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3:58

This is Eric Glass. On This

4:00

American Life, we like stories

4:02

that surprise you. For instance, imagine

4:04

finding a new hobby and

4:06

realizing to do this hobby right,

4:08

according to the ways of

4:10

the masters, there's a pretty good

4:12

chance that you're gonna have

4:14

to bend the law to get

4:17

the materials that you need.

4:19

If not break it. Yeah. To

4:21

break international laws. Your life

4:23

stories, really good ones. This American

4:25

Life. What's

4:28

good, everybody? All right, I'm joined by Abanay

4:30

Clayton, who covers gun violence for the Guardian. What's

4:32

good, Abanay? Thanks for having me, Jane. All

4:34

right, so first I gotta set the scene a

4:36

little bit. So

4:39

it's been over a week since

4:41

a masked gunman shot and killed Brian

4:43

Thompson, the CEO of United Healthcare,

4:45

outside a Manhattan hotel. This

4:48

week, authorities identified and detained an

4:50

alleged gunman, and he's being charged with

4:52

murder. You've probably heard his name

4:54

by now, Luigi

4:57

Mangione. And we

4:59

kinda have to walk a very

5:01

delicate line here, because we're talking

5:03

about, you know, violence here, a

5:05

brazen murder, which is pretty scary

5:07

to think about for a lot

5:09

of people. And at the same

5:12

time, there's been a lot of

5:14

praise and solidarity for this alleged

5:16

gunman and his actions. The alleged

5:18

shooter even got his own superhero

5:20

-esque nickname, with some people on

5:22

the internet calling him the adjuster.

5:24

And on the other end, there

5:27

are reports of CEOs across industries

5:29

being scared for their lives, beefing

5:31

up their security details, removing their

5:33

identities from their company's websites. All

5:37

right, Abanay, as somebody who

5:39

covers gun violence, how would you

5:41

characterize the reactions we've been

5:43

seeing to this shooting and how

5:45

have these reactions been different

5:47

from the normal reactions to violence?

5:49

You know, it is violence

5:51

hitting somebody who a lot of

5:54

people feel like typifies the

5:56

inequalities that lead to other forms

5:58

of violence. You know what

6:00

I'm saying? Obviously, we

6:02

are not. condoning

6:04

murder, and this is a awful

6:06

tragedy for his family. But

6:10

The responses, it reminds me a little bit

6:12

of the way, when you read about

6:14

like Bonnie and Clyde, right? They were doing

6:16

these really horrible things where they were

6:18

killing people. They were robbing banks, but they're

6:20

also during the Great Depression and people

6:22

were very, very angry at bankers, right? know,

6:24

banks that basically tanked the economy and,

6:26

you know, people have lost their lobbyists, they

6:28

lost their homes. And so because they

6:30

were robbing banks, it was seen as a

6:32

sort of, even though what they were

6:34

doing wasn't sort of vigilantism, right? It wasn't

6:36

sort of resolving any of the situations that

6:38

people found themselves in. They were

6:41

also going after or like hitting the

6:43

pockets of people that were really,

6:45

really unpopular. And it feels of like that

6:47

kind of folk hero. thing. think

6:49

the Bonnie and Clyde thing is

6:51

quite accurate. Yes, this was a

6:53

very public hard

6:56

to watch, traumatizing. active

6:58

violence that will impact his family

7:00

for years to come. And

7:02

also, what does he represent? What's

7:04

the backdrop? right? Yeah, I

7:06

mean it's something that we don't

7:08

really think about as you know

7:11

violence. but just last year the

7:13

American Medical Association reported that a

7:15

third of the physicians they surveyed

7:17

and they asked a thousand. physicians, A

7:19

third of them said that

7:21

they'd seen delay or denial of

7:24

care due to prior authorization

7:26

lead to either serious adverse health

7:28

effects for their patients even

7:30

death. Why do you think people

7:32

have a harder time seeing.

7:36

What happens to people like us on the business

7:38

end of, you know, insurance companies decisions as

7:40

violence. But we can see gun violence more clearly

7:42

as the destructive thing that it is. Yeah,

7:44

you know, it is violence, right? To

7:46

me, by definition of what harm and

7:48

violence is, I would absolutely put it

7:50

in that category. But I think in

7:52

the U .S., we have such narrow

7:55

framework of

7:58

whose victimization. deserves

8:00

to be remediated. hear it

8:03

I hear it all the time when I

8:05

write about shootings that that you know, in our

8:07

hoods across America, someone can straight

8:09

up be shot and killed a young 22

8:11

and it's like, well, that's no victim. Is

8:13

that violence or is that someone getting, you

8:15

know, all these no comments that now are kind

8:17

of is that at this

8:19

CEO. like I've seen

8:21

comments that now are with

8:23

no power. at this little

8:25

money. Honestly, whose communities

8:28

have been scarred by the

8:30

extractive nature of industries

8:32

like healthcare. nature of It's violent,

8:34

but. health care. It's violent,

8:36

but is not a

8:38

young a boy on

8:41

the the corner gunned

8:43

down, but to see

8:45

his down, but to see his

8:47

in this way also

8:50

questioned been interesting to

8:52

watch. to to watch. We should

8:54

should also know here that we do

8:56

do know, at least the police that

8:58

that the bullets he used had

9:00

inscribed on them the words, deny,

9:02

defend, and echoes a phrase commonly used to a

9:05

phrase commonly used to describe the

9:07

alleged tactics that insurers out to, you

9:09

know, avoid paying out insurance claims to

9:11

their customers. Care, we should say, we should

9:13

say, is the biggest health insurance company

9:15

in the country. it And it was

9:17

just slammed month in the Senate investigation for

9:20

denying people certain types of care. of

9:22

care. as a a way to boost

9:24

the company's profits. profits. honestly, when I first

9:26

heard the news, I thought the news, I thought when

9:28

my wife and I were

9:30

going through our long long arduous IVF

9:32

journey, after we not long after we our

9:34

son, I'm so and had our son. of

9:37

the I'm so thankful for, in one of

9:39

the big clinics in our area informed our health

9:41

patients was dropping health insurance was dropping coverage

9:43

for that clinic. And so me and impact me

9:45

and my wife directly, we but we just,

9:47

we just could not stop thinking about

9:49

all the other folks folks. that we would see

9:51

like in the waiting room, right? The waiting

9:53

people who are in the middle of

9:55

treatment and they were going to have to

9:57

pay out of pocket if they could, right? could right to

10:00

try to start a family. And it's

10:02

just like financially and a mostly

10:04

devastating news that must have been to

10:06

them, right? Because these are choices

10:08

about their lives that are. out of

10:10

their hands, and it all kind of

10:12

happened on a dime through the decisions

10:14

of some health care executive or somebody

10:16

with an actuarial table somewhere. Then

10:18

when you see like documents

10:20

that show how sometimes arbitrary

10:22

these decisions are, like your

10:24

people's lives are being played with.

10:26

You know what I'm saying? So

10:29

that a spreadsheet is balanced. And

10:31

that's a recipe for resentment. One

10:33

thing that, is usually

10:35

a component of why someone shoots

10:37

someone else is around grievance,

10:39

right? You have done me wrong.

10:41

And it sounds like, and

10:44

obviously we don't know like Luigi

10:46

is innocent till proven guilty. He

10:49

hasn't made any statements. It's unclear what

10:51

his motivations are, but based on the

10:53

context and the information that we have

10:55

now, it appears that a part of

10:57

the thinking was like. You

10:59

have hurt all these people. sending

11:03

this signal. is worthwhile.

11:06

Like, you know, I was reading something that said

11:08

that the majority of Americans. are

11:11

satisfied with their health care. but The

11:13

majority of the Americans also say that they've

11:15

had problems accessing health care. And then of

11:17

course the people who report being in poorer

11:20

health, majority of those people unsurprisingly, overwhelming numbers

11:22

of them, of poor people who report being

11:24

in poor health say that they're unhappy with

11:26

their health care. So even the people who

11:28

like their health care are frustrated by it,

11:30

right? When When you're talking about it,

11:32

it sounds like how people at the

11:35

airport are like, this sucks, but

11:37

you know, it's the airport. It should

11:39

not be that way when you

11:41

need to go down to get your

11:43

pap smear and your colonoscopy. Just

11:45

because we have become used to terrible

11:47

service in this particular department does

11:49

not mean things are going okay. I

11:51

think that just having coverage period

11:53

has so many Americans just like, oh,

11:56

okay. I don't nothing else to complain

11:58

about. You know what I'm saying? I got my coverage. And

12:00

that's a shame, that's a shame.

12:02

Jean. But it's It's also not being

12:04

acknowledged. Absolutely. I

12:06

mean, on that point, right, I've seen

12:08

a lot of people criticizing how the

12:10

media has been covering this,

12:13

like how the public is riding

12:15

with this alleged shooter and

12:17

the media hasn't been able. to

12:19

capture that sentiment. How do you think

12:21

the reactions of the public differ from

12:23

what you've seen? from the way

12:25

you've seen this covered. You know, when

12:28

I knew that I'd be coming on

12:30

to talk about this topic, I

12:32

started paying more attention to cable news.

12:34

And I saw people straight up

12:36

like, scold, right and

12:38

say oh and there's this like

12:40

disgusting perversion and people loving it

12:42

mean like having that become a

12:44

part of the story feels

12:47

incredibly tone deaf,

12:49

right? And I'm also

12:51

concerned that... mainstream

12:53

national news is putting

12:55

the same sort of...

12:57

burden of badness, if you

12:59

will, on people getting their jokes

13:01

off on the internet, on

13:04

people who are saying. who

13:06

are telling their stories, right,

13:08

of these horrific outcomes because of

13:10

shoddy healthcare coverage, they're putting

13:12

those on the same level as

13:14

folks who have actually contributed

13:16

to that harm, right? Like you

13:18

can't say that you're just

13:20

as bad as the billionaire who

13:22

is buying up these homes

13:24

and selling them at exorbitant rates.

13:26

You're just as bad as

13:28

that person because you got a

13:30

joke off about Brian Thompson.

13:32

That's just not true. We can't

13:34

equate those and. I think

13:36

that Doing so will only lead

13:38

to more alienation and lead people

13:40

to double down. You know what I'm

13:42

saying? It's dangerous. You

13:46

was really interesting to see Ben

13:49

Shapiro, know, famed right pundit, sort

13:51

of lamenting the air quotes, the

13:53

less response to the shooting and

13:55

taking glee. His audience clapped back

13:57

at him really pretty hard. was

13:59

like, nah. is not a left thing. We

14:01

are very angry at these people too.

14:03

We don't have tears of shed for

14:06

these people as well, which is really

14:08

interesting to watch them have to metabolize

14:10

the fact that this wasn't like partisan

14:12

shot and forth. This was like a

14:15

thing that has felled broadly across. ideological

14:17

categories. The polarization you mentioned whenever there

14:19

is a high-profile kind of vigilante-style shooting,

14:21

it's usually pretty evenly split along party

14:23

lines, right? You think of, of Trayvon

14:26

Martin, of Ahmad Arbree, you know, so

14:28

many folks who were shot by usually

14:30

a white or white adjacent person who

14:32

said, I'm taking the lawn to my

14:34

own hand. Usually you can rely on

14:37

how people are going to feel about

14:39

that on who they voted for in

14:41

their politics. And I think they were

14:43

going to see the alleged shooter as

14:45

this sort of like Antifa figure who

14:48

their base would reject. But their base,

14:50

I'm sure, was among the Americans who

14:52

are like, yeah, I got health care,

14:54

but it don't work for me. And

14:57

that has just thrown people into a

14:59

warp that is really interesting to watch,

15:01

but I worry won't end. in root

15:03

cause solutions as most mass shootings don't.

15:05

I keep thinking about when we cover

15:08

like police violence on Coach, which one

15:10

of the things we always have to

15:12

like remind people is that like these

15:14

individual cases they often unearthed, like all

15:16

this feeling, anger that people have over

15:19

historical racism, right? Like it all comes

15:21

to bear on these individual cases, but

15:23

there's no way the actual resolution of

15:25

these cases like in a American court,

15:28

right? Like it's going to resolve all

15:30

those issues, right? I imagine that the

15:32

trial for Luigi Mangioni is going to

15:34

be really, really heavily covered, right? Maybe

15:36

even like OJ levels of coverage, right?

15:39

But then what's going to happen is

15:41

that people are going to like think

15:43

of the verdict as reckoning with all

15:45

this other stuff that this case is

15:47

on earth. The verdict is only about

15:50

this case is only about who shot

15:52

home, who was where. I wonder what

15:54

that means for a... how

15:56

we do or don't

15:59

resolve all the

16:01

other stuff. This is

16:03

something I have been thinking

16:05

about, right? Like this

16:07

really high profile incident of

16:09

gun violence, what is

16:11

it gonna change? I worry

16:13

that much like other high

16:16

profile shootings, especially high

16:18

profile mass shootings where someone

16:20

does it for these

16:22

grievance reasons. I don't

16:24

think that those will ever truly

16:26

get addressed with this.

16:28

And I'm just really worried

16:30

that we're going to lose

16:32

the plot, which is that

16:34

millions of people, even if

16:36

they do have insurance, don't

16:39

have actual access to healthcare

16:41

in a timely, sustainable, affordable

16:43

manner. And the fact that

16:45

that continues to get lost is

16:47

extremely worrying and. makes

16:50

the ground really fertile. for

16:54

someone else try it, you

16:56

know? So I

16:58

guess to close out, I'm wondering. like

17:01

At the end of the day, this is

17:03

still the killing of a man. whose murder,

17:05

as we said, is like in for all

17:08

these other things, right? This rage that so

17:10

many people feel towards this larger system. I'm

17:12

wondering, what do you think are the wrong

17:14

lessons? that we could take away

17:16

from this moment. One of the

17:18

negative things we can get out of

17:20

this is just seeing more and

17:22

more people be okay with folks settling

17:24

their grievances with guns. We see

17:26

arguments that start in bars that end

17:28

in shootings. We see conflict in

17:31

homes that end up with entire families

17:33

dead, straight up. And I understand

17:35

where the jokes are coming from. And

17:37

you know, a couple have elicited

17:39

a little like, ooh, they kind of

17:41

ate it with that one. I

17:43

don't. want the lesson that

17:45

people take from this to

17:48

be like, oh, Well, I

17:50

could just, oh my gosh, I'll

17:52

shoot somebody too. And then my message

17:54

will get out, right? Because we've

17:56

seen that sentiment lead to some of

17:58

the most devastating high mashing. shootings

18:00

in our nation's history because someone said,

18:02

I got a grievance, y 'all got

18:04

me messed up and I got

18:06

this gun, watch what's gonna happen. Abaday,

18:10

you are incredible. I've learned so much

18:12

here. Thank you so much for coming and

18:14

trying to think about this and trying

18:16

to make sense of this very banana story.

18:18

obviously this story is far from over.

18:20

mean, this trial is gonna be an obsession.

18:23

So thank you for coming on. Thank

18:25

you so much for having me. It on.

18:27

was a great discussion. That was Abaday Clayton.

18:29

She covers gun violence for The Guardian. And

18:42

that's our show. You can

18:44

follow us on Instagram at NPR

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19:22

of It's Been a Minute

19:24

was produced by Barton Gurdwood, Alexis

19:26

Williams, Liam McBain, Corey Antonio

19:28

Rose. Our executive producer is Jasmine

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Romero. Our VP of programming

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B21. Be 21. This This

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message comes from Thuma. Create your oasis with

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with Thuma, a modern design

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company that specializes in furniture

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and home goods. Thuma's

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core collection, bed, bed, nest dresser,

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and pillar bookshelf combines craftsmanship,

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simplicity, and functionality, bringing inspiration

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and purpose to every home.

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To To explore Thuma's entire

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collection, visit thuma .co the the

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flagship location in New York City.

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Pieces ship quickly and straight

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to your door. To get get

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$100 your first bed purchase, purchase,