A grainy image of his face drew comparisons to Hollywood heartthrobs. A jacket similar to the one he’s wearing on wanted posters is reportedly flying off the shelves. And the words written on the bullets he used to kill a man in cold blood on a sidewalk on Wednesday have become, for some people, a rallying cry.

Four days after a gunman assassinated a top health insurance executive in Midtown Manhattan and vanished, the unidentified suspect has, in some quarters, been venerated as something approaching a folk hero.

  • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    Ah but we’ll never know for certain who he is! If they can’t find the real guy, they’ll likely pin it on some nobody with a problematic past. So we can’t fall in love with the real guy, but only a hero archetype instead. And that’s perfectly fine.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      3 days ago

      That makes no sense. If they don’t catch the real guy, he’ll be free to do it again. If he does it again, it will be clear that the nobody they pinned it on was the wrong person.

      • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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        3 days ago

        We do not trust the oligarchs and their police to actually catch the real guy. There’s a good chance that, whoever they kill and claim to have “got him!” the public will not accept that they really did. We already think they’re going to just murder someone in order to close the case. Maybe they’ll get him for real. Maybe they won’t. We will never know and the conspiracy theory machine will just keep churning out maybes.

        If another CEO bites the dust, it will probably be a copycat. This guy is getting away, if not in actual truth, at least in folklore. He’d be a fool to strike again.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          3 days ago

          Again, that makes no sense. We know what he looks like and surveillance cameras are everywhere. Are you suggesting the copycat would somehow do some sort of Face/Off thing with the killer?

          • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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            3 days ago

            We have no idea what he looks like. The pictures are of a guy with a different jacket. They’re the ones who claim that’s the guy, and handsome white dudes are a dime a dozen in the city. There’s still no reason to trust they showed us the right guy.

              • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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                3 days ago

                Dude. I’m not saying one way or the other. I’m just saying that the conspiracy machine is gonna churn up reasons why they might have lied, no matter who they pin it on.

                You think they’ve finally let the jet fuel steel beams go after all these years? There’s no reason why the conspiracy machine is ever gonna accept that they got the right guy. Your insistence that it makes no sense is utterly irrelevant to conspiracy theorists.

                • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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                  3 days ago

                  Yes, people come up with stupid conspiracy theories all the time, but you were saying it was a conspiracy. I’m not sure why you’re claiming you didn’t:

                  Ah but we’ll never know for certain who he is! If they can’t find the real guy, they’ll likely pin it on some nobody with a problematic past. So we can’t fall in love with the real guy, but only a hero archetype instead. And that’s perfectly fine.

                  We do not trust the oligarchs and their police to actually catch the real guy. There’s a good chance that, whoever they kill and claim to have “got him!” the public will not accept that they really did. We already think they’re going to just murder someone in order to close the case. Maybe they’ll get him for real. Maybe they won’t. We will never know and the conspiracy theory machine will just keep churning out maybes.

                  If another CEO bites the dust, it will probably be a copycat. This guy is getting away, if not in actual truth, at least in folklore. He’d be a fool to strike again.

                  We have no idea what he looks like. The pictures are of a guy with a different jacket. They’re the ones who claim that’s the guy, and handsome white dudes are a dime a dozen in the city. There’s still no reason to trust they showed us the right guy.

                  That’s not what the “conspiracy machine” churned up. That’s what you churned up. You even said “we” multiple times. You are the one doing the “jet fuel can’t melt steel beams” here.

                  • Olhonestjim@lemmy.world
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                    3 days ago

                    Yeah, I’m the only one saying this stuff.

                    They haven’t caught anybody yet. I gave you examples for why the public (we!) might have reasons to doubt whoever they put on display. I was explaining how he’s not unlikely to become an uncatchable folk hero. I used the word “myth” for chrissake.

                    I get that nuance does not always come across well in text online. May I suggest that you may not have fully understood what I was implying?