Hidden True Crime - UNITED HEALTH CARE CEO: Luigi Mangione Unmasked

Episode Date: December 18, 2024

Renowned Forensic Psychologist Dr John Matthias breaks down the hidden motives behind the slaying of United Health Care CEO Brian Thompson. 26-year-old Luigi Mangione was arrested and charged with the killing, and Dr Matthias takes listeners to a place no one else has gone before when it comes to the WHY behind the crime and criminal. Subscribe for additional episodes and seasons coming in 2025 What started as a simple conversation at their dinner table became a captivating podcast. Join the dynamic duo of Dr. John Matthias, a Princeton educated forensic psychologist, and Lauren Matthias, an award-winning investigative journalist, as they delve into the psychological facets of unthinkable crimes every week. Their unique perspectives and in-depth analysis offer a fresh take on true crime storytelling. Thank you for your support through sponsorships, subscribing, listening, and becoming a Patreon member at Patreon.com/HiddenTrueCrime Our Sponsors:* Check out Acorns: https://acorns.com/HIDDENTRUECRIME* Check out Acorns: https://acorns.com/HIDDENTRUECRIME* Check out Armoire and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://www.armoire.style* Check out Effecty and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://www.effecty.com* Check out Happy Mammoth and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://happymammoth.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/hidden-a-true-crime-podcast1836/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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then we all of a sudden came across a brand new article, and we were reading some new information that we were digesting because we really want to be on top of everything before we go live tonight. John is nodding, and you are. John said, yeah. Right. I literally just finished reading a New York Times article that laid out. out more of his physical, medical issues, conditions, and where he's been and where he disappeared

to, where he was, the family said he went radio silent. There's more information about that now. Yes. We are ready, though. We are ready to bring you the last time we went live. We went live just hours after his arrest very quickly. And the world has been learning more about Luigi And we are here to bring you more tonight. For those of you who watched our show on Monday, I just want to reiterate that that analysis still applies here. And we'll talk about that a little bit. I think this is someone who was clearly radicalized.

And you see those extreme beliefs in his so-called manifesto. I don't know if he calls it a manifesto, but the manifesto shows a lot of anger towards healthcare companies, and that's what a lot of people have paid attention to on this case. But since that show, we've learned a couple of really important facts about Luigi Mangione. And I think some of that information is really critical to understanding what's going on here. So I think we mentioned that we were digging as deep as we could on Monday with what we knew, but now we know a lot more.

The plot thickens, and I think this becomes much more. interesting now. Let's start. I guess I wasn't going to start here, but let's start with the article I just read. I've been gathering information all day about his medical conditions and I've focused mainly on the spinal, the back injuries and his spinal condition and how that's really impacted him. And it has. I think that's still critical for understanding this situation. But let me also now read what the New York Times has uncovered. So some of this was discussed in his Reddit posts, but the New York Times was able to uncover some other information about some of his medical maladies. And now, in addition to all the spinal cord issues, some of the other problems he was complaining about, and many of these go back to college years as well, include brain fog.

That was something he did talk about on Reddit. he described insomnia in 2018 and beyond. He's talked about IBS or irritable bowel syndrome. That was 2018 and beyond. We've also learned that he seemingly had or described having symptoms of Lyme disease. I don't know if he was treated for that. And interestingly enough, he describes visual snow. That is incredibly interesting.

I don't know why. if people know why. Yeah, right. But did everybody remember who had visual snow? And actually John and I were sitting here together, breaking the news about Brian Koberger being on a forum complaining about his visual snow. And we just learned tonight that Luigi Mangiani also complained of visual snow. There's a couple of conclusions from this. this broader net of medical maladies.

One is that this guy seemed to suffer from a lot of medical problems, even though he was quite young and he appeared to be quite fit. So that must have been really disheartening and distressing to him. If we're looking at this from a psychological standpoint, which is what our channel does, obviously, you know, I don't want to diagnose here. Those who know me know that I'm not going to diagnose. But when you look at this range of symptoms,

it really raises some questions for me about mental health issues, just as it did for Brian Coburger. With Coburger, I think it was more focused on a specific issue, which was visual snow. But with Coburger, it seemed like a lot of it was psychosomatic or some of it was psychosomatic, and there was really no concrete evidence that he had this neurological condition. I mean, he may have, but it's not clear cut. And so with Coburger, you see the visual snow kind of intertwined with these mental health issues around depression and anxiety, right? And so it's really hard to kind of separate those issues for Coburger.

And now I think looking a little bit more at these medical problems with Luigi Mangione, I think I'm having a little bit of confusion here in terms of saying that all of this. is purely medical and that perhaps some of this could be mental health related. Although, again, you know, separating these things, I don't know. And I don't know, you know, what medical interventions he had. I don't know what treatments he received. I don't know if any of these were fully diagnosed. I don't know if these were things he talked about. But certainly, you know, insomnia.

So that would be a good example of a diagnosis. He complained about this himself. He probably diagnosed this himself. but insomnia can oftentimes or often does have depending on the situation it does have a psychological component so insomnia would be a great example of something that would be considered more psychosomatic visual snow would be something that could be more psychosomatic right and so i think you're seeing for the first time here i think you're seeing a little bit of crossover into maybe some psychosomatic issues which would indicate some mental health issues.

The term that psychologists used for this type of thing would be hypocondriasis, which is now changed in the more current DSM, but hypocondriasis is essentially someone who may or may not have significant medical issues, but they're always worried about them. And again, that's not, it's referred to as illness anxiety disorder these days, but I think a lot of people know what a hypochondriac refers to. That's kind of a term that's in our common vocabulary. So it's interesting.

And again, I don't know. I'm not going to offer an opinion on this. I'm just going to put it out there. But just the large number, this expanding catalog of medical problems he has really, I think, raises some red flags about mental health issues. In other words, psychosomatic is what you're saying. And someone is asking, in other words, you're saying it's in his head more. No, I'm saying I don't know.

What I'm saying is that I'm saying when you have a 20 year old or younger, a lot of these problems start when he's younger. A lot of these problems start when he's in his preteens even. So some of his back problems can be traced back to teenage years. The Lyme disease was from 2013, right? That a lot of these can be traced back to his younger years. What I'm saying is that when somebody has these types of physical, or medical problems early on. And then they seem to escalate and they seem to broaden.

What I'm saying is there may, I'm not saying there is, I'm not saying this is definitively true. There may be a psychological component. There's probably some likelihood that some of this may have a psychological component. And I'm saying there's a close tie between, there can be a close tie between, mental health issues and what we would call somatic issues. Okay.

In psychological terms, you know, these are sometimes called somatic symptom disorders, but I don't want to get too specific and I don't want to pretend to diagnose because I don't know enough. But what I'm saying is that I think when I first looked at Luigi Mangione and what we knew about him, which wasn't a huge amount, I couldn't even begin to speculate on this type of thing, on this issue. But now that we're seeing that this, you know, when you start talking about brain fog and visual snow and insomnia, it's starting to cross over into potentially. And again, I don't know. It's starting to cross over more into psychological terrain. That makes sense.

And at the very least, even if, let's say all of these things are legitimate medical diagnoses, at the very least, these are diagnoses that would have some psychological impact. And we'll get into that more when we talk about the spinal cord injuries because those clearly are quite legitimate. And we have, we've seen supposedly, I mean, we haven't confirmed, but legitimate news sources have pictures of the x-rays and the surgery. And presumably there were diagnoses and the surgery was warranted, right? I have to assume that all that was real. The psychological component comes in there in terms of dealing with the aftermath or the right, the consequences of the surgery and in this case maybe the failed surgery. Okay.

So I think it's interesting, you know, initially this looked like a really kind of, you know, fairly healthy, psychologically, you know, mentally healthy guy potentially with kind of of this stellar resume of Ivy League education and master's degree in computer science. He's got this, you know, he's got good jobs. He comes from a wealthy family, not there. that that could mean, that could mean, in some sense, there's a lot of pressure on and perform, too. So that doesn't necessarily mean he's mentally healthy

or his mental health issues are non-existent. But it seemed like by all accounts and by talking to his friends and people that knew him, that this was someone that was fairly well adjusted. Now I'm starting to wonder if in that environment he was raised in of private schools and private universities and all this pressure to perform, I'm wondering if some of that shows up in terms of these medical or, right, these medical symptoms, such as insomnia.

So insomnia, you know, it has close ties to mental health issues and specifically anxiety and maybe kind of, you know, obsessive thoughts or this inability to kind of shut down our thoughts. And again, I'm not implying OCD at all here, but it's interesting to speculate that we're, when you start getting into these, this huge, this broader net for a 26 year old of all these somatic symptoms, you know, how much of this is psychological and how much of it isn't, right? And I can make a case, and I just finished this article 10 minutes ago, I could make a case that perhaps this is someone who is under a lot of pressure to perform and in this very kind of elite, you know, wealthy family he grew up on with some generational wealth and he's attending these very, you know, these top level schools. Maybe some of that is being expressed

somatically through his body, through some of these medical issues. Yeah. Because this is not, this is probably not a family that is going to be super receptive to, you know, a child coming to them and saying, hey, you know, hey, mom and dad, you know, I'm feeling a tremendous amount of pressure here to be valedictorian and all of this stress is overwhelming me and I'm so afraid of my future, right? I mean, he might be doing that, but I don't think he's doing that. I think he's probably just being fairly stoic, focusing on his homework, focusing on achievement, focusing on performance. And I think at some point, all of that becomes very overwhelming to him. And now you start seeing maybe it's anxiety related. Again, hypochondriosis these days,

is called illness anxiety disorder. Maybe this is getting expressed through brain fog and insomnia and, you know, visual snow, right? And so there can be a close tie between stress and a lot of somatic symptoms. And he talked about his grades falling in college too, just on and on. Right. It all goes together. Right. His grades are falling.

He's worried about it. He's been a straight-a student. you know, there's something called self-handicapping, which is that when you feel all this pressure to perform and you have all of these high expectations from your family, sometimes what people do is they do what's called self-handicapping. They create a narrative of, let's say, illness, let's say medical problems, so that they don't if they're not performing at the level of expectations, they have a rationale. So in other words, they're handicapping themselves so that if they're not performing at the level

of other people's expectations, they now have a reason why. So if you say, for example, well, you know, I would have gotten an A in that class, except my insomnia and my brain fog wouldn't allow me to study as well as I should have. Right now you're engaging in this process of kind of giving yourself an out, you're handicapping your performance in the future. And he seems to be doing some of that. Okay, right. Agree.

That makes sense to me. With this new information, I think I would expand my analysis now to question. And again, I don't know for sure, but I'm questioning whether some of this medical history doesn't have some psychological component, which again takes us into the terrain of mental health issues. Yeah. Again, people are asking about visual snow. They came later. Yes, a New York Times article today. People are saying, wait, I thought that was Coburger.

We're here to tell you. that it is also Luigi. And I am sharing the quote on our screen right now. Go ahead, John. Right. So was this from the New York Times what you just posted? Mr. Mangione also consulted with others online about irritable bowel syndrome and visual snow, a neurological condition,

in which a person's vision is obscured by flickering dots. While he appears to have stopped doctors help for his brain fog symptoms, he did not mention being treated for any mental illness. The New York Times article also describes him being worried and sharing online about his dropping grades in college, as well as other things he was just not able to do referring to his brain fog. We will have a link to the New York Times article

in the description of this video once we conclude. I'll actually put it in the chat right now and then you can find the New York Times article as well soon. You know what? it's interesting because on Monday I was going to make, I was thinking about making a comparison to Kohlberger because I also talked about crime and punishment, Dostiaski's crime and punishment with Kohlberger

in the sense that Kovberger 2 was in some sense an ideological killer. Because for two reasons, number one, I believe that Kohlberger, and I don't want to get into this too much, but since there seems, since there's now some overlap between these two in terms of their medical issues. And Coburger's medical issues, I think, definitely had more of a psychological component. Now, I think, another tie is that both of these guys are, you know, kind of these ideological killers in the sense that Colberger had done surveys, where he was surveying murderers to see how they could get away with their crimes. And then all of a sudden, he's accused.

So obviously he hasn't been convicted, but he's accused of. of killing these four people. And it almost feels like in Koberger's case that he wanted to see if he could commit the perfect crime and get away with it. But there's also a larger conkron it with Kovberger, which I think has to do with this idea of women rejecting him. And in some ways, I think he was symbolically, he was acting out against these women, specifically sorority women who had rejected. him, just like Elliot Roger, who the well-known kind of father of in-cells, did the same thing. And so there is this ideological component with Koeberger, just as there is with Mangione. Mangioni, however, obviously is directing his anger and his resentment and his grievances

towards a healthcare CEO, whereas Koberger is directing his grievances towards. females and specifically successful, attractive females in sororities. But they both have this symbolic component. And now it seems like potentially they both have this overlap with, again, potentially these kind of psychosomatic symptoms. Yeah. And so, again, like the similarities here keep multiplying. I'm not saying they're the same.

There's certainly very different crimes. but there do seem to be some commonalities, which is interesting. Yeah. And so what does this tell you? I'm moving on to the next step in your analysis. Well, so what I wanted to start with, so all of this is going to be relevant. So I think what it tells me is that we're starting to move away from this really mentally fit, psychologically healthy guy to something else.

Right? And we're going to get there. We're going to get there eventually. I started my analysis a little differently because of the article I read. But, you know, I think the public portrayal of this guy so far, I mean, I guess it depends on the source or it depends on who you ask. I think a lot of news outlets are saying, obviously, that this guy's a stone cold murderer. But then, you know, in a lot of social media and in some news outlets, and including among some prominent people, you know, there's this perception that he's, He's sort of this martyr and this social avenger that's finding justice for many Americans who have been wronged by the health care.

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injuries, which you can, which in this narrative where the hero is flawless, except for his back injuries. He only has back injuries which lead to resentment and grievance against the health care industry, which leads him to murder the CEO, right? It's a simple narrative. And I think it goes along with this tendency to glorify this guy and to treat him as a hero. I think it's, you kind of need that narrative to do that. You know, the hero, he's the smart, insightful, you know, mentally fit guy that, you know, sees the truth and he's seeking justice. He's sort of like the, you know, he's like a guy from Westerns. You know, the guy who comes down from the mountaintop.

And the guy who comes down from a mountain top to write all wrongs and to like create a new civilization. Right. You know, right? The guy who rolls into town. The Western hero that's rolling into town isn't there to uphold the status quo. He's there to overthrow. the status quo. And the status quo here is a healthcare industry that's clearly flawed,

that clearly has problems, that's bringing out a lot of anger and grievances among people that have been wrong by the system for many years. And in that narrative, I think it's much more compelling to say that this, to see this guy as a hero who doesn't have any mental health issues, who doesn't suffer from insomnia, who doesn't have Lyme disease, right? Like, all of that complicates that picture. If you present him as something, somebody with flaws and vulnerabilities and mental health problems, then you start have to, you know, I think you have to start questioning that narrative a little bit. Maybe he's not murdering because he's this flawless vigilante that wants to

recreate our society in a healthier fashion. Yeah. He does put out ideas as about recreating societies. He did that with Japan on X and others, you know, ways to better. society of different countries. He certainly does that, the shared ideas. Right. And so part of that narrative is that the martyr is he's sacrificial. He's sacrificing himself for the larger good of society. And that's sort of what the Western hero does as well. Right. And in, but again, like if you want to create a perfect martyr, you're not necessarily, I mean, you can create a

marter with flaws. It's a more interesting story, but it's much more simplistic and it's much easier to kind of elevate that martyr to godlike or deity status or whatever, you know, guru status if that martyr doesn't have mental health problems. Sure. Right. And so by bringing in these issues, I think, I hope I'm starting to paint a picture of this guy. It's much more complex. Yeah, you are. I appreciate everything is complex. So thank you. Right. And part of that complexity,

part of that complexity is that, you know, there clearly are, there could very well be. There probably are psychosomatic issues going on here that are impacting his mental health. And on that issue, so let me jump to what I was going to start with. Just make sure not to send me New York Times articles

that are so compelling like five minutes before a show. That's always going to be a big distraction around here. because I want to be up to date on everything. I do want to talk about his back injury. So what I said on Monday was that I believed that the back injury was significant and probably had some impact in terms of radicalizing him. Okay. This is a guy who went from some extremist beliefs

or at least kind of toying around with extremist beliefs and toying around with ways to change the same. system and ways to revamp society in a healthier way to someone who had these really significant injuries at a young age and had to deal with chronic pain. And I think, you know, he had to deal with chronic pain in his 20s. And this is someone who was athletic and he had to confront the limitations of his athleticism and his future, I think, in a very significant way. and I think in some ways what he saw before himself was a lifetime of suffering,

you know, with no real relief in sight. And he was dealing with the healthcare industry in his mind's eye that was unwilling to assist him in any really significant way. And so, I mean, if you want to radicalize someone, just, you know, saddle them with chronic pain for the rest of their lives when they're, you know, in their early 20s, and there's no viable solution to that problem. And so I think those beliefs that he was 20, with and we mentioned that he did the Unabomber, you know, the Unabomber's manifesto appealed to him.

He gave it, you know, a favorable review on his Good Reeds account. And so, you know, he's toying with these ideas. I don't think he's quite there. He wasn't quite there. But I think the chronic pain and the back injuries really kind of pushed him over the edge. I think so. And as people have pointed out, that can cause mental health issues to, just debilitating depression. Right.

which is what you're pointing out here. Right. And so as a matter of fact, there's a really important player in this story. So let's take this a little further. There's a guy that in Hawaii, he lived in a place called Surf Break, which was kind of a common living and workspace for people. And this guy, RJ Martin, oversaw these people that lived in this community. I think in the old days they might have called this like a commune,

But I don't know. I'm not sure. I'm not sure the exact nature of this place. But, you know, they all lived together. And this guy, R.J. Martin, was responsible for vetting who came in. And he interviewed and got to know Luigi Mangione. He saw him as a really kind guy, a very smart guy. He saw a lot of good qualities on Luigi like a lot of people did.

A lot of his friends did. But one thing that R.J. pointed out a few times was, let me just, I'm going to actually I'm going to read from, I'm going to read a quote from R.J. Martin, and I'm going to read something that Luigi said on his Reddit account. And these are both really important to this analysis. So R.G. Martin says of his back condition, he says, Manjioni, quote, knew that dating and being physically intimate with his back condition wasn't possible. He told this, Martin told this to the New York Times. He said, quote, I remember him telling me that and my heart just breaks, unquote. Martin told the today show that the back pain, quote, constantly weighed on Mangiote, unquote. And this is going to be, I think, the most critical part of this analysis. And that is that this idea that Luigi Mangione's back pain was so severe that he couldn't be physically intimate. and it severely compromised his ability to be in significant relationships.

There's another person. I guess he's R.J. Martin's spokesperson, whatever that means, but he also commented and apparently knew Luigi Mangione. His name is Josiah Ryan. And he was interviewed too. And what Josiah Ryan said about Mangione's back pain was, quote, his back pain impacted every aspect of his life, his relationships and his romantic connections.

He told this to People magazine in an interview. So he's saying something similar to RJ Martin. His back pain impacted every aspect of his life, his relationships, and romantic connections, unquote. And then another quote from Josiah Ryan, quote, the constant pain led to depression, which further affected those relationships.

So here, this is the first time in any of the art of many, many articles that we've now scoured where there's a reference to the fact that Luigi Mangione has some type of depression. And why does he have that depression? According to this person, he has that depression because his back is affecting his ability to be intimate and to develop romantic relationships. And that is depressing to him. This is a really important part of this story, by the way. In fact, I think it's the most significant part of the story, because in some ways I see this as a love story gone bad. And I'll explain that in more detail later, but at bottom,

so this is going to sound really strange to a lot of our listeners, but behind every criminal, I could argue, is a love story gone wrong? Wow. You heard it from Dr. John. And behind every criminal and every crime is a bailed love story, and that's what you have here. Wow. And we'll talk more about that in a minute. But this is what we know about Luigi Mangione's back problems overall. It seems that he started having some back pain as a child.

So it's not entirely clear whether that back pain was psychological, because it would be unusual to have back pain in early childhood. But so again, there's this question here about is this psychological, is it congenital, right? Is it genetic? I don't know. I don't know. It's confusing. He has this back pain as a child. He goes to this place surf break.

And this, again, this is according to R.G. Martin, he goes out on a surf lesson. The first week he's there. And his back is so negatively impacted by the. that that he spends a week in bed. He can't get out of bed for a week. So he has this surfing accident. And then apparently he slipped on a piece of paper, which exacerbated all of that. And then at some point he had the surgery. I don't have the exact dates on this, but he has this surgery and then he starts having these problems with intimacy, probably sometime around 23. And one consequence of that, he has this Reddit account under the name Mr. Cactus, which

Multiple sources apparently have verified. We haven't, but I presume I'm putting faith in some of our sources here, although we've been disappointed before. Assuming that this Reddit account is accurate, it seems to be many, many people have quoted this. This is what, after the surfing accident, this is what Luigi Mangione says on Reddit. He says, quote, my back and hips locked up after the accident. And this is the most important part. quote, I'm terrified of the implications.

Terrified. I'm terrified of the implications. I should note, too, that he's used that word terrified several times here. And that, I think, is the key to this analysis. Because terror, it's interesting to use the word terrified, because, and again, in my profession, for those who follow us, our listeners would know that I pay attention to the most minute details of what people say,

how they present themselves. The smallest things sometimes can have the most importance. And when somebody uses the word terrified, stop and pay attention because he's not saying fear, right? He's not giving us a lesser interpretation. He's saying he has terror. He's not saying he's worried.

He's not saying he's stressed. He's not saying he's concerned. He's terrified. He's terrified. And I think in many ways that gets to the heart of this situation. Because you'd have to imagine that, you know, the thing, let me, well, let me back up just a little bit. Terror, I often associate the word terror with something like horror. That is, it's extreme.

And, you know, terror goes beyond just fear. sense that like terror is the type of thing that can't be contained. Terror is the type of thing that that overtakes your life and it fundamentally undermines our sense of self at some level. It kind of, it kicks off the slats of ourself. And that's what's going on here. Terror is a core emotion that has the ability to rewrite and reshape someone's life. And Luigi Mangione is telling us that he's terrified of his future. A 26-year-old. A 26-year-old valedictorian is terrified of his future.

And so let's go to, you know, what's fascinating, can you put up the picture of the picture that we all know that we saw of Luigi Mangione when he pulled down his mask? Yep, I'll pull it up. And by the way, everything you're interested in me showing, John, I have. So just let me know whatever you want me to show whenever. Okay. So let's go to this now somewhat iconic picture of Luigi Mangione. And what we know about this picture, so this picture tells a really interesting story.

And that story is that he's checking into this hostel in New York City. And apparently there's a female that's with him and flirting with him or he's flirting with her. It's not entirely clear which. But there's a moment here during that flirtation, where Luigi pulls down his mask, the only time, he's in New York City for 10 days, the only time in all of his stay in New York City and outside of New York City where cameras have caught him, this is the only time he pulls it down. And this is the picture that essentially gets him identified and caught. And it's because a female who's checking him in in the hostel is flirt.

with him. And this is going to take, this is going to take me back to why this is a love story. This is why this is a failed love story. Because behind this moment of him pulling down that mask, which gets him caught in this moment and behind this moment, is everything you need to know about Luigi Mangione and why this murder occurred. And what's behind this moment is the fact that he knows, because of his back injuries, he knows that he's terrified of trying to develop a connection with this other person, even though they're flirting. He knows that behind that mask, behind this facade of a really virile, healthy, young, 26-year-old that all these females are really interested in and attracted to, behind that mask is a tremendous amount of shame

and there's a tremendous amount of pain and helplessness. I can go through all these emotions, I think. He pulls down that mask because he wants to ignore the fact that he's terrified of developing relationships because, to quote R.J. Martin, because he can't be physically intimate and he can't sustain a relationship. So you have this hopelessness and you have this helplessness and you even have this sense of amasculation. that I think because he can't be intimate, because of his back pain, because of his injury,

perhaps I'm speculating, but perhaps he doesn't feel masculine enough, that this moment of flirtation, which for a normal 26-year-old would be a moment of joy and exaltation. And right, it would be a fun moment. For him, for him, it's the opposite. It's terror. It's depression. it's anger, it's fear, it's desperation. I could go on and on.

But this moment, this is where love stories begin. And you have to imagine that this moment, and again, I can't tell you how important this moment is, this is the moment where he lets his guard down and the moment that gives up his identity. This is the picture that the McDonald's employee in Altoona, Pennsylvania sees and uses to identify. to identify Luigi Mangione. And it's because he wants to connect with this person so badly. And yet behind that is this terror that he won't be able to become intimate with this woman or develop a relationship with her

or whatever the expectation is. I mean, I think he's in town not for that purpose. But my point is that this moment of flirtation is a moment that he's had a lot in his life. or at least in the last year or two since the surgery with these back issues that have rendered him essentially, I'm not going to use a more common term here, but they've rendered him incapable of intimacy. That's the way I'm going to put it. Okay.

And so this is, when I say that this is about a failed love story, this is what I mean. Because this moment, this is a moment of connection that fails and it has to fail. and almost all of Luigi's similar interactions are similar moments, sadly. And actually, you know, I talked about Dostoecki's crime and punishment, and now I'm going to use another literary reference that I've thought of since that time, the more I think about this case. And it's actually quite tragic. So this is a tragic love story.

For those of you who have read The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway, Ernest Hemingway, Jake Barnes is a similar character. And just to summarize that book quickly for those who haven't read it, it's Hemingway's considered Hemingway's first great novel. It puts them on the road to a Nobel's prize in literature. The plot of the sun also rises. This guy, Jake Barnes, he falls in love with this woman named Brett, but he was in World War I. Jake Barnes was a soldier in World War I.

He sustained a catastrophic injury to his genitals that rendered him. impotent. That's the term they use in the book. They rendered him. Mom, can you tell me a story? Sure. Once upon a time, a mom needed a new car. Was she brave? She was tired, mostly. But she went to Carvana.com and found a great car at a great price.

No secret treasure map required. Did you have to find a dragon? Nope, she bought it 100% online, from her bed, actually. Was it scary? Honey, it was as unscary as car buying could be. Did the car have a sunroof? It did, actually. Okay, good story.

Car buying you'll want to tell stories about. Buy your car today on... Carvana. Delivery fees may apply. Impotent. And because of that, he could never have a significant and lifelong relationship

with the love of his life, who was Brett. And even though they both wanted that, they could never move forward with their relationship. Some of the more emotional moments of that book are when Jake is trying to connect with Brett and he loves her and they love each, other, you just sense this agony and this frustration in him because he can't, you know, he wants

a family and they want to get married. They can't do that. I mean, they don't say that, but that's implied. And so Brett, Brett has to find these other relationships. She doesn't want to, but she does, she has to or she does because Jake simply is incapable of intimacy in the way that, that Brett wants to, you know, experience in a relationship. And in The Sun also rises, by the way, that too is a tragic love story, right? Because it's a story about the inability to really develop and facilitate this love interest with someone that fails. And, you know, the more I think about this situation, the more I think of Jake Barnes. That, you know, I think in some ways, this is the story.

This is a failed love story. Well, the way I would phrase it now is this is like a Western meets a, love story gone bad meets a crime story. And that's how I think of. So this is kind of a multifaceted narrative here. This is, the sun also rises meets crime and punishment, meets, I don't know, a Western Yellowstone. Let's say Yellowstone. The story of Yellowstone is the story of John Dutton. And John Dutton is sort of, you know, there's components of the hero in John Dutton, that he inherits this land for those who watch Yellowstone. He inherits this land from his family and he does everything to protect it. And the beginnings of the Dutton family and their ranch,

their massive ranch, is that they tame the land first. And John Dundon has to fight to keep the land. And then after the land is tamed and after they tame nature, corporate America steps in. And they want to build an airport on his land and they want to take over his ranch. Right. And so then it becomes a fight against corporate America. And that's where, that's what, that's who Luigi Mangione is fighting. The story of Luigi, Luigi Mangione is a story of a Western, meets a love story, meets a crime story. And it has all of those components, which makes it kind of complex.

But underneath it all, if we go back to this idea of, let's call it sexual dysfunction, if we go back to this idea of sexual dysfunction that comes from his back campaign, I think in many ways that drives this narrative. And what's behind the murder then is this absolute rage about his inability to connect to other people, to females specifically in his case, and his inability to experience intimacy and his anger at these, so he's scapegoating the healthcare industry for his problems. This is really a story about families. love and the inability to grieve that about himself and his life. That Luigi Mangione, you know, so in getting back to the Hemingway story novel,

Jake Barnes, Jake Barnes, because of his issues, Jake Barnes becomes very stoic. And he realizes that there's no way out of his condition. He has to accept it. And there's no way he's ever going to have Brett. And he realizes that. And so there's a process of mourning. He doesn't like it. He consumes a lot of alcohol.

He acts out a lot, right? But Luigi Manigioni doesn't have that stoic acceptance. Luigi Mangione is angry and he escapes goat. Like it or not, Brian Thompson becomes a victim because he's a scapegoat for all of his rage about. He's blaming the healthcare industry for his medical issues and for his inability. ability to be intimate. And he's acting that out. He's projecting all of that on the one person who has nothing. He doesn't know this guy, right? He doesn't know Brian Thompson. He doesn't know that Brian Thompson has two children that are going to miss him terribly. They are missing. I'm sure

they don't understand what's going on. Yeah. And that's not to say that there aren't major problems with the healthcare industry, and that's not to say that there aren't a lot of corporate CEOs that are as greedy as you can imagine that have ridiculous, you know, stock option packages that they make more money in a month than most of us, probably, you know, the majority of us will ever consider making it in our lifetimes. But that doesn't have anything to do with Brian Thompson. Okay. I mean, Brian Thompson's just, he's a cog in the wheel, right? He's just part of the machinery. I mean, he's just trying to get what he can get out of the, the system. Well, he's gotten a lot. He's gotten a lot. I mean, look, I'm not, I'm not defending

Brian Thompson, but I am defending the fact that just because you don't like what someone symbolizes or represents, that doesn't mean you can go murder them. And it doesn't mean you can go murder them because your issues with intimacy and your sexual dysfunction are so painful and so fearful and so terror-inducing to you that instead of looking at that, you would rather blame the system or health care or whatever it is or one specific individual that represents the health care system, you would rather do that than try to come to terms with, you know, with your own mental health issues or with your issues around sexual dysfunction, right? Kind of the way Jake Barnes tries to when the sun also rises.

I mean, I don't know that Jake Barnes was a good job of that. It's not clear. But the fact is, you know, it's got to be. terrifying to a 26-year-old who's looking out of his future and has this vision for a family and children or whatever else he's having and probably has some recognition that maybe that might not happen, right? There's one post on Reddit where he talks about his fear of being in a desk job the rest of his life and, you know, being immobile. And so I think if you dig deeper into this case, there's a lot more here that has to do with mental health and

potentially psychosomatic issues and depression and sexual dysfunctions. You know, I don't know if this is like erectile disorder, whatever it is. And by the way, sexual dysfunctions are considered a mental health diagnosis because of the potential clinical implications of those issues. So in other words, sexual dysfunctions are medical or are to medical issues, but they have psychological ramifications such as depression. And so

okay, I'm just letting you fly tonight. You've been preparing. I'm like, keep going, moving on. I'm listening with everybody else in chat, just so you know, I know that John likes me to share and ask more questions. I am starring questions here, but I am letting

John share his thoughts. Yeah, I remember in high school, I just want to, there's this other little analogy I think that I was thought about today. I remember in high school when I read the Sun Also Rises that we had talked about, I don't know why I remember this

by the way, but we had talked about how Jake Barnes was similar to this Greek god and Greek mythology called tantalus. And the word tantalus, by the way, later becomes the word tantalizing

in the English language. And Tantalus, because he reveals the secrets of the gods to some mortals, he's condemned to this place called Tartarus, where he's always hungry and he's always thirsty. So he's placed in this, he's placed in Tartarus, and he's situated right below this fruit tree where he can see the fruit, he can almost grasp it, but he can't quite get it. Right. So the fruits always ought to reach to him. And he's, right by this water. And he's always trying, he's reaching for the water with a cup. But just as about, just as he's about to get the water, the water recedes before he can drink it.

So he's perpetually hungry and he's perpetually thirsty. And there's nothing he can do to satisfy those desires. And I remember, that's how I learned about this Greek myth of Tannelus, by the way, was talking about the sun ultra rises. And I thought about that today. And I think in some ways, that's what's going on here. That this myth of Tannolis is also completely relevant to Luigi Mangione in the sense that this is a guy at some point in his life that has it all. He's gone to the best schools. He's got the best education.

His future is so bright. He's got all this talent. He's a computer wizard. He can develop computer games. There's so much this guy can do. This guy's future is unlimited. in it. It's limitless. It's so bright. And yet, and then he gets these injuries. He has these medical conditions. And now at 26 years old, he's like panelist. He's like Jake Barnes.

Like now everything is swept out from under him. And all those dreams and those visions of his future are swept away. He has this intense longing that he can never fulfill. Right. And that's what's driving this. If you want to know how Luigi Mangione, goes from this incredibly talented human being who probably contributed, could have contributed so much to society to a murderer, that's why. That's the path. Because when you have this incredible desire and all these expectations and hopes for the future,

and then they're dashed, and you look for a scapegoat and you have this rage because you're like panelists, you can almost get that fruit. You can almost taste that fruit. fruit, right? But then you can't. You realize you can't. You're never going to have the fruit. Think about the anger. Think about the rage you would feel. Think about how the terror, right? Think about how that would just undermine everything you wanted. Once Luigi Mangione became more radicalized and latched on to the health, the U.S. healthcare system as the symbolic of all the

Illes of Corporate America and as the agency that's responsible for all of his physical problems and for not curing him and for not helping him enough, right? Once he starts blaming them, now you're on that path to violence. Now you're on that path to murder. And by the way, like, that's one of the other elements of a Western is that if, for those who know the Storth Yellowstone series, the Dutton's, you know, the question in a Western that the hero always confronts is, do I fight or do I not fight? Do I engage in violence to seek justice? Or do I try to negotiate and find peaceful means of resolving the problem? And I realize this is fiction. You know, this is, the Yellowstone is made for TV. It's made to get ratings. But the Dutton's engaged in violence.

To answer the question, the Dutton's invaging, always engage, not always, but they almost always engage in violence, that violence in Westerns is the path oftentimes to justice. And so it makes perfect sense to me that somebody like Luigi Mangioni with this type of rage and this inability to really grieve his condition, his lifelong chronic condition that he can't change, this inability to accept that is inevitably going to lead to violence in order for him to feel like there's justice. And it does. That's how we got here. Is this guy a hero?

I mean, that, you know, that's not up to me to determine. Well, someone said, I think he thinks he is. What did he shout for the American people as he was taken in? I have that video, too. Yeah, let's take a look. Thank you. And silly out of cups and insults. He tells us of American people.

and completely out of touch and insults the intelligence of American people Okay. Did you catch that? Yes. So what he says is this is clearly unjust and an insult to the intelligence of the American people. I take it that he's saying, so again, getting back to this idea of justice and Westerns,

you have to engage in violence oftentimes to achieve justice. That the, you know, one of the ironies, by the way, of if you think about, if you think about this narrative that I'm creating here of Luigi Mangione, it's of a Western meets a failed love story meets a crime story. If you think about this, the crime story, right, because of the murder, the failed love story because obviously the sexual dysfunctions. But, you know, one of the ironies of the Western is that the Western, in the hero oftentimes in the Western, Western, they can't experience love and they can't experience family fully. In other words, oftentimes in Westerns, the hero is the outsider that fights for justice, but they're always kind of condemned to roaming in the wilderness, that they never fully find a home.

They're always kind of, right? And ironically, I think that's true here, that Mangione. in some ways for the year, he goes radio silent from his family for six months to a year. He rejects his family. He's rebelling against his family to some degree. And he's given up on the idea of love. So he really doesn't care. Right.

He sees justice as his best, justice and martyrdom as his best path to become this martyr, to become this, this given his condition and his inability to fully accept his, condition and his anger at his condition, this is how he sees resolving it. And so he's telling us right there. I mean, in that little moment, again, like the picture of him taking his mask, pushing down his mask, he's telling us that he feels like he's a marred, that he, that this is unjust, that even though he murdered someone, that he shouldn't be arrested. The American people are going to demand that he be released, that he be freed, even though he murdered someone.

Right? So, I mean, this is like straight out of like any, this is like straight out of Yellowstone. This is like the script for a Western. There's a lot of people that are angry with the health care system, including yours truly, me. And so that rage that he has also belongs to many others. I agree. I agree. But I mean, my job, yeah. And there's a lot of justified rage. I totally agree with that. But I think, but the larger issue is, does that allow someone to murder another human being? Right. Whatever your rage is and however severe it is, should that justify murder? Right.

That's the question. Right. I mean, a lot of people, as you and I, you and I were talking about this earlier, a lot of people are saying, I don't condone murder, but, right? Like when you throw in the butt, things get complicated. I don't condone, but this is what people are essentially saying in this case. I don't condone murder. But I kind of condone murder in this situation. But, yeah.

And there have been some very funny TikToks. We've been on TikTok laughing at very many, you know, someone said, I'm not going to say but. I'll say, however, you know, we've laughed along with many of you. But yeah, does it really? Does rage really? really, really condone murder, really because of rage. Right. And I mean, in spite of the fact that the CEO appears to have been cheating the system

and he was making millions and millions of dollars, right? Like all of that is enraging to a lot of people. Keep in mind, that's nothing new. Corporate CEOs have since the late 90s or early 2000s, they have made so much money relative to the typical worker. It's not even, it's, this is, this has been going on for years. But does that mean that we should go kill, if we murder them? Does that solve the problem? Yeah, I agree. I agree with, I agree with Kiwi Bridget that he felt like he had nothing to lose.

Exactly. He had given up hope. There was, as I said, there was this inability to accept his condition. to accept the fact that he had this chronic, potentially untreatable condition that really would have impacted his future, that he was not willing to accept that. He was not willing to grieve that. Yeah. My father's alibi, I agree there's justified rage. However, we need to harness our fury and channel it into a productive action. Let's pull up his manifesto for a second, too, if you can. Do you have that?

Yeah. The handwritten manifesto, I'll explain, released by an independent journalist Ken Clippenstein. This has been the New York Times, or sorry, Newsweek has also published this saying that it was brought by Ken. And we also, you know, the New York Times has said that the manifesto, the handwritten manifesto found on Luigi at the time of his arrest was 272 pages, and I did the word counter, and this is 271. So here it is. Yeah. So let me-

Ken explains that he doesn't understand why all of these people have not, you know, why the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, and NBC are withholding the manifesto while gladly quoting from it selectively, and it's not been answered. But here it is. and again, Newsweek has said that has been published by this independent journalist. Right. Let me, I'm going to read the last part of this. There's some elements in here, I think, are important to point out.

You can see it on the screen, but I'll read from the point where he says, United, he's referring to United Healthcare, which, by the way, it turns out that he wasn't even using United Healthcare. He cite United Healthcare is symbolic because it's the largest, health care or insurance, I'm sorry, insurance provider, health insurance provider in the country. So he says, United is the largest company in the U.S. by market cap behind only Apple, Google, and Walmart. It has grown and grown, but has our life expectancy? No, the reality is these, I assume it means health care companies, these healthcare companies, has certainly gotten too powerful. And they continue to abuse our country for immense profit because the American public

because it allowed them to get away with it. Obviously, the problem is more complex, but I know not have space, and frankly, I do not pretend to be the most qualified person to lay out the full argument. But many have illuminated the corruption and greed, for example, Rosenfall more, decades ago, and the problem simply remain.

It is not an issue of awareness at this point, but clearly power games at play. Evidently, I am the first to face it with such brutal honesty. And before I talk about this, by the way, I've noticed some comments of people saying, well, healthcare companies kill millions of people every day by not allowing certain procedures or claims, right,

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ORA gives you all of it, together, at the same price competitors charge for just one service. Start your free trial today atora.com slash remove. Protect yourself now at aura.com slash remove. I have the exact statistics on that, but the question is, does that mean we can murder people? Should we just indiscriminately start murdering health care administrators and CEOs because the companies aren't performing as well as they should be? I mean, it's a problem. I mean, and people do die because they're denied coverage.

But again, I mean, that's not how our system set up. But let's look at this argument, right? If we drill down and try to figure out whether this makes any sense, Let's see what his logic. Does his logic make sense here? So he says, frankly, I do not pretend to be the most qualified person to lay out the fullest argument. All right. Well, look, if he doesn't understand the argument in the argument's complexity and detail,

then why is he committing murder? He's telling us right here in his so-called manifesto that he's not qualified to assess this problem. And yet he's murdering someone. Right? Well, if you're not qualified, then go find someone who is and get them to put up the fight. Right? But this tells you that this is not about being a market. This is not about health care.

This is about his rage and his disability and his sexual dysfunction. This is about his inability to grieve his physical and medical conditions and not accept them. if he's not qualified to figure this out, then why murder someone? He goes on, quote, but many have illuminated the corruption and greed, for example, Rosenthal and Moore, he's talking about Michael Moore, Rosenthal is a writer who's written about health care. Many have illuminated the corruption green decades ago, and the problem simply remained. Well, that's true of a lot of things.

That's true of climate change. That's true of the oil industry. Like, this is not unique to health care. There's many people that have laid out arguments about other problems in this country that haven't been addressed. That doesn't mean that you go murder people. He goes on, it is not an issue of awareness at this point, but clearly power games at play. My response to that is yes, welcome to reality. Our entire political system is about power games at play.

Our system is not fair. It's not just. That's the way it is. Like, I don't have an answer for how to change that. Health care is not fair. It's not just. But again, does that mean you can murder someone? And this is the last part.

This is the part I really want to focus on. This is the last line of his manifesto. You ready for this? Here we go. Evidently, I am the first to face it with such brutal honesty. Now, let's think about that line. evidently I am the first to face it with such brutal honesty. What?

He just pointed to two, right, he just pointed to Rosenthal and Moore, who have addressed this issue decades ago. And there's, by the way, there's way more than Rosenthal and more. There's many people addressing these health care issues or trying to in a very deliberate conversational way. And he's saying here, even though he just cited other people, he's saying here, he's the first to face it with such brutal honesty. that is grandiosity.

Yeah. That is there, as I said on our show Monday, there's this mesionic utopian quality to this guy. This is it. He sees himself as the first and only person to really see the brutal honesty of this situation evidently because of, apparently because of his back issues.

And because he can't be intimate. So he's the only one. He's the chosen one, right? He's the chosen one who's going to bring this issue to light and change the world. Yet he is the first to face it. He is the only one at the same time. He does not pretend to be the most qualified person to even lay out an argument for this. I do find that fascinating.

I can't be the one that lays out an argument in this handwritten manifesto because I really don't know. But I'm going to be the first one ever to do this. Watch me. And so what does this mean? You might be saying, okay, what are you getting at here, John? Well, okay, I'm going to tell you this manifesto is providing a really flimsy rationalization for committing murder because none of this makes sense. None of this is particular logical. This is a really poorly constructed argument for an Ivy League graduate. He's telling us he's not qualified and yet he's the only one. with the brutal honesty to face this, like, this is not coherent. This is not well done. This is a rationale and a justification for committing murder. The reason he commits murder is because he has chronic health conditions that he cannot accept and he cannot grieve and he cannot come to terms with.

And he would rather scapegoat an entire industry and a particular CEO than to face his, his own issues and his own vulnerabilities and his own weaknesses and his own medical calamities. To use his term, he can't face them, his inability to face them with, quote, brutal honesty. That's if he was able to face his medical issues and all of his psychological issues with, to use his term again, with, quote, brutal honesty, we would not be on this show tonight. and two kids, two lonely, sad, mourning children would still have their father right now. Yeah.

So in other words, this was selfish, completely selfish. This wasn't about all of us being angry because, look, I'm seeing a lot of, I'm angry with the healthcare industry. I'm angry, I'll be honest that Brian Thompson is making the amount he was making, and I'm angry that United Health Care has been and is denying claims. I'm very angry and I'm very angry that as, as Luigi states that we have the most expensive health care system yet rank roughly number 42 in life expectancy. All of this makes me very, very angry.

But he's not thinking of me. He's not thinking of me when he does this though. In other words, it gets, it gets worse. He's not doing this. He's not being a martyr and doing this for me because I'm angry. He's doing this for himself and his rage. Right. You could argue that he's trying to draw attention to this issue, but not in a very compelling

manner. And I mean, what I would say to people is the people who say, well, you know, health care system is killing millions of people. And look to your politicians, right? Look to, I mean. Find out who's, there are a lot of people that want to change. health care system, are we voting for them? Look to find out who to vote for. Yeah, you look to your politicians, look to your local and state representatives, look to lobbyists, right? Like, I mean,

admittedly, all of that is broken. I get that. But like the, you know, the question is, do we just, do we condone vigilante justice and start killing people we don't like? I mean, there's a consequence for that. And also, I would say, look, you know, this is complex. The reason why I'm presenting this analysis is to show this isn't just about some hero who, some martyr who's out there killing for, you know, killing for the common nan who's getting screwed by the healthcare system. This is way more complex than that. This is about way more than that. This is about the way the entire healthcare system works, the way it's structured, right? I mean, it's a bigger problem than this. So when I think what I'm saying is I say this, I say this a lot, but one of my

favorite lines from Shakespeare. It's from Kinglier. It's one of the most simplistic lines in all of literature. What I say a lot is see better. See better. It's more than you think it is. We need to see better. We need to see deeper, broader, further, right? It's more than just, you're not going to solve this problem by murdering a CEO. And I think, you know, a lot of people, they can relate to him and, you know, they probably feel in some ways like, I don't know, like that he's speaking for them in some sense, maybe. But I just don't think that taking a father away from his children is the solution. Yeah.

You know, as a country, I like this, Candy, as a country that has been so divided. I agree. Isn't it nice to see this is something we can all be on the same page about? So now let's all do something. that doesn't have to do with killing a father. Right. Like, let's find out who we all vote for now.

Let's fight for everyone. Yeah. And I would say to anyone out there who we all have fathers, whether they're in our lives or not, like if our fathers were CEOs of major companies, I realize most of our fathers are never going to be CEOs. But if they were, would you,

how would you feel if your father was just gunned down and ambushed in cold blood? Admittedly, I've found it quite refreshing to see how angry everyone else is about health care too. I'm angry. You know, I'm very angry. I've been angry for a very long time. And I'm like, oh, everyone is. I didn't realize.

So, you know, let's think there are a lot of politicians actually that, you know, would help us if we. There's probably a lot of politicians watching their backs right now. Yeah, that too. And CEO. and CEOs. Right. What was that one TikTok we saw? They're like the CEO of Costco sitting pretty because he kept hot dogs at $1.50.

So he's good. Yeah. No, but it is very, sorry, dark humor. I don't have the issue. You know, I'm not going to presume to like have the solution to fixing health care in the country. I'll leave that to people that know this. Unlike Luigi, I'll leave that to people who are better qualified and more knowledgeable on that topic than me. But one thing I know is I don't have any interest in murdering someone to make a

point. Right. What else, John? That's about as far as I can go without getting myself into trouble, apparently. All right. I'm trying to think what else we didn't share here. No, we shared. We never shared that video. Okay. Yeah, we're good. Somebody just said, I don't, you know, I can't, I just noticed a comment where someone that, you know, said, it's about a broken hair health care system. Clearly, I'm coming from a position of privilege. I mean, it misses the point. But I can't make the point enough.

If you condone murder, then I guess you see this guy as a martyr. But if you don't condone murder, then, you know, if you don't condone murder, then I get, you know, I don't know. It's a difficult, it's a complex discussion. Yeah. Let me just see a few things. yeah what we're talking out here is let me clarify luigi mangioni's motive for murder what is hidden in the motive that is what hidden true crime does and maybe we should have

stated this at the beginning because we do have many new subscribers hidden true crime is about finding what is hidden in the crime in the criminal and that is what we're doing here today I think you've been doing a good job because you've made both sides upset, John. That's always a good sign. Some people think you're making him a hero and other people think you're being too hard on him. And I think, again, we can all agree that we're angry at the health care system. Forgive my poorly placed joke, everyone. I'm sorry.

Sometimes when something is serious, I have a habit of lightening things up with a bad joke sometimes. I apologize. All right. Ivana's good to see you. We talked a lot about the psychosomatic at the beginning. It was another person's question as well, what you meant when it comes to this case. A lot of,

thank you everyone for your kindness. Sorry, go ahead. What that means is that there's a psych, there's potentially a psychological element to a medical condition or to a physical ailment. So I use the example of insomnia is a kind of a perfect example of that. In some cases, insomnia can be strictly medical, could be related to, let's say the pituitary gland, or there could be many things that could lead to insomnia,

but a lot of times it has to do, it also has some psychological component, meaning that many people can relate to the fact, for example, that racing thoughts before you go to sleep will impede your ability to fall asleep, and that's a psychological issue. Okay. So I suffer from anxiety. us. There's some underlying emotional and mental health issues. That's fair enough. It would be partly, it would be partly medical and partly psychological.

Okay. That makes sense. All right. We do have a bonus episode of this case on Patreon. Patreon.com slash hidden to crime. We actually recorded it two nights ago. And we have numerous bonus. episodes on Patreon. We've actually been recording different bonus episodes,

exclusive episodes of Patreon once a week to thank those that support us over there. So I just want to share that. Thank you so much. And we have plans to cover more crimes, more cases. You are still working on the Delphi series that we're going to have exclusively on our podcast. We are working on a case about or a discussion soon about Suzanne Simpson out of Texas. In fact, you can see the whole entire backstory of Suzanne Simpson on our YouTube channel posted about four days ago. And yeah, and we are prepping for Christmas and holidays and things for 2025. We're planning on bringing you a lot. So thank you so much.

Oh, here we are. Yvonne. Isn't all radicalization caused by pain of some sort or loss of status? That's a really great observation. Most radicalization is caused by grievance. And so, yes, I would say that pain and loss of status or loss in general often leads to grievance. So, yeah, radicalization is the research on radicalization shows that grievances drive radicalization, different types of grievances. Interesting. That reminded me of something I said in here.

Let me see then if I can find this one, something somebody said about. shame. This is a good observation by Stephanie, by the way. Can we talk about anti-heroes in literature? Yeah, I'd love to. Right. I guess he'd be more of an anti-hero. True, because you can't.

I mean, yeah. In modernist literature, he would be considered more of an anti-hero for sure. Peace through cookies. If every crime is a failed love story, every crime is also built on a foundation of shame. Thoughts. There's some interesting research showing. that shame is the underlying basis for most crimes. So yeah, that's a great observation.

Right. Fow love often leads to anger or shame. Yeah, I agree. That's a great observation. When I say a foul love story too, I'm talking about, I'm not just talking about romantically. I'm also talking about a foul love story could be a mother's inability to nurture or attach to their infant child.

that is also a failed love story. So the love story begins at birth. And the first question is, can this mother or this father or can these parents love this child enough? That's where the love story starts. So a foul love story can be an attachment disorder or it can be a failure of attachment. And almost all criminals are many, many of the most severe criminals have what we call insecure attachments, meaning that they're not attaching to their parents because they're not getting the right type of attention and nurturance. And so that's where a failed love story typically begins.

In this particular case, I'm talking about a failed love story with a young adult because of medical injuries or disability in this case. I guess you could call it. But every love story starts at birth. And behind every cynic is a disappointed idealist. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Maybe that's why there's a lot of cynicism in our house sometimes.

I'm not sure on this issue for Luigi Mangione, I'm not sure he got to the point where he was a cynic. Right. Right. He was still an idealist. Right. He was an idealist that obviously believed and believes that he can reform the system. And he thinks it's an injustice that he's arrested.

So he's clearly an idealist still. Right. Or seems to be. I don't know. Seems to be. Yes. All right, everyone. We will see you all soon again.

Bye-bye. Good night. Hello, Hidden Jems. It's Lauren with Hidden a True Crime podcast. As a TV reporter, I learned the art of visual storytelling. So if you're like me, you enjoy listening, but also viewing. You can actually head to our YouTube channel, Hidden True Crime, to watch the interviews. Hit the subscribe button for surprise lives and breaking news. And for exclusive content,

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