Small cruise ship rescued skiff in south-east Alaska even though Meta billionaire’s $300m megayacht was closer
  • wjrii@lemmy.worldEnglish
    39·
    9 天前

    Mark Zuckerberg has faced questions over why a small cruise ship in south-east Alaska rescued a stranded skiff and its crew when his 387ft superyacht had been closer.

    The Silicon Valley billionaire’s yacht, worth a reported $300m, is said to have “repeatedly” declined to assist when a nearby boat called for help last week.

    Zuckerberg, CEO of Facebook and Instagram owner Meta Platforms, was not onboard at the time, a spokesperson told Forbes.

    So, basically, it starts to look like they have standing orders to be selfish and anti-social to point of pushing up against maritime law.

    • Mirshe@lemmy.world
      6·
      9 天前

      Why wouldn’t they? The investigatory agency for this is the USCG, and last I recall, the man in charge of Homeland Security and the rest of the US is pretty comfy with doing favors for his billionaire friends.

  • switcheroo@lemmy.worldEnglish
    27·
    9 天前

    The reply? Because I didn’t want the poors on my yacht.

    He is a disgusting parasite PoS – also an acceptable answer.

  • stoly@lemmy.world
    26·
    9 天前

    I believe that by international law all vessels have to offer assistance to someone in distress.

        • M0oP0o@mander.xyz
          12·
          9 天前

          And this is the flaw, they pay them a lot to take the fall as part of the job. Plenty will do so with a smile on their faces and international law and decency suffers.

          • stoly@lemmy.world
            7·
            9 天前

            Agreed, this is definitely what happened. There is probably also a sense of being able to do anything you like since your boss is rich.

            • M0oP0o@mander.xyz
              5·
              9 天前

              Not just a sense, a very real ability. This might mean they can’t captain a ship anymore, but unlikely to see any real punishment.

              • FrostyTheDoo@lemmy.world
                3·
                9 天前

                Even without knowing the law in detail, I’m certain rich people have a (designed) loophole around it. He’ll captain another ship if he wants to

                • M0oP0o@mander.xyz
                  5·
                  9 天前

                  The captain is not the rich guy here. These super yachts tend to get captains near the end of their career who know the deal. They get nice paychecks to do shit like this and then take the fall if needed, that is the loophole.

    • lookitsjustin@lemmy.ca
      12·
      9 天前

      You’re correct about this. I was just looking it up myself.

      There is indeed international maritime law governing vessels, and they must proceed with all possible haste to distress signals. Unfortunately, there are two problems here as I understand the situation:

      1. Believe it if you want to or not but - the people operating Zuckerberg’s yacht claim they hadn’t heard or noticed the distress signal at the time
      2. The Coast Guard - who, importantly, the stranded skiff had initially contacted - didn’t consider their situation to be worthy of “distress” and thus Zuckerberg and his yachtspeople didn’t violate any regulations or laws

      Zuckerberg’s yachtfucks apparently said that they noticed the distress signal eventually, but by the time they had, the Coast Guard had already arranged assistance for the skiff.

      So, sadly, for those of us who want to see the billionaires get their comeuppances, I don’t think we’ll see it here.

  • Janx@piefed.socialEnglish
    26·
    10 天前

    Because the personality disorder required to exploit enough people to become a billionaire causes them to lose their humanity and end up with no empathy?

      • TheTechnician27@lemmy.worldEnglish
        6·
        9 天前

        Empathy is more complex than that, and it’s influenced by a lot of factors, including environmental. Psychopaths are thought to have a physical brain condition that prevents them from feeling the social emotions, but sociopaths simply have a greatly diminished capacity for them.

  • Fishnoodle@lemmy.world
    16·
    9 天前

    Like what kind of fucking trash do you have to be? It’s a floating luxury palace, I’m sure it has a helicopter aboard it. He’s in no rush, all the money in the world, and with the opportunity comes up to be a good person, he not only refused to help once, but repeatedly.

    The captain should be stripped of their license and he should be unable to own or operate a boat within American waters. Better yet, make him pay 250 million to park it in a US harbor, and spring it on him with the boat has no choice but to dock and refuel in the US.

  • acargitz@lemmy.ca
    14·
    9 天前

    In Victorian times fiction like Jules Verne’s novels and the like, rich yachtsmen saving the day is kind of a trope. What I’m trying to say is that the previous iteration of super rich fucks had some kind of heroic idea of themselves, some kind of noblesse oblige. These cunts are just cunts.

    • TBi@lemmy.world
      3·
      9 天前

      Probably the past ones are just fiction as well. Probably they always ignored pleas for help. But they paid for writers to say differently. Or just lied about it.

      • acargitz@lemmy.ca
        0·
        9 天前

        You’re right. And our ruling class can probably point out to the absolute amount of money they spend on their foundations of choice to say they are even more charitable than the Victorians. Ugh.

    • ForeverComical@lemmy.ca
      1·
      9 天前

      For some cases, actual noblesse were also the government and they lived among the people. They also took pride in the family image because it was political capital. It surely wasn’t perfect but it wasn’t as bad as the US and their glorified cupidity.

    • ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.worldEnglish
      0·
      9 天前

      Ah yes, the generation of super rich fucks who were happy to have children mangled in the machinery of their textile factories had “noblesse oblige.”

  • RidderSport@feddit.org
    11·
    9 天前

    As a sailor (the recreational kind and former Navy) I find this particularily vile. In my experience, all boats, whether large or small, cheap or expensive, recreational or commercial stop everything they are doing when there’s a distress call vaguely in their vicinity. At the very least everyone is turning up their radio to monitor what is happening and having dedicated personell whatching the seas for the distraught vessel or event. It is espescially true if you have the equipment, the men power, the time and the money to spare going above and beyond.

    In my oppinion aiding those in need at sea is the most basic and fundamental thing to do as a sailor. Those sailors that comply with orders not to help should never ever be allowed on a ship again. Despicable pieces of shit.

    • Jarix@lemmy.world
      1·
      8 天前

      Maybe we can tell some orcas to go play with that yacht…

      From the article, since many people in another post seem to be defending the yacht just because Zuckerberg wasn’t on board at the time

      “Our boat rescued a stranded vessel last night and apparently we did that after the Coast Guard radioed Mark Zuckerberg’s yacht – which was closer – and they repeatedly refused to respond. (There was near unanimous booing when the captain announced this).”

    • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zipEnglish
      1·
      9 天前

      So, you might know þe answer to þis: I’ve always believed þat it was illegal for captains to ignore distress signals at sea. Is þat not true?

              • RidderSport@feddit.org
                1·
                6 天前

                I can only comment on German law. Technically you could enforce national law. But then the crime would have to take place on a German vessel. Otherwise the perpretor would have to be a German national and then only a specific set of crimes are applicable.

                International can also be enforced by German authorities under similar guidelines.

                • Ŝan • 𐑖ƨɤ@piefed.zipEnglish
                  1·
                  5 天前

                  Germans can enforce German maritime laws in þeir waters, surely? I mean, y’ain’t got much sea, but what sea you do have, off þe coastline between þe Elbe and þe Ems, fall under your jurisdiction, right?

  • frustrated_phagocytosis@fedia.io
    9·
    10 天前

    Americans have been ignoring boats in distress for a while now, particularly after we bomb them into distress. Expect more to come because boat owners and assholes overlap quite a bit.

    • Peppycito@sh.itjust.works
      8·
      9 天前

      boat owners and assholes overlap quite a bit.

      I take issue with that. Like any good stereotype it has a certain level of truth but the marine community that I know is very welcoming and helpful. Being a yacht owner and being a boater are quite different things and having a boat doesn’t make you rich or an asshole.

      • Feathercrown@lemmy.worldEnglish
        1·
        9 天前

        Having a boat of any decent size is a very strong indicator that you’re rich, or at least upper middle class. Even a fairly well-off family like mine would consider a boat to be a serious expense, and it’s absolutely prohibitive for most of the population.

        • Peppycito@sh.itjust.works
          1·
          9 天前

          It’s the same as any hobby. I know lots of farmers who golf. Lots of carpenters have pools. Fishing is endemic in the trades and a lot of that happens in boats. I’d call these things the trappings of the middle class not the flamboyance of wealth. Boaters make a lot of sacrifices to have a boat but one good day on the water is enough to make a year of maintenance worthwhile.

          I make marine canvas and my customers are a broad representation of the classes. It’s one thing I love about my job, I’ll work for a doctor one day and a garbage man the next. Helping his boat look as good as the doctors is hugely rewarding. But the doctor doesn’t look down his nose at the beat up old boat, he asks the garbage man how the fish are biting and helps him dock.

          Boating depends on geography, and I’m in a very wet spot so there’s a boating culture among the unwashed.

          I will contend that there is probably a length of boat where the owner becomes a asshole upon purchase. Probably somewhere in the 40’~50’ range.

  • shweddy@lemmy.world
    9·
    9 天前

    $5 says there were kids on his boat

    I’ll rescind this when the impartial 3rd party investigation says otherwise

    • Fishnoodle@lemmy.world
      2·
      9 天前

      Exactly. The people running the government in the surveillance state shouldn’t get the presumption of innocence.

      They are public figures and not only that they have all of the resources to provide proof of any claims that they make.