So the saga of the billionaire submersible comes to an end. It seems the underwater craft imploded, ending CEO Stockton Rush and his wealthy passengers in the blink of an eye.

It’s been interesting to see how people have been reacting. There are exceptions, but for the most part people don’t seem very fazed by the tragedy. I’ve seen a lot of “too soon” jokes and not much finger wagging.

The Titanic – A spiritual field recording by Alan Lomax at St. Simons Island, April, 1960. Performers include John Davis, Bessie Jones, Emma Ramsay and Hobart Smith.

A lot of it has to do with the hubris and foolhardiness of the CEO. He apparently did it on the cheap, used off the shelf parts and ignored the warnings of people who knew how dangerous it was.

James Cameron made a good point. Kind of ironic how similar Rush’s fate was to that of Captain Smith of the Titanic. One thing’s for sure, Rush will be remembered. He’s become a myth, like Icarus flying too close to the sun.

I can’t say I wouldn’t have done myself in if I’d had the resources to make a submarine. How hard could it be? I grew up on shows like Salvage 1, where Andy Griffith plays a junk man who makes his own spaceship. A lot of the Golden Age sci fi I read had premises like that.

TV in the ’70s was so dumb – and fun. Pretty sure I watched every ridiculous episode.

Mostly though, the lack of empathy toward the CEO seems to be about class. Like why should we care about billionaires when they don’t care about us?

I understand the sentiment to an extent. I was excited when Robert Ballard discovered the wreckage of the Titanic. The thought of colonizing other planets excites me. I have a much harder time caring about “extreme tourism” for the wealthy. Billionaires in space or billionaires under the sea – the rest of the world could really use those resources.

If you’re not careful though, you can get carried away. The guys who died in that sub didn’t deserve it just because they were wealthy.

If you think of it, the wealthy are just as trapped by the system as the rest of us. I’ve actually met a billionaire and I like the guy. He runs an ethical company and believes in paying his taxes (he’s European).

Money is survival and wealth is security. If you don’t have enough, the system will let you die. But how much is enough? If you have a lot, you’re gonna want more, just in case.

The more you have and the less everyone else has, the more you have to close yourself off. You can do it with walls and surveillance, private security, or distance. You can use your influence to keep the people you’re scared of away.

The Bastille was a prison, but so was Versailles. Nobody wants to get robbed or Marie Antoinetted. But the worse life becomes for those people you never see, the more likely it becomes. Poverty is a trap, but so is wealth.

I don’t know how we’re gonna get out of this mess, but billionaires do have a lot of resources. If enough of them could be convinced that we’re all in this together, they could do a lot of good.

It’s worth remembering that FDR, who helped the country out of a depression and got us through a world war, came from the wealthy class.