{"version": "1.0", "type": "rich", "title": "Snapping someone\u2019s neck is a euphemism. The thing in movies, in games, where you sneak up behind someone and snap their neck and...", "author_name": "kontextmaschine", "author_url": "https://kontextmaschine.com", "provider_name": "kontextmaschine", "provider_url": "https://kontextmaschine.com", "url": "https://kontextmaschine.com/post/89747666328/", "html": "<p>Snapping someone\u2019s neck is a euphemism.<br/><br/>The thing in movies, in games, where you sneak up behind someone and snap their neck and they\u2019re dead and they were a person once and they grew up however many years until however old they were and they were a person and they knew other people and now they\u2019re meat because you killed them by snapping their neck and now they\u2019re dead, that\u2019s a euphemism.<br/><br/>(And a play/plot mechanic.)<br/><br/>It\u2019s a euphemism for the <em>actual</em> reliable, quiet method of killing someone from behind, or after you dominate them in a fight - choking them to death. The Vulcan Nerve Pinch was another euphemism, older and more delicate.<br/><br/>Choking people to death kills them just as much, but being sure about it involves being in intimate contact with someone\u2019s body for say three minutes as it becomes a corpse.<br/><br/>Do you have a sense of how long three minutes is? <a href=\"https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3X6npds4rvc\" target=\"_blank\">Here</a>.<br/><br/>I\u2019ll wait.<br/><br/>There are two \u201cchokes\u201d that work the same way, by depriving the brain of oxygen. There\u2019s the \u201cair choke\u201d, which is to block the flow of air into the lungs by constricting the windpipe. People will struggle a while because they\u2019ll still be conscious as long as they can draw down the oxygen already in the bloodstream, but as long as you control the windpipe they can\u2019t draw attention by vocalizing.<br/><br/>You can attack the windpipe by crushing it, or by cutting it open, but it\u2019s got the best boneless armor on the body and unless you follow through lethality\u2019s iffy. That thing on Xena where she chopped someone and they couldn\u2019t breathe but then she could chop them again and they could? That was just a thing on Xena.<br/><br/>The second choke is the \u201cblood choke\u201d, where you constrict the carotid arteries of the neck, so blood can\u2019t get to the brain to deliver oxygen. That causes unconsciousness quicker, but to implement it you\u2019ve got to control both sides of the neck. Cutting works better here, even if you only get one you can drop blood pressure enough. Messy, though.<br/><br/>From there, it\u2019s only three minutes.</p>"}