this post was submitted on 11 Apr 2026
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It doesn't matter that he got replaced, because the replacement learned the lesson, and eased their restrictions. That's the goal, to make them respond in our favor.
Eventually, he will respond to pressure from shareholders and the board, and increase restrictions again, and then the entire building will have to come down.
Tim Noel has been at United for almost 20yrs and is onboard with continuing the mission Brian was helming. The system may have been shocked that someone fought back, might even have responded in our favor, but without continued observation and pressure, they’ll quietly transition back to the model they want to operate once the hubbub and anger dies down. They’ve also beefed up their security and gone to ground with anything the public could access that might give them personal information about who’s up to what. Look at what has happened again and again with demands for police reform in this country. Every once in awhile some cops will behave so egregiously even the thin blue line will offer them up as consolation prize to appease the masses, they’ll announce some joint venture with a reform group to “address” the issues, put their cops through some classes of their own choosing- but it’s the bare minimum and mostly in the hope that some fresh outrage will start trending and people will forget what they were mad about five minutes ago. Then we’re caught in the cycle of momentary violence boiling over but no sustained change.
Oh, yeah, I'm not convincing myself that sustained change will come from this, but it did change for a minute, and that's the point. They know how to behave, and when forced to, they will, but we also know they'll go right back to being shitheads, first chance they get.
So we just have to stay on them, keep legislating against them, keep regulating them. Mostly we have to slap them down when they start talking back, and acting like they are more important than the rest of us. They are not, we are.
We citizens are the reason this nation exists, not the wealthy. The wealthy are here to serve US, not the other way around. If their corporations aren't serving the American people, and if in fact they are damaging American interests and society, the Oligarch in charge should be imprisoned, their company should be confiscated, and operated by those who will prioritize responsibly.
Shareholders will unhappily lose their investments, and in the future they will learn to encourage their CEOs to behave within the law and reasonable society.
Just don’t forget that many of the shareholders are not in fact “the rich”, but the “better than average” middle class who will hand power to the filthy rich so long as those in power will keep punching down the lowest class on their behalf. We are surrounded by ladder-pullers and gate-keepers who have a lot more in common with the rest of us than they do their billionaire idols, but will fight to keep the illusion that they are superior. It’s a class war, but it’s also a class civil war since a lot of our peers are convinced their participation makes them a part of the club. The change won’t happen until we can convince our neighbors empowering leaders and systems that promise them the world will, in fact, just use their cash/votes to enrich themselves and occasionally toss some bread and a circus.