41% of Voters 18-29 Find Health Care CEO Killing Acceptable

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A new Emerson poll out on Tuesday has some sobering results regarding young people’s attitudes toward violence. The killing of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson earlier this month has uncovered some shocking opinions on the left about what is “justified” when it comes to violence in America. 

The idea that killing someone who runs a health insurance company can be an acceptable course of action is shocking in and of itself. The Emerson poll found that 22% of Democrats thought Thompson’s killing was “acceptable.” Just 12% of Republicans and 16% of independents believe that.

More troubling, 41% of voters 18-29 believe it was “acceptable” to kill a healthcare CEO while only 40% of younger voters believe it wasn’t acceptable.  

This is not a “what is the younger generation coming to” moment. Inurement to violence is the logical outgrowth of generations who have been programmed to see “justice” in simplistic terms. The bad guys always get it in the end, and the bloodier the better. With faith in the American judicial system disappearing, many younger Americans see “vigilante justice” as an “acceptable” means to an end. 

Thompson’s killing was a cathartic moment for the left. And it was just a happy coincidence that it gave them a twofer line of attack: capitalism sucks, and we need national health insurance so this doesn’t happen again.

The Hill:

The survey from Emerson College Polling found 68 percent of all respondents found the actions of the person who shot and killed Thompson unacceptable.

But a startling 24 percent of those aged 18-29 found it “somewhat acceptable,” and 17 percent of that group found it completely acceptable. 

Since Thompson was shot, first in the back and then again as he fell to the ground, a number of social media posts from people saying they do not have sympathy for his death have gained popularity.

Spencer Kimball, the executive director of Emerson College Polling, said the results of the poll highlighted “shifting societal attitudes among the youngest electorate and within party lines.” We see this same shift in young people’s attitudes toward capitalism, communism, religion, and the very idea of America. 

Culture drives the shift, and our educational system ratifies and reinforces it. It’s not the entire fault of one or the other. Culture and education are the twin pillars of radical left influence in America, and they’ve thoroughly wormed their way into both.

John Hinderaker at PowerLine points to the breakdown in moral authority as one cause for the shift.

What can we make of these appalling findings? Presumably the 41% who say that cold-blooded murder is A-OK don’t go to church. So they rely for moral instruction on the public schools, which border on complete uselessness, and their parents, assuming they have parents. And on the popular culture, which can fairly be described as depraved.

What we are seeing here is a culture in steep decline. Donald Trump never set out to be a moral leader or exemplar, but maybe he can play a role in restoring sanity to our public discourse.

Perhaps if we reformed the educational system to do battle with these toxic attitudes rather than confirm them, America might have a chance of surviving as a bastion of human liberty. But with radicals in charge of many teachers’ unions, I’m not optimistic.