#death tourism

[prokopetz]

"Private submarine carrying several billionaire tourists goes missing while surveying the wreckage of the Titanic."

Well, it had to happen eventually. This is where big-ticket extreme tourism and shooting untrained assholes into space and such was always going to lead – frankly, it's surprising that it took this long for a major incident to crop up.

"One of the missing passengers is the president and CEO of the company that owns and operates the submarine."

Huh. Well, points for putting his money where his mouth is, I guess. I wonder if–

"The missing CEO's name is Stockton Rush."

Oh, bullshit. That's not a real person – that's the name of a guy who builds an inexplicably 1950s-themed underwater theme park and then gets eaten by a shark in a cautionary tale about the perils of libertarianism. That's the name of a guy who carries off an oceanfront real estate scam that somehow ends with Superman fighting a telepathic squid. Fucking "Stockton Rush". Unbelievable.

[oodlesodoodles]

I couldnt finish. Got too sad.

[lambentplume]

Maui Fires & How to Support Relief Efforts

(Posted on 8/10/23) Hi, I'm Jae and my family is from Lāhainā. I watched my hometown burn down this week. The fires caused immeasurable loss in my community so I'd like to spread awareness of the situation as well as provide links to support local organizations directly assisting survivors. I'm pretty sure most of my following is Not local so I'm writing with intent to inform people outside the situation, but if you're reading this and happen to have family in the affected area that isn't accounted for, message me and I can send you the links to the missing persons tracking docs + more localized info!! If you'd like to skip down to how to help and follow community organizations, scroll to the bottom of the post after the image.

Earlier this week, Hurricane Dora passed south of the Hawaiian Islands, bringing strong wind gusts that caused property damage across the islands. On Tuesday August 8, high winds caused sparks to fly in the middle of Lāhainā town, knocking out power lines and immediately igniting drought-ridden grasses. The fire spread quickly and destroyed the entire center of town, the harbor, and multiple neighborhoods including Hawaiian Homes (housing specifically for Native Hawaiians), parts of Lahainaluna, basically all of Front Street, and low-income housing units. There is only one public road in and out of town, and after a very hectic evacuation period that road has been mostly closed off except to emergency responders, thus it is extremely difficult for anyone to leave town to get help. The nearest hospital is 20 miles away in Wailuku, and most grocery stores in town have burnt down.

As of Thursday, August 10, over 1,000 acres have been burned and 271 structures (including homes, schools, and other community gathering places) have been destroyed. Cell service is still extremely spotty, many of the surrounding neighborhoods deemed safe for evacuees are still without utilities. There are currently confirmed 53 deaths but that number is expected to increase as search-and-rescue efforts continue. Countless families have been displaced and many have lost the homes they lived in for generations. Places of deep historical significance have been reduced to ash, including the gravesites of Hawaiian royalty, the old Lāhainā courthouse where items of cultural significance were stored, and Na ‘Aikane o Maui Cultural Center. To add further context: Lāhainā has a population of about 13,000 residents. EVERYONE I know has been impacted in some way--at best forced to evacuate, at worst their house was burnt to the foundation, they cannot find a loved one, etc. I'm still trying to track down family members and it's been over two days. My neighbors down the street had homes last week and now many don't have ANYTHING. The hotels are taking in residents (tourists are also being STRONGLY urged to leave so that locals can recover). Without open access to the rest of the island, Lāhainā residents are now dependent on whatever people had in their homes already as well as disaster relief efforts coming in, but it's been difficult to organize and mobilize due to the location + conditions. People who have made it out are in shelters where no blankets or medicine were provided. Friends and acquaintances from neighbor islands are preparing aid to send over. Community response has been incredible, but the toll on the town has been immeasurable. My parents were desperately walking through town yesterday, my mom sounded absolutely hollow talking about it on the phone with me. It's horrifying. Below is a satellite map with data from the NASA Fire Information for Resource Management System showing the impacted areas from the past week; all of the red blotches were on fire at some point in the last three days.

Here are ways you can help:

If you have the means to donate:

Here are three donation sites verified by Maui Rapid Response, which also lists FAQs for people who are wondering about next steps.

Hawaiʻi Community Foundation - Maui Strong Fund accepts international credit cards. Maui United Way

Maui Mutual Aid Non-monetary ways to support:

If you know anyone who is planning to travel to ANY Hawaiian island, not just Maui, tell them to cancel their trip. Resources are extremely limited as is. Advocate for climate change mitigation efforts locally, wherever that is for you. The fire was exacerbated by drought conditions that have worsened due to climate change.

Lastly, remember that these are people's HOMES that burned, and Native Hawaiian cultural artifacts that have been lost. Stop thinking of Hawaiʻi (or any "tourist destination" location, really) as an "escape" or a "paradise." If that's the only way you recognized my home... I'm glad I got your attention somehow, but I would ask that you challenge that perspective and prioritize local and native voices. For transparency, I don't currently live in Lāhainā, I've been following efforts from Honolulu. My parents and brother have been updating me and I've been following friends and family who are doing immediate response work. I'm doing my best to find reliable and current sources, but if I need to update something, please let me know. If you're going to try to convince me that tourism is necessary for our recovery, news flash ***IT'S NOT***!

Thanks for reading.

[ladymidnytemare]

Spent this weekend re editing my photographs from the Paris Catacombs, taken October 31st 2018

[fallbabylon]

Bills of mortality- South Newington church Oxfordshire, UK

[mon-ster-chen]

So what you are waiting for 🏜

[listen-to-the-inner-walrus]

now that oceangate have stated they believe those in the submersible are dead, can we please not make posts talking about how the ghosts of all the third-class passengers killed the millionaires on board?

like yes, its a poetic idea, but those passengers you claim to be vengeful ghosts were real people. not only is it likely disrespectful on religious grounds because fun fact, not everone on titanic were white westerners, but it is also just fucking disrespectful to create ghost stories about real people who died during a tragedy.

the titanic tragedy was a real thing that happened; the people who died were real people. unfortunately, its one of, if not the most romanticised shipwreck where many real life people have mischaracterised for so long that this is how we now remember them. i mean look at j bruce ismay who wasnt the money-hungry, corner-cutting, evil man hes been made out to be.

how about we not mischaracterise any more folks? and we not create ghost stories about the real people who died?

its really not that difficult to show compassion and respect to the dead.

[cultofweirdthings]

Explore these 8 crypts, catacombs, and bone churches you have see before you become part of the display.

[diapasondame]

Stede voice from episode 1: good luck with your fishing!

Me now, knowing Ed wants to run away to be a fisherman: ;_;

[sailforvalinor]

OC Mundane Tag Game

Tagged again by @accidental-spice--thanks for the tag!

Rules: Pick an OC you'd like to talk about and answer the questions for them! Then tag ten people, or as many as you can. 'Underdeveloped character I adopted' is fine, too! Absolutely no pressure to play, though

Also, if some of it can't apply to your OCs, just answer what would be the answer-- like if they're in a historical setting, they likely can't watch movies, but what is a movie they'd like?

(Also, most people have many ocs, so feel free to retag people and answer as many times as you get tagged! Or get really wild and just answer for as many ocs as you'd like! :D)

Since I talked about Ace last time, it's only fair that I talk about Joker :D

1. What is their favorite movie?

I feel like Joker's taste in movies is pretty eclectic (especially as she has all of time and space to draw on!), but the first thing that came to mind was White Christmas (the dance numbers!) and Hitchcock's To Catch a Thief (she idolizes Grace Kelly). I do associate her quite a bit with that classic Hollywood era, but I find I haven't actually watched a ton of them? If anyone has suggestions, I will gladly take them.

2. What is their favorite season?

Most definitely spring--beauty, rebirth, gorgeous flowers, etc etc. Actually, Ace's favorite being winter and hers being spring is pretty fitting, now that I think about it.

3. What do they find annoying?

People with a lack of imagination, when people don't appreciate things she's enthusiastic about, when she can't find the perfect outfit, bad hair days.

4. How would they like to spend their Christmas or equivalent holiday?

She really would love anything as long as she's not celebrating alone--she has done some pretty spectacular things on her hundreds of Christmases past (sneaking into one of Queen Victoria's Christmas parties, going ice skating on a planet of ice palaces, visiting the Christmas Theme Park that Australia built on the moon in 3489 that only lasted a year (turns out it was because of her, actually), but she mostly does these sorts of things to distract herself from how lonely she is, as Christmas is a pretty family-oriented holiday and that's when she feels it most acutely. Needless to say, her Christmases become much lovelier with Ace around.

5. Do they play an instrument? If so, what? How good are they at it?

I imagine she's probably collected almost every instrument imaginable, and can at least make most of them make sound, but she only really plays acoustic guitar (specifically really finger-plucky stuff) and probably a bit of piano. She also sings, and unlike Ace, has no qualms about doing so whenever the mood strikes. And sometimes it strikes at odd times.

6. What's their favorite meal to eat?

Ooh, this one is hard. I feel like she would be one to be constantly excited about trying different kinds of food--but as for a favorite of hers, the first thing that comes to mind is tiramisu for some reason. There is also always a hot pot of tea in her TARDIS without exception.

7. Do they have a favorite video game or board game?

Joker does strike me as a video game girl--I can see her being a Final Fantasy/Kingdom Hearts fan (and unlike all of us, she actually has the time on her hands to play every Final Fantasy game, lol). As for board games, I think she would probably like Life, as well as some of those newer fantasy games with a ton of worldbuilding like Scythe. Of course, she probably never played them much up until she met Ace, as playing board games against an AI avatar gets boring very fast. She's also so bad at chess that the first time she played with Ace, he was dead convinced that she had let him win.

8. Do they celebrate their birthday?

Poor Joker is an amnesiac--she has no memory of who she is or where she came from, and only knows the simple fact that she is a Time Lord, and her first memory was floating in the vacuum of space-time as a child in her TARDIS. (I'm not even sure that she knows about the Time War. It's difficult to believe that she wouldn't have heard about it after so much time, so she probably knows...?) Thus she has no idea when her birthday is, so she just picked a random day and celebrated it in much the same fashion as she does Christmas. After she meets Ace, she usually convinces him to take her out dancing (which, to his credit, doesn't usually take too much persuading).

9. What's their bedtime routine?

Do Time Lords sleep? I've been getting conflicting answers about this. I'm gonna go with "sometimes," and in those cases, pretty nightdress, cup of tea, usually plays music.

10. What's an OC (or canon character) they like to spend time around? What do they tend to do together?

Ace is the first person she has ever truly connected with beyond the surface-level, despite their very disparate personalities. I don't want to give too much away too early, but what I will say is that initially, Joker views Ace a little bit like a project, and he views her as a character stepped straight out of a fairy story who is too otherworldly to be real and must have some secret agenda for bringing him with her, and thus distrusts her, but they slowly but surely overcome this rockiness. She sees something in Ace that he refuses to see in himself—but I really can’t say more without spoiling things. Joker is very verbally affectionate, often referring to Ace as “my Ace” or “darling.” He makes a very noble effort to hide how flustered he is by this.

As for what they do together, they of course have their time-traveling adventures (and sometimes run into the Doctor and his companions). I'd say they're a bit more like tourists than the Doctor and Rose are, they tend to go to different times and places with the intent of exploring and sightseeing and their adventures are rarely, if ever, premeditated. Also, as I mentioned earlier, they love to go out dancing--the Doctor and Rose are half-convinced that they're just on a dance tour of the universe, as 50% of the time they run into them, they're checking out the local social dancing scene.

Also, I mentioned this in my post about Ace, but Joker loves introducing him to movies, tv shows, music, and other kinds of media that he missed out on in his time. In return, Ace reads aloud to her a lot--it sort of began out of his frustration that she constantly leaves half-read books around and forgets to finish them, but then it just kind of became a habit.

Tagging @o-lei-o-lai-o-lord @rainintheevening @novelmonger @mythicalartisttm and anyone else who has oc's they'd like to talk about!

[aphantpoet]

I don't care for the met gala

it's a rich person game

played by the people with wealth and with fame

to waste on pretty dresses and parties and champagne

and ignore the cries, the bombs and the pain.

Raffah's being bombed

millions displaced

By fools and by children playing for face.

Congo's enslaved

they make and they break

work all day for the people who take.

trans rights are missing

with them goes beauty

Goes laughter and love and all that is true to me.

Students arrested

they empathy mocked

Hope the schools are ready when history knocks.

Sudan is at war

Hawaii occupied

And Indigenous peoples hated

No matter what we try. 

A garden of time

The theme for the met

in looking for beauty

They seem to forget

the crystalline flowers

few and far between

One day run out

No shine to be seen.

the mob they are coming

they're just at the gate.

dance Countess drink

There's no escaping fate.

The flames will be watered

the stories are told

though dead lay slaughtered

the people are bold.

They're coming, my lordship

By the end of this line

you've ran out of time. 

They’re at the front door now

Look and you’ll see

Your haven  is trampled

So the people are free. 

[gay-jewish-bucky]

i have so many thoughts on disaster tourism...

[milf-harrington]

living in a tourist town means that once a year we're all like "fUCKING TOURISTS-" but at the same time its like *pained smile* "thank you so much for coming and preventing our town from dying a slow and painful death <3"

[shodansbabygirl]

it is probably easier for me to make jokes about the submersible shit because i am under the wholehearted assumption that they imploded >72 hours ago. like i just believe that.

[minglana]

death and violence

[girlbob-boypants]

"So you think it's funny those people are going to die horrible deaths?"

Yes? A group of people who became ridiculously rich by exploiting poor people paid enough money to save lives all so they could take part in some sick voyeurism of a tragedy that killed over a thousand people. And they did it while eagerly getting inside a tube with a cheap camp lantern and a Logitech controller to drive them.

I'm not wasting an ounce of compassion on those people. Not with everything that's going on. Those buyers got exactly what they paid for and we should send more billionaires to join them.