Why Some Take Pleasure From the Story of Luigi Mangione

Is Luigi a symbol for justice now?

Source: Alexas_Fotos/Pixabay

You might have seen pictures of Luigi, one of the characters from the video game Super Mario Bros, floating around online. The pictures have become a type of code. They’re a thinly-veiled reference to Luigi Mangione, who has been charged with the shooting of Brian Thompson, the CEO of Unitedhealthcare. Right after the story broke, there was more than enough malicious glee to go around. Social media users quipped that any “thoughts and prayers” to Thompson’s family would require prior authorization. They pondered whether the hospital he was taken to was in-network. Before the police had taken a suspect into custody, people were joking about looking the other way and even offering to provide the shooter with an alibi.

Of course, the reactions weren’t all gallows humor. There was plenty of concern about vigilantism and celebrating someone’s murder. The rejoinders pointed out that Thompson was the head of a company that routinely denied people access to medical care. The implication was: why shouldn’t we celebrate when a villain gets his comeuppance? Maybe we can agree that the law is the law, but surely, some might say, he got what he deserved. Since then, any time there is a news story about a health insurance company denying claims or a CEO doing something shady, you might see the cartoon Luigi show up in the comments.

What some people found shocking about the response to Thompson’s death was the frank and honest expression of Schadenfreude. “Schadenfreude” is a German word we use to name the pleasure we take in someone else’s pain. If you’ve ever laughed at a video of someone slipping and falling in spectacular fashion, you’ve experienced Schadenfreude. When Henry Kissinger died last year, we saw a similar Schadenfreude to the one we’re seeing on social media today.

When people openly express feelings like Schadenfreude, we respond as though they are putting the ugliest parts of human psychology on display. Celebrating someone’s murder couldn’t be anything other than irrationality or bloodsport. We refuse to believe that negative emotions might be intelligent—that the Schadenfreude we’re seeing might point to something important.

Most of the time, the targets of our Schadenfreude are people who act like they’re above us. Everyday life gives us plenty of examples. Your neighbor who is a little too high on his handyman skills creates a plumbing disaster at his house. The holier-than-thou TV preacher gets caught with his pants down. Your snobby, fashion-conscious co-worker comes out of the bathroom with toilet paper stuck to her shoe. We like to see people on high horses fall off. And if they land in the mud, all the better.

We feel schadenfreude for people who think they're better

Source: RonPorter/Pixabay

It’s easy to see why people might feel Schadenfreude at Thompson’s death. CEOs, whether of healthcare companies or not, are often untouchable. They’re the most powerful figures in the office hierarchy and they’re many layers removed from the people who work for them. People also feel controlled by their health insurance. Your plan dictates which doctors you see, what tests you get, and which medications you take. Insurance companies use black box formulas to determine how much your care costs and then pass the rest of the bill on to you. A health insurance company CEO represents the untouchable of the untouchable: the head of a company that decides who lives and dies.

Schadenfreude isn’t just joy at seeing the powerful made powerless. When they fall, they’re back on the ground with the rest of us. Schadenfreude is our way of communicating: you thought you were better, but you’re not. You’re just like us and you were wrong to put yourself above us. Schadenfreude doesn’t have to be pointless cruelty. There’s nothing wrong with being happy when someone who has set themselves on high comes back down to Earth.

While we are too quick to dismiss Schadenfreude as pointless cruelty, we are also too quick to assume that celebrating the murder of a CEO in an unjust system makes us revolutionaries. The fact that Schadenfreude is directed toward people who put themselves above us doesn’t mean we’re justified in dragging them off their pedestals by force. Setting aside any crimes Thompson may have committed, for most people he’s a symbol. He represents wealthy, powerful elites or the healthcare system that has devastated so many lives. His murder might look like a blow to an unjust system, but only so long as we treat him as a symbol of that system. Thompson was also a person just like the rest of us. Perhaps powerful CEOs sometimes forget that, but that’s no reason for us to forget it.

Loud and public displays of Schadenfreude don’t have to be a sign of moral decay. Our collective allergy to negative emotions betrays our inability to see them as actually communicating something important. People feel bullied by their health insurance. When someone lands a blow on one of the head bullies, it’s natural that people would cheer. But Thompson, the individual, isn’t the healthcare system. We shouldn’t mistake our Schadenfreude for justice, even if it’s fine for us to feel it.