Urban75 Home About Offline BrixtonBuzz Contact

Oceangate's Titan. The Bayesian yacht. Why do the deaths of rich people matter more than poor people?

R

rasputin

Well-Known Member
Don't get me wrong. I think it's a terrible tragedy that people lost their lives on a trip to see the Titanic, or on holiday on a luxury yacht in the Med.

They had a lifestyle of which I can only dream. But they were fellow human beings. They had families and my heart goes out to them.

But why the endless coverage of why this or that vessel failed, or what procedures were or were not followed, when it matters not a carrot to most of us? I'm never going thousands of feet underwater to look at shipwrecks. I've no plans to cruise across the Med in a luxury yacht. I'm sorry these people perished at sea, I really am, but can we get a sense of perspective? These safety issues matter only to a tiny few. Where, for example, is the commentary on the cladding issues that still haven't been resolved nearly a decade after Grenfell? It really is a skewed world.
 
I think the Titanic sub coverage was understandable: people lost on a trip to see a famous sunken ship that people are still fascinated by. Are they dead? Possibly, but we don’t know yet, so there’s mystery.

I get that.

But the unknown billionaire and family? No, I don’t understand the wall to wall coverage.
 
Plus the Oceangate events had a wonderful frisson of irredeemable hubris about them. There's a good story in there about some arrogant richie thinking he knew better than the dozens of experts with over a century of collective knowledge and experience, and getting his personal comeuppance.

Unfortunately it seems some of the news agencies have taken home the wrong lesson. Some bog-standard rich prick perishing on their perfectly ordinary (for a rich prick) yacht lacks that special element. What's next, tear-laden coverage the next time one of these monied goons dies while crashing their ridiculous sports car into some street furniture?
 
I think that there is an element of people being drawn to spectacle.

Before there were airliners, there were airships, and there were a number of airship disasters. More people will know of the Hindenburg disaster than the crash of the R101, although the latter killed more people. In the case of the Hindenburg, there is film of the spectacular fire that engulfed it.

I know that there was no film of the Titan, but I think that people were gripped by the drama, when it was wrongly believed that there was a chance that the people had survived.

There was a lot of coverage of the case of the miners trapped in Chile, some years ago. I think that this was seen by media organisations as dramatic, because someone from, I think, the USA, came up with a way of rescuing them. Most cases of trapped miners do not get a similar level of coverage.

The Grenfell Fire disaster did receive a lot of coverage at the time.
 
PTK said:
I think that there is an element of people being drawn to spectacle.

Before there were airliners, there were airships, and there were a number of airship disasters. More people will know of the Hindenburg disaster than the crash of the R101, although the latter killed more people. In the case of the Hindenburg, there is film of the spectacular fire that engulfed it.

I know that there was no film of the Titan, but I think that people were gripped by the drama, when it was wrongly believed that there was a chance that the people had survived.

There was a lot of coverage of the case of the miners trapped in Chile, some years ago. I think that this was seen by media organisations as dramatic, because someone from, I think, the USA, came up with a way of rescuing them. Most cases of trapped miners do not get a similar level of coverage.

The Grenfell Fire disaster did receive a lot of coverage at the time.
Click to expand...

That's all good, but I just don't see what spectacle there is about this recent yacht business. I doubt it will have the same legs as Oceangate or Grenfell have, each for different reasons. I think some of the news agencies covering it have got a mistaken notion into their heads about that the general public finds engaging.
 
NoXion said:
That's all good, but I just don't see what spectacle there is about this recent yacht business. I doubt it will have the same legs as Oceangate or Grenfell have, each for different reasons. I think some of the news agencies covering it have got a mistaken notion into their heads about that the general public finds engaging.
Click to expand...
For those who like these things, there is fuel for conspiracy theories.
 
Rompipalle said:
We've been wondering this all week. Yes, a truly horrible tragedy for all those affected but not sure it warranted top billing on the news for days on end.
Click to expand...
Similarly mystified and now, even more so, that the rich people's lawyers are pressing for manslaughter.
 
Because a lot of the people going on about what a tragedy it is are actually thinking," fuck yes"?
 
The deaths of rich people "matter" more than the deaths of poor people in the same way that the lives of rich people "matter" more than the lives of poor people, because they're rich.

It really is as simple as that :(
 
tony.c said:
How many fishermen, merchant seafarers, and migrants fleeing war, famine and climate change die on the seas every day? No continuous and indepth coverage of them. No human empathy.
Click to expand...
The media are always looking for a human interest story and the yacht incident is certainly one of them. The fellow who owned the yacht; Mike lynch was extradited to the USA for what amounts to a trumped up charge. He spent months under house arrest awaiting his trial and was recently found not guilty. The group on the yacht were celebrating his victory over the US court.
 
Wkdloz said:
The media are always looking for a human interest story and the yacht incident is certainly one of them. The fellow who owned the yacht; Mike lynch was extradited to the USA for what amounts to a trumped up charge. He spent months under house arrest awaiting his trial and was recently found not guilty. The group on the yacht were celebrating his victory over the US court.
Click to expand...
Given his CFO was found guilty of fraud by a US court, it doesn't seem that surprising they went after Lynch too.
 
Yes he was rich. He wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth his parents were a fireman & a nurse from council estates in Ireland. Mike Lynch was a very clever men who did very well for himself without any outside help. He donated a lot of money to local causes in the towns in Ireland his parents came from. He did not come from money everything he made was made by him alone! The ignorance & bitterness on this site is something else
 
stellaashtray said:
Yes he was rich. He wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth his parents were a fireman & a nurse from council estates in Ireland. Mike Lynch was a very clever men who did very well for himself without any outside help. He donated a lot of money to local causes in the towns in Ireland his parents came from. He did not come from money everything he made was made by him alone! The ignorance & bitterness on this site is something else
Click to expand...
Did it all themself with no colleagues or workers??
What ignorance and bitterness? Or did you just mean a view you disagree with?
Maybe you can answer the question in the OP...
 
stellaashtray said:
Yes he was rich. He wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth his parents were a fireman & a nurse from council estates in Ireland. Mike Lynch was a very clever men who did very well for himself without any outside help. He donated a lot of money to local causes in the towns in Ireland his parents came from. He did not come from money everything he made was made by him alone! The ignorance & bitterness on this site is something else
Click to expand...
IMG_4079.png
See that figure on the left?
That’s you, that is.
 
lose of life in any circumstances is very sad & no life is worth more than another but we can not also blame people for being rich or poor & all life’s considered equal, however in this case it sounds there may have been suspicious circumstances to this loss of life’s
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

N
Anyone else feel like the NHS almost doesn't exist for them any more?
4 5 6 7 8
Replies
228
Views
6K
gentlegreen
gentlegreen
Dog_Voodoo
Tory Mark Menzies, who are these bad people?
2
Replies
43
Views
2K
Wilf
Wilf
B
The status of terms 'people of colour' and BIPOC in the UK
2 3 4 5
Replies
144
Views
6K
likesfish
likesfish
Boris Sprinkler
Why are people not rioting in the streets already?
Replies
18
Views
958
DaveCinzano
DaveCinzano
P
In Blackpool South, did people vote because they are head over heals with Labour
Replies
27
Views
948
A380
A380
Back
Top Bottom