I am going to be a little more charitable towards the Titan submarine tragedy than my esteemed colleagues Jim Goad, Gunnar Alfredsson, and Thomas Steuben. (more…)
Tag: the Titanic
-
I usually adhere to the Roman custom of only speaking well of the dead, but I will make an exception for Stockton Rush, the CEO of OceanGate and designer of the ill-fated Titan. As the Joker would say, “We live in a society.” OceanGate says a lot about that society, and I can’t help but see the funny side of the Titan’s catastrophic implosion. (more…)
-
The story of a missing — later discovered to be destroyed — improvised submersible that had set out to visit the Titanic’s rusting hulk has been covered by every major news outlet on the planet over the past two weeks. (more…)
-
2,110 words
Titanically Stupid: 61-Year-Old White Guy Who Refused to Hire “50-Year-Old White Guys” Perishes in Hubristic Deep-Sea Quest to Ogle the Titanic’s Ruins
One of last week’s biggest stories involved the deep irony that during a mission to venture two miles underwater merely so that its five inhabitants could gander at the Titanic, a clunky little submersible known as the Titan endured a “catastrophic implosion,” (more…)
-
Hypocrisy there is in the story, and weakness, false pride and vaunting, deceit, poltroonery, ugly perversions, and baleful frenzies. But there is more also. Through the story runs the scarlet thread of courage and the golden thread of heroism. — George R. Stewart, Ordeal by Hunger
It may be trite to state that people show their true colors in extreme circumstances, but what better way is there? James Cameron certainly mocked the hubris of the Titanic true believers in the first half of his iconic 1997 movie, but the numbers of the disaster reveal a chivalry which speaks fairly well of the people who traveled and served on that ill-fated, immortalized vessel. (more…)