‘Historians will skip our generation’: Luigi Mangione fever reaches new heights as Gen Z concert-goers shout and sing in his name

Everything about the Luigi Mangione situation – it feels a little ludicrous to think this name was largely unknown a month ago and now everyone knows the meaning of this phrase – is out of the ordinary, to put it mildly.

People have been idolizing killers for possibly as long as humans have killed one another. Not every killer or killing, and not every person shares the same point of view. In fact, the odd idolization of killers like The Nightstalker, the Unabomber, or Cameron Herrin – objectively differing in degrees of criminal egregiousness and intent – has been restricted to a smaller group of people, normally deemed highly misguided and perhaps a little delusional by the rest of the population (especially given America’s propensity for tough punishments and emphasis on penal accountability).

Mangione, however, appears to fall under the category of exception to this rule. Indeed, the mounting ramifications of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson’s murder have materialized in an unusual set of social phenomena. Although there is no wholly encompassing support, the American public’s positive view of the accused shooter seems to have bridged bipartisan lines. Gen Z in particular – the generation Mangione belongs to – appears to be more intensively supportive than others. If anything, this TikTok video taken at the Disney-channel-centric Bop to the Top Tour proves it beyond a reasonable doubt.

‘He could be the one’ to spark a social movement of class consciousness

“You gotta give the people what they want hey?!” the DJ having the time of his life while wearing a Santa hat and dancing to Hannah Montana’s “He Could Be the One” says at the end of the video. One can tell this disc jockey tasked with playing Disney Channel songs for a whole evening has indeed understood the assignment (as we, Gen Zers, would say). The video shows an overwhelming number of singing voices and arms in the air as a whole montage of Luigi Mangione photos plays in the background to the sound of the song’s romantic lyrics.

Some netizens (hyperbolically) think this kind of behavior will prompt historians to pretend our generation never existed. “Historians will skip our generation,” one writes. However, others are of a different opinion: “This will be studied for generations in US history.” My thoughts might lean towards the latter. True, at times one may wish to have been born a measly couple of years earlier and be able to call oneself a millennial. But that is not the point.

The point of this wave of support – however weird and unusual its expression – is where it stems from, at its core. Not from Mangione’s looks – though those may have played a part for some people – but from the American people’s overwhelming dissatisfaction with the current state of their healthcare system, particularly with regard to for-profit healthcare insurance companies.

If one needs further proof, one must only look at the dozens of aired grievances – a significant amount of which are from people insured by United Healthcare – that are out there. Turning on the usual mainstream television channels may not give one this perception but, in this peculiar case, social media, and TikTok, in great part, have been very consequential in getting the everyday person’s justified bitterness towards the system out in the open. Only the willfully deaf cannot hear the rallying cry of a need for change towards a more humane reality.