1.
On January 5, 1943, the Paris papers all agreed: another act of terrorism
As reported by Le Cri de Peuple, Madame Claire Vioix, a concierge, 7 rue Neuve Popincourt, received a visit from two men. The were let in by her boy. She went with them into the courtyard.
“It was then that her young boy heard a shot…”
According to the Emancipation Nationale, the cowardly murder happened on Sunday, at 7 p.m. The daughter of Madame Vioix, according to the same paper, was a member of the Jeunesse Populaire Francaise. They opened a register, a sign- up sheet where citizens could inscribe their name and their indignant sentiments. Madame Vioix was an activist in the PPF, the Petit Parisien noted, and the mother of four children.
L'oeuvre noted that she had received several threatening letters.
The funeral cortege was graced with officials from her party, the government, and the police.
Reading the account of the terrorist murder in Le Cri de Peuple, one discovers that Madame Claire Vioix was a 'patriot', a true citizen of the occupation:
“A P.P.F. activist, Mme Vioix never hid her opinions. Thus, she never missed an occasion to call to order, in the waiting lines, the Jews, who were not conforming to the regulations.”
Exemplary woman, as we can see.
Reading the officially allowed French newspapers during the occupation is a good exercise. It helps you, in a sense, see how a term like terrorist is picked up and used. It helps you see that “normal” things like the regulations allow one to remind the Jews of them – Jews that one sees, with some satisfaction, rounded up from the streets – although in the eleventh she would not have seen the “rafle” she would have seen in the Marais.
Le Cri de Peuple last mentioned the fallen heroine, Vioix, in June of 1944, when the PPF had a cortege to pay homage to the martyrs of “Jewish capitalism”. No mention is made of reprisal. Apparently, the terrorists – who were also labelled communists – had escaped retribution.
Although surely the price on their head was high enough, nobody snitched on them.
As though moved by the spirit of the assassinated Vioix, the Cris de la Peuple reported in May 20, 1943, the following: “Jews were forbidden to go to the official state pawn shop, the Hotel des Ventes. “Thus there should be an end to the scandalous black market trade of Jewish second hand goods dealers who corrupt the price regulations. However, for some time, we have seen reappear on Rue Douot some disquieting figures, individuals who do not wear the star and use borrowed names for signing the checks that they use to pay for their purchases.
This must be put a stop to.”
Now, neither Vioix nor, say, health insurance executives, nor the newspaper participated in the murder of anyone specifically, although condoning it generally. And the two “communist” terrorists did murder someone specific, who was condoning a general massacre. The latter action is not the kind of action we should need in an order that was fair, solidaire, and just. But, as Dickens or Lloyd Garrison might have put it, there are higher courts than the courts of law, and those two French terrorists – or resistors – were its instruments.
So: of what is, or was, a CEO of a mega Health Insurance Company the instrument?
2.
In the 60s, it was popular to say that "society" was to blame for crime. This has fallen out of fashion. Yet in the case of the assassination of Brian Thompson, this seems close to the truth. It is American society, its politics, economics, and media that allowed a man like Brian Thompson in a company like United Healthcare unparalleled power over the life and death of millions of people. They abused that power as much as they could, and we watched, and knew. We knew about the algorithms, we knew about the medical bankruptcies, we knew about the pain, pointless misery, and the barbarous second guessing of doctors by people with a high school knowledge of biology. We knew about the trail of death that leads directly to the offices of United Healthcare. We knew and did nothing and Luigi M. did something.
On January 5, 1943, the Paris papers all agreed: another act of terrorism
As reported by Le Cri de Peuple, Madame Claire Vioix, a concierge, 7 rue Neuve Popincourt, received a visit from two men. The were let in by her boy. She went with them into the courtyard.
“It was then that her young boy heard a shot…”
According to the Emancipation Nationale, the cowardly murder happened on Sunday, at 7 p.m. The daughter of Madame Vioix, according to the same paper, was a member of the Jeunesse Populaire Francaise. They opened a register, a sign- up sheet where citizens could inscribe their name and their indignant sentiments. Madame Vioix was an activist in the PPF, the Petit Parisien noted, and the mother of four children.
L'oeuvre noted that she had received several threatening letters.
The funeral cortege was graced with officials from her party, the government, and the police.
Reading the account of the terrorist murder in Le Cri de Peuple, one discovers that Madame Claire Vioix was a 'patriot', a true citizen of the occupation:
“A P.P.F. activist, Mme Vioix never hid her opinions. Thus, she never missed an occasion to call to order, in the waiting lines, the Jews, who were not conforming to the regulations.”
Exemplary woman, as we can see.
Reading the officially allowed French newspapers during the occupation is a good exercise. It helps you, in a sense, see how a term like terrorist is picked up and used. It helps you see that “normal” things like the regulations allow one to remind the Jews of them – Jews that one sees, with some satisfaction, rounded up from the streets – although in the eleventh she would not have seen the “rafle” she would have seen in the Marais.
Le Cri de Peuple last mentioned the fallen heroine, Vioix, in June of 1944, when the PPF had a cortege to pay homage to the martyrs of “Jewish capitalism”. No mention is made of reprisal. Apparently, the terrorists – who were also labelled communists – had escaped retribution.
Although surely the price on their head was high enough, nobody snitched on them.
As though moved by the spirit of the assassinated Vioix, the Cris de la Peuple reported in May 20, 1943, the following: “Jews were forbidden to go to the official state pawn shop, the Hotel des Ventes. “Thus there should be an end to the scandalous black market trade of Jewish second hand goods dealers who corrupt the price regulations. However, for some time, we have seen reappear on Rue Douot some disquieting figures, individuals who do not wear the star and use borrowed names for signing the checks that they use to pay for their purchases.
This must be put a stop to.”
Now, neither Vioix nor, say, health insurance executives, nor the newspaper participated in the murder of anyone specifically, although condoning it generally. And the two “communist” terrorists did murder someone specific, who was condoning a general massacre. The latter action is not the kind of action we should need in an order that was fair, solidaire, and just. But, as Dickens or Lloyd Garrison might have put it, there are higher courts than the courts of law, and those two French terrorists – or resistors – were its instruments.
So: of what is, or was, a CEO of a mega Health Insurance Company the instrument?
2.
In the 60s, it was popular to say that "society" was to blame for crime. This has fallen out of fashion. Yet in the case of the assassination of Brian Thompson, this seems close to the truth. It is American society, its politics, economics, and media that allowed a man like Brian Thompson in a company like United Healthcare unparalleled power over the life and death of millions of people. They abused that power as much as they could, and we watched, and knew. We knew about the algorithms, we knew about the medical bankruptcies, we knew about the pain, pointless misery, and the barbarous second guessing of doctors by people with a high school knowledge of biology. We knew about the trail of death that leads directly to the offices of United Healthcare. We knew and did nothing and Luigi M. did something.
To put it another way: if Brian Thompson, in the streets of
NYC, had smashed himself down repeatedly onto the body of Luigi Mangioni,
damaging his spine for life, he would have been arrested and jailed. But
instead, phone callers from Thompson's division of United Healthcare just
denied and delayed back pain care, so it is all good. Well, it isn't good. If
you like your healthcare insurance, as President Smooth put it, you can keep
your healthcare insurance. He didn't add: as they kill and maim other clients. That's
the unspoken part.
There are few cases where America, as it is now, is directly on trial. But this is definitely one of them.
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