Reposted by Lance
The idea of “social murder” is super useful, and we need to get comfortable using it. Engels is the best, man - reading him feels like finally acknowledging the obvious reality everyone wants you to ignore
![Engels on 'Social Murder'
When one individual inflicts bodily injury upon another, such injury that death results, we call that deed manslaughter; when the assailant knew in advance that the injury would be fatal, we call this deed murder.
But when society places hundreds of proletarians in such a position that they inevitably meet a too early and an unnatural death, one which is quite as much a death by violence as that by the sword or the bullet; when it deprives thousands of the necessaries of life, places them under conditions in which they cannot live - forces them ... to remain in such conditions until that death ensues which is the inevitable consequence - knows that these thousands of victims must perish, and yet permits these conditions to remain, its deed is murder just as surely as the deed of the single individual ...
Engels, The Condition of the Working Class in England (1845 [1967]), p. 126 (Panther Press)](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:jfcht3gt62twn3r32e7bziq4/bafkreifeiogd6watrjgxqrzfsfrujyv4765jeh4why7my2rl76nbnqr5xu@jpeg)
December 5, 2024 at 4:42 AM
The idea of “social murder” is super useful, and we need to get comfortable using it. Engels is the best, man - reading him feels like finally acknowledging the obvious reality everyone wants you to ignore