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While fucked up, it’s disinguinuous suggest that the news is blowing up only due to the fact that they’re billionaires. While large boat disasters are fairly uncommon, how often do you hear of a submarine disaster. Especially one where the inhabitants are missing but potentially on a timer - trapped in a submarine with no way to open from the inside, many peoples ultimate fear. The story writes itself, pile on what seems to be a neglectful company and you’ve got a story people are going to be invested in. I don’t think the coverage or the search and rescue would be any different if it were a scientific submarine with scientists.
The Thai cave boys are another good example. They were rural third-worlders, but it still became a sensation. It just has to be bloody and dramatic to attract attention. A story like “people on boat drown again” is too mundane, it becomes a statistic instead of a tragedy.
What’s really irksome is that these rich guys that pay people to put them weird but often already-explored places get called “explorers”.
Rich people think spending money is what makes them special.
My favorite lately is the rise of the ‘world traveler’ who treats travel as a moral imperative that elevates them above those who can’t or don’t have the means to spend 5-6 figures per year on international vacations.
International travel certainly does broaden a person’s perspective. It’s great if your can do it, but anyone acting superior because they can travel is just an asshole.
I enjoy traveling but it does bring a bit of guilt that I have the ability to do it when so many people never will. Hoping there’s some advancing in vr/ar to provide better cultural sharing and better immigration reception to provide the physical interactions.
I have to wonder if these people are really getting the straight dope anyway, or going to all the tourist spots and being shown what they want to see. They’re definitely not hanging out in a refugee camp if they’re spending that much.
These days, it’s much cheaper to just have international friends online.
This is effectively saying, “This article is correct but for the wrong reasons”. People aren’t angry about why hundreds of migrants dying isn’t newsworthy. They’re angry that it’s not newsworthy.
I’m frankly surprised that not enough people find it disgusting that the EU passively killing hundreds of refugees is less interesting because the EU does so regularly.
People like novelty. That’s not too surprising. Additionally, a growing share of people in the EU don’t want migrants to come. Empathy is declining.
And that’s exactly what were speaking against.
Because immigrants die in stupid ways all the time. A shit in your toilet is not newsworthy. A shit on your kitchen table is.
The way you just compared migrants to shit in your toilet rubs me the wrong way.
Username checks out I guess.
I agree. Rubbed me so wrong that a genie just shot out of a bottle next to me.
It would absolutely be different if it were scientists. The memes about billionaires and the sub are all over the place. Bezos should go on a sub and explore the titanic too and all that shit.
The problem is lack of coverage for the migrants, who are seen as “less valuable people”
In 2022 there were nearly 50,000 automobile fatalities in the US. There isn’t a big story about all of them because, frankly, they’re common.
But 5 people died in a submarine. That’s news because it’s different.
im not sure how this relates to 500 people seeking refuge relates to automobile accidents
I would argue that they are more valuable then people who have it made but ya
The migrant boat sank in the Mediterranean off the coast of Greece. While a tragedy, it’s largely irrelevant to the US news. It’s not like it was a migrant boat from South America going to the US. Those do happen and they become huge news here.
The Titan submersible happened off the coast of Canada and the US and Canadian coast guards were involved. The company running the excursions is American. That’s a lot more relevant to US news.
Looking at European news, the BBC has been covering the migrant boat disaster. It’s been reported in US news too. ABC started covering it over a week ago when it first happened.
It’s also just common, which makes it less newsworthy. Another boat sank in the Mediterranean off the coast of Italy in February. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-64776621
When things become common, they’re no longer as newsworthy.
Yeah, having a shittily built submarine for a billionaire to visit the most famous shipwreck in the world while then joining those who died there 100 years ago, is a pretty unique story that we’ll now always remember whenever we talk about the titanic.
There’s a real irony in naming your submarine after a shipwreck, neglecting all safety devices like the shipwreck, and talking about how the hull was indestructible.
I mean, the billionaire class believes they can do nothing wrong, so…
That’s true of everyone
The ticking timer is news gold, it creates a real sense of tension…
you’re right - if those on the sub do happen to have met their end, at least it was done in pursuit of their dream?
Yeah.
The awful truth is that migrants drowning on the sea crossing to Europe or to the UK is mundane. It happens regularly, so it’s not news. A sub drowning near the Titanic is newsworthy.
News = man bites dog. Dog bites man = not news.
While I don’t necessarily disagree with you. It would be interesting to know what would happen if each one of those 50 immigrants paid $250,000 to be on that boat. I don’t think money had nothing to do with it.
Also it’s unfair to compare it to the migrant story. Most Americans and Europeans are very hateful towards people from MENA so they are either indifferent or supportive of such “accidents”.
That’s entirely the point. That shouldn’t be the case.
I think the issue is the resources dedicated to each disaster. I don’t know if all the immigrants died though, so there may not have been a point in rescuing them at all.
There have been plenty of resources dedicated to rescuing the migrants. Over 100 have been rescued.
A big issue in the news coverage is that the migrant boat sank in the Ionian Sea in the Mediterranean. The Titan submersible was off the coast of Canada. So the news coverage in America largely focused on the thing happening near America. Same with the search and rescue. The US and Canadian coast guards were deployed for the search.
The Greek coast guard ran the search and rescue for the migrant boat since it happened off the coast of Greece.
I think this is a rather disingenuous read of the situation. The drama of the situation should not overshadow the gravity of the difference between the number of human beings in question, it’s disturbing that anyone would find this even remotely acceptable because it’s more dramatic. And that’s not to mention the discrepancy in response and spending on each issue. It’s a true indictment of our societies.
There are people dying all the time, so the ones that are “news worthy” (i.e. attention grabbing) are the unique ones with stories that set them apart, and often it’s more relatable when it effects fewer people so it’s less abstract. I don’t think it’s an indictment of our societies, it just plays off of how our brains work.
I’m pretty sure those immigrants have more interesting stories to tell than a billionaire. Just saying.
Living your entire life in a warzone or in inhospitable environments that force you to leave your family behind and getting drowned while the general society ignores the underlying problem seems more worthy of questioning than a billionaire trying to go sightseeing thinking their money shields them from nature. I’d post a clip of a movie that fits here perfectly, but the clip is not on youtube, for anyone interested, look up ‘whatever works’ with Woody Allen there’s a newspaper scene at the beginning of the film.
Anyways, apparently they’re dead. Now to move to more important issues in society.
agree 🙏
tl;dr:
Greek authorities have so far recovered the bodies of at least 81 people, and more than 100 passengers have been rescued, including Pakistanis, Egyptians, Syrians, Afghans and Palestinians. Survivors and the United Nations have said hundreds were aboard the boat and many are still missing and feared dead. If a death toll in the hundreds was confirmed, it would be among the worst shipwrecks recorded in the Mediterranean. Greek authorities have further been criticized for not acting to rescue the migrants, even though a coast guard vessel escorted the trawler for hours. International maritime law dictates that authorities are obligated to conduct immediate rescue operations - with or without an explicit plea for help. Artist Oliver Jeffers shared his feelings with a cartoon on Tuesday, which marked World Refugee Day.
I am a bot in training. Suggestions?
Good bot
I don’t think they made a bot ranker bot yet haha
Pfft hahaha. 😂🤦🏻♀️ Thanks for saving me the future embarrassment
Ya well tragic shit happens all the time. We’re desensitized to it. This submarine is interesting and the circumstances are kind of like a movie. Of course media will cover it more. It’s what people are interested in.
Yeah, the titanic situation involved submarines, suspense, radar, underwater drones, etc.
The suspense was key, too. A race against the clock of oxygen running out. What happens if the drone finds them, but can’t free them? Stuff like that made it a very unique story.
So of course people are more interested in that one.
More to your point, the reason we are so interested is in the uniqueness of the situation. For the North Americans this the Titanic is culturally significant. For Europe, the migrant issue is local news. The problem is that our news is blended.
Yeah, but what was their net worth? /s
Well I mean the coverage on the submarines isn’t really because of their net worth (not denying that it isn’t a contributing factor), but submarines sinking isn’t really that common, as another user have said in their comment. Remember MH370? A majority of the passengers weren’t wealthy, but it still got a lot of media coverage.
The Kursk disaster also garnered world wide attention
But even the contribution of their net worth to the coverage is only in the sense that people think it’s funny that something bad is happening to an arrogant billionaire. I don’t think the intent of OP was to say that people should feel schadenfreude over the migrant situation.
Won’t someone think of the poor billionaires?
I’m really loving your username! Was reading that book to the kids yesterday and they too are enjoying it.
Haha, glad to hear it. It amuses me too!
Irelevant comparison. Must have missed the part where the chilean miners and the cave kids were billionaires too. That’s why people cared about those stories. It’s not getting coverage cause of the people on it. It’s getting coverage because of how idiotic the whole situation was.
They found a debris field near the titanic recently. It was a catastrophic failure. RIP to those on board.
If you mean the OceanGate submarine, it seemingly spectacularly imploded after its carbon fiber structure gave in to various microfractures. If that really is what happened, the water pressure killed the crew faster than their brains would’ve processed anything.
The pressure does not kill. Whales live down there. It’s the compressibility of water. At this depth it’s about 4% compressed. The cabin has 1 atmosphere of pressure, the water around it about 100. Through a microfracture water shoots in at the speed of sound in water (3x speed of sound in air) - that’s about 100 bars. That’s like a water jet cutter. It rips the microfracture open. Within a tenth of a second they get pressed to death by the compressibility of water.
I think because they were potentially still alive, it sparks interest around the world.
And the memes are people making fun of a foolish decision by rich people.
There are always migrant ships from North Africa traversing North across the Mediterranean that have issues or sink vs a unique one-off sub disaster
As unfortunate as it is, migrant boats wrecking is common enough that it’s not really “newsworthy” in terms of what grabs people’s attention. Especially on a global scale. Similar to how a murder in somewhere like Maine would make the news, but in NYC it’s just another day.
People also talk about migrants constantly, and a lot of the attention the sub is getting is hate.
Unfortunately where I live we hear weekly in the news of these immigrants boats.
Can’t do much as a small community, except sending help as soon as we know another one sunk.
Unfortunately, these migrant ships that sink are not exactly unique. There’s at least a handful that go down every year. As someone else pointed out that this is pretty much a first of its kind disaster. Tourists dying visiting the Titanic. Before this became news I had no idea that this was even something people do… then again I’m not a millionaire with a disposable 250k.
Migrant boat sinking with hundreds on board - tragic? Yes. Is this something new that happens? Unfortunately no.
Well, perhaps other billionaires will see how these folks have been treated, and decide that they’d rather be remembered for doing something great for society, rather than pursuing individual/deadly hobbies.
Don’t hold your breath, lol. Billionaires aren’t tripping over each other trying to save everyone else.
You don’t become a billionaire without being cool with exploiting people. Modern society rewards antisocial behavior.
So tired to have that sub story popping up in all my feed…
Finally some larger outlets are covering it!
