Comment on Do life insurance rules that deny payment after suicide discriminate against those with mental health issues? If those rules didn't exist would suicide rate increase?

fiat_lux@kbin.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨year⁩ ago

Discrimination is the insurance industry's entire business model.

Discrimination as a word doesn't mean a bad thing, it literally just means "to choose between 2 or more of something/someone". As long as there is choice, there is discrimination. If I needed a plumber, and two people wanted the job, I would discriminate against the one without a plumber's license and/or experience. I think that's probably sensible discrimination.

These days discrimination is used to imply some form of social harm, especially towards a marginalised community, and the word "against" frequently follows it. The question really is though: Is an act of discrimination harmful or not, to whom it is harmful, and do the harms outweigh the benefits?

Is the insurance industry's decision to choose prices for people based on their medical situations harmful discrimination? For the customers? Definitely. For the insurance company? Definitely not.

And then the choice really boils down to which of the two you think are more valuable, for whatever it is you value most. People, or insurance companies?

As someone who values less suffering in the world and thinks all people are worthy of dignity, safety and equitable experiences, and huge profits for a private business are not constructive in delivering those values, profit-seeking health and life insurance companies can burn to the ground for all I care. Bankrupting people for things they didn't choose causes far too much suffering in this world.

Stress drives people to suicide in the first place, and insurance companies feed on that to live like social parasites.

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