causing the deaths of many others in the past, and would have been central to many more deaths in the future, is a consideration. A trolley problem redux.
Should vulnerable individuals in our society have been pushed to the brink on this subject? Of course not. In a more ethical society, the horrifying issue of health care denial for profit would have been sanely addressed by a caring government long before it got to this point.
So, we might contemplate--who are the real villains in this scenario?
Luigi is likely the least of them. And for the multitudes of people whose lives his actions have saved, he is surely to be regarded as a hero.
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