Luigi
The Making and the Meaning
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- $14.99
Publisher Description
The first book to explain why the world was primed for the Luigi Mangione moment, showing the history that led him to be embraced as an avenger with an affection not seen since Jesse James or Robin Hood.
The explosion of glee and sympathy for Luigi surprised everyone, but it was everywhere. Hours after the shooting of the United Healthcare executive, his company put out a message out on Facebook saying their “hearts go out to Brian’s family and all who were close to him.” People replied with laughing emojis and comments like this one: “No one here is the judge of who deserves to live or die. That’s the job of the AI algorithm the insurance company designed to maximize profits on your health.” On TikTok, another commentator said, “Oh my god, y’all really raised the school shooter generation and now you’re asking us for sympathy?” she asks. “Welcome to a regular Tuesday at school in America.”
When he was arrested, TikTok exploded with more love for Luigi: “They could’ve been more gentle with him, he has back problems,” said one commentator. Others attempted to come to his rescue. “He is innocent, he was with me the whole time.” EBay said that while it had a policy prohibiting items that glorify violence, they were allowing the sale of items with the words “deny defend depose.” In Seattle, someone reprogrammed a couple of electric highway signs so they flashed: “One CEO down…many more to go.”
So where is all this coming from? Richardson has tracked the building blocks of this widespread alienation for three decades, finding it across not only the environmental movement but among those who reject capitalism itself, including the rules that govern everything from insurance to healthcare. He has followed the men and women who have gone to extremes to express that alienation, and studied the inspirations they found in other outlaws, most especially Ted Kaczynski (Luigi had posted a review of Kaczynski’s manifesto on Goodreads). The result is a book that will put Luigi in context and even illuminate how his appeal is likely to play out in the future.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this rudderless examination, Esquire writer-at-large Richardson (My Father the Spy) attempts to uncover and contextualize Luigi Mangione's ideology and the outpouring of support following his alleged assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Richardson sifts through Mangione's trail of online reviews, Reddit posts, and DMs, analyzing his beliefs about AI, nuclear power, masculinity, and psychedelics, and cobbling together a loose portrait of a "kindhearted, deep-thinking, tech bro–adjacent, woke-mind-virus social justice warrior" who "wanted to rise above political categories." The book gets the most mileage out of Mangione's Goodreads reviews of texts ranging from The Lorax to Unabomber Ted Kaczynski's Industrial Society and Its Future. The latter allows the author to expand his focus to Mangione's "kindred spirits"—other furious young male extremists inspired by "Uncle Ted" who likewise flirted with the necessity of violence. Indeed, the most illuminating part of the book comes from Kaczynski himself, with whom Richardson corresponds. The author delves not only into Kaczynski's "lively mind" but also his own fascination with Kaczynski's perspective on dangerously accelerating technologies. These efforts most effectively get at the book's looming question: "If all this is true, don't I have a responsibility to do something?" But the account's too-ambitious scope, as it ranges from interviews with Mangione's supporters to a recap of 14th-century peasant rebellions, blunts its sharpness. Readers will be left disappointed.
