Think about it: You've got rampant corner-cutting to save costs, use of the wrong materials (carbon fiber instead of steel) to build a deep-ocean submersible in the first place, no back-up systems and reduced safety practices, poor maintenance and industrial safety compliance, lack of oversight or regulation, and pervasive greed and suicidal risk-taking. It's all in there. The only really amazing thing about this is that it took so long for something serious to go wrong. (1, 2, 3)
What I really find boggling is the way the owner cut so many corners to save on money, placing his passengers and staff's lives at increased and unreasonable risk just for the sake of increased profit - on what is basically a joy-ride, nothing more - so that a bunch of billionaires could brag about visiting the Titanic in person. What's even more upsetting is that he was allowed to get away with it by every single entity that should have insisted on compliance - from departments of the US government to insurance companies.
The fact that any individual could afford to actually PAY the $250,000 for a seat on that ship of fools is disturbing enough to me, but the sheer greed evident in all these accumulated disastrous machinations evident in the somewhat appropriately named OceanGate overshadows the stupidity of it all... Except for the part where - unbelievably - the guy who KNOWS all this crap has been going on and what corners he's cut, actually gets IN with them and pilots the thing himself?! I mean, seriously, that's a Darwin Award right there.
If this incident has highlighted anything at all, it is the fact that billionaires get to play outside the rules everyone else has to follow. The only difference was that in this case, that sense of superiority, entitlement and elitism turned right around and delivered a fatal bite. Whereas the owner of OceanGate got to callously ignore industry safety practices without being shut down or censured or forced to comply, he was allowed to continue to offer deadly joyrides to people willing and able to pay his price unimpaired - without them knowing the actual risks - which in this particular instance, turned out to be the ultimate price.
In the end, all five of them were unintended victims of their own social position, arrogance and hubris. Being allowed to place oneself above the rules that apply to "lesser mortals" has its consequences - sooner or later - and even for them.
While it's a terrible way to die - I can't and won't deny that, and I wouldn't wish it on anyone - I honestly can't say I'll lose any sleep over the deaths of five billionaires. I'd rather reserve my pity for the poor of this world who have to eke out a living in their shadows in spite of people like them, and voice a special note of thanks to the Universe, or Fate, that the ship wasn't being piloted by an employee instead.
I've seen a few people criticizing the jokes and memes that instantly sprang into circulation about this event even as it was unfolding - "how can people be so callous?" etc.
As far as I'm concerned, if you can afford to waste a quarter of a million US dollars on a joyride to not see much of the Titanic wreck through a tiny window - while risking getting killed outright in what amounts to little more than a pressurized beer can that was built as cheaply as possible - you've got way, way too many dollars and way, way too little sense.
Unlike some people out there, it seems, I actually think very little of billionaires. In this day and age, where poverty and its consequences and comorbidities is one of the biggest growing global disasters in the world, to be a billionaire is simply shameful. Some people still seem to worship at their feet however, as if greed and avarice are admirable traits. Not to me - as far as I'm concerned, billionaires are societal parasites, corrupt leeches and paragons of greed and selfishness who benefit disproportionately from the labors and suffering of the working classes, selfishly hoarding most of the world's wealth for themselves while the rest of humanity struggles to survive on what's left - and the world could really do with far fewer of them.
It seems to me that people who're struggling to put food on the table while working two or three jobs at minimum wage to pay off loans, mortgages or rent, or health insurance, and to keep their children off the streets and in school, are being asked why they don't show more empathy for those poor billionaires who died during a $1,000,000 joyride in that submarine.
While billionaires are indeed people too, and they also have feelings (apparently) - unlike the rest of us, they're quite well insulated and protected by their wealth and power against anything the world can usually throw at them - except it seems, Fate, Karma - and forces of nature.
Why, when something unexpectedly comes along that cuts so cleanly through that insulation of power and wealth - touches the apparently untouchable, and levels the playing field - should the world's poor shed any tears for them?
That's the prerogative of their beneficiaries after all, should they be that way inclined, while they're on their way to the bank.
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