• PugJesus@kbin.social
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    10 months ago

    Is all this bunker-building a sign the 1% know something we don’t

    No.

    and are preparing for end times?

    Yes.

    They fantasize constantly about their wealth becoming even more disproportionate to the general population - even if it, in absolute numbers, collapses. They crave more power over people, and are deluded enough to think that in a crisis scenario, their wealth will mean anything.

    • queermunist she/her@lemmy.ml
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      10 months ago

      Yeah these bunkers would just be the homes of warlords that kill billionaires - probably the heads of their own security teams.

      • Tolstoshev@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        I’ve heard floated the idea that they will try and stop this happening by having remote detonation collars on the families of their security team.

        • Peppycito@sh.itjust.works
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          10 months ago

          Who are the assholes who would take that job? “But Honey, I get weekends off and dental! Just put on the decapitation collar… Please?”

        • Literati@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          They could store the families in a separate underwater bunker built on the ruins of a death cult’s sunken wizard tower too.

    • Lowlee Kun@feddit.de
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      10 months ago

      I hope we still have some concrete during the apocolypse in order to seal those fuckers in.

    • zurohki@aussie.zone
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      10 months ago

      It’s cute that they think the society that supports them is going to continue to support them in their bunker and they only have to worry about attacks. What are they going to do when the plumbing breaks or the canned food runs out?

      • azertyfun@sh.itjust.works
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        10 months ago

        Is it? Is it? Short of an utter and complete societal collapse the likes of which we have basically never seen, history tells us the billionaires will emerge from any catastrophe with even greater wealth.

        During WWII the Nazis got their factories bombed to smithereens. Entire cities like Dresden got essentially wiped off the map. Can you guess what happened to the rich industrialists who benefitted from slave labor? That’s right, they came out of their bunkers and proceeded to become richer than ever and are still household names to this day. Oh, and of course while everyone was on food stamps/rations the rich were having lavish banquets.

        Capital is power, by definition. Instead of hoping for an apocalypse so bad all capital vanishes and even gold and land don’t hold any value, maybe we should focus on wealth distribution through democratic means.

    • RedWeasel@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      I don’t think I would personally like that if I were a billionaire. Would like to prove that either way though.

  • GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    Here is a silly take:

    The billionaires could use their doomsday bunker money to try and help solve the global issues we are having instead of just saying “fuck it I’m going underground.”

    • dangblingus@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      10 months ago

      It’s too late. The billionaires are well aware it’s far too late…

      The climate change and insane weather patterns that we’re experiencing are a byproduct of the carbon that was emitted into the atmosphere in the 1970s. That’s 50+ more years of carbon accumulation that we haven’t even really been able to measure. In another 50 years, the feedback loops will be very underway and the acidification of the oceans, the collapse of the AMOC, and massive heat domes will probably kill most people on Earth.

      • GoofSchmoofer@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        It may be too late to avoid the damage of excess carbon in the atmosphere but these fucks have enough resources and political connections to try and make the lives of us that will be very much negatively effected by all of this slight less shitty. Instead they double down on the only thing they know to do which is ‘fuck you I got mine’

  • Margot Robbie@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    The idea of a doomsday bunker being dumb and mostly pointless aside, a flammable moat is the best defense system they can come up with? In a doomsday scenario, why would someone waste precious good fuel to set a moat on fire for a few days? Instead of using, say, booby traps?

    And of course Yudkowsky, the writer of the world’s most boring Harry Potter fan fiction had to chime in with an even worse take.

  • Bobmighty@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    Doesn’t matter. They’re going to burn with the rest of us. They won’t be able to keep staff as it gets worse, and many of them lack any real ability to care for themselves. Pampered fucks are facing a grim future they made sure was going to happen.

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      The staff won’t keep them. What security guard is going to agree to protect Elon Musk after the apocalypse? They’ll shoot him in the back and take the keys to the kitchen.

      • njm1314@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        I mean you say this but our species has a long history of people serving authoritarian monsters. I think you’re vastly overestimating humans ability to say this is messed up I should do something about it. Most people just keep their heads down.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          Usually because those authoritarians have the power to kill them. Armed guards have the power to kill Elon.

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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              10 months ago

              By holding the purse strings (the economy will have collapsed) and by making the laws (which won’t exist anymore).

              Also, I think you underestimate the loyalty of a paid security staff when they stop getting paid.

      • APassenger@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        These things have been thought through. The money may be worthless, but the highly controlled access to food, guns, ammo and medicine would be adequate leverage.

        I expect, at some point, a leader would emerge with more cred than, "I started a company, " but they’d need to get permanent access and they’d have the same problem: control, rationing.

        All this stuff is just people fantasizing about being smart and solving hard problems. The truest hard problem is we are not meant to live alone or like Morlocks.

        There are ways to have a retreat hidden in plain site.

    • CitizenKong@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Yeah, once the global economy collapses, their billions are worthless and the people with the guns are the most powerful. How long until their private security force is like “hold on, why are we following you again?”

      • Corkyskog@sh.itjust.works
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        10 months ago

        You section off the food and booze, so that only you can access it and then have two security teams that never intermingle. Nothings guaranteed, but it would be harder to coup you.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          I’m not sure what never intermingling will help with. I doubt they’d shoot at each other when they know that if they do the prisoner’s dilemma thing and both kill the billionaire to get to the booze and food and then they can share it.

    • Illuminostro@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      There was an article where a reporter sat in on a discussion between Tech Lords, where one actually proposed shock collars on “The Staff” to keep them loyal.

      “The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew. Or making guards wear disciplinary collars of some kind in return for their survival. Or maybe building robots to serve as guards and workers – if that technology could be developed “in time.”"

      https://www.theguardian.com/news/2022/sep/04/super-rich-prepper-bunkers-apocalypse-survival-richest-rushkoff

      Time to start building guillotines, boys and girls.

      • Saledovil@sh.itjust.works
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        10 months ago

        I feel like shooting fish in a barrel:

        The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew.

        That would just get them tortured. While torture is normally not a good way to get information, it’s different when the obtained intel can be immediately verified by trying the combination. The lock could be set up in such a way that it jams when you enter it wrong, but its unlikely that the torturers will just give up at this point. More likely, they’ll keep going in hope that you have a way to circumvent the lockdown.

        Or making guards wear disciplinary collars of some kind in return for their survival.

        Thing is, there’d be two ways the collars can fail. They can go off when they shouldn’t, or fail to go off when they should. Both can be exploited by an attacker, and guarding against one makes the other more likely.

        Time to start building guillotines, boys and girls.

        That’s a good idea.

  • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    I say we convince them society is collapsing, let them hide in their bunkers, wait for the flaming moat fuel to run out, then wall them in.

    • RagingSnarkasm@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      No need for a wall, just grade over it all with some bulldozers, plant some trees, and make a park where my dog can have a nice place to shit while I read a book.

        • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          Pour concrete down the ventilation shafts before making the park. They won’t realize what’s happened until they’re too oxygen deprived to do anything except panic for a few minutes and then asphyxiate.

        • masquenox@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          How? There will be no working class down there to wipe their arsses for them, never mind dig for them.

          • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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            10 months ago

            Doesn’t hurt to make sure. You put the soil over the wall and still have a very nice park.

            Anyway, don’t you think it’s about time we did the real-life version of The Cask of Amontillado?

  • Fedizen@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    bunkers are terrible in general because of air/exhaust problems. If you know where they are you can just tape all the vents shut. What they should be investing in is submersibles.

    Either way this a grotesque squandering of society’s resources.

  • Crismus@lemmynsfw.com
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    10 months ago

    Funny how that if collapse happens, only their security guards will be enjoying those bunkers.

    • TherouxSonfeir@lemm.ee
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      10 months ago

      Oh yeah he wouldn’t last a day if I was on the property. Thanks for the bunker Zuckie

      • fidodo@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        Here’s an article about that

        But how would he pay the guards once even his crypto was worthless? What would stop the guards from eventually choosing their own leader?

        The billionaires considered using special combination locks on the food supply that only they knew. Or making guards wear disciplinary collars of some kind in return for their survival. Or maybe building robots to serve as guards and workers – if that technology could be developed “in time”.

        • AquaTofana@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          “Disciplinary collars”. JFC, that’s some Cyberpunk 2077 bullshit right there.

          How fucking appalling that anyone other than a fantasy writer trying to create a dystopia hellscape would even float that idea as reasonable.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          Or maybe building robots to serve as guards and workers – if that technology could be developed “in time”.

          This is how you can tell they’ve seriously thought things through and definitely have a good plan.

        • AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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          10 months ago

          You can also find articles about one prepper that raided another prepper’s bunker, and killed the dudes daughter, in an attempt to take the other guy’s bunker. Another dude killed his entire family, and tried to hide in their bunker. It’s not just the ultra rich, and they’ll get raided by rightwing doomsday nutjobs as well.

          Christ predicted the end of the world in the 1st century, and these god of war worshippers have been predicting “the end of the world” ever since.

          The craziest part it that The Baha’is have a pretty good argument that the world ended in the mid 1800’s. The old world did anyway. How many horses do you deal with on a daily basis? Have you managed to travel more than 10-20 miles from your birthplace? Do you happen to have access to the sum total of human knowledge, available in your hand?

          That world is already over. Biblical Scholars are also pretty sure that the events described in Revelations, were talking about things that were supposed to have happened in the 1st or 2nd century.

          • fidodo@lemmy.world
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            10 months ago

            The core premise is ridiculous. They’re trying to survive an apocalypse in luxury using technology, but maintaining our level of technological luxury requires a global supply chain. The author is right, the best way to survive would be to establish a community that helps and protects each other.

          • Fedizen@lemmy.world
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            10 months ago

            more fucked really. If the government collapses the #1 thing Elon Musk knows how to do is suck the G-man’s teat. The second the government has better things todo the guy is a dying cow surrounded by vultures.

      • butterflyattack@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        I suspect they’re looking into ways to keep their staff loyal, they’ll be considering things like controlling the supply of an addictive drug, implanting behaviour modification chips in their brains, explosive collars, holding their kids hostage. Shit like that. Because why else would anyone be loyal to these vermin?

          • Illuminostro@lemmy.world
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            10 months ago

            I think the main reason he’s into Neuralink is because he hopes to be able to transfer his consciousness into one of his brood, or into a machine. 1950’s immortality hyper-nerd shit.

  • Son_of_dad@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    I told you guys. I’ve been waiting for you guys to catch up for ages, so we can go drag these fucks out of their homes, now they’ve gone and built moats

    • DannyMac@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      The good thing is that these moats need fuel to work which means they’ll eventually stop burning.

        • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
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          10 months ago

          Can also stop any invading group of goblins if you create a lava waterfall, or a couple of lava dams to let loose at the flick of a switch

      • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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        10 months ago

        An enterprising person could siphon off the fuel to power their own survival and leave the paranoid billionaire without as much protection.

  • Mycatiskai@lemmy.ca
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    10 months ago

    This is the best case scenario.

    1. We the under classes scare them into their bunkers.

    2. We cut off all forms of communication with them.

    3. We seal them in so they can’t change their minds.

    4. We switch the rules to “Socialize the profits and privatize the losses.”

    There is only so many in the .0001% that need to be taken off the board and left to play with their toys inside their gilded cages. If they go voluntarily then how can they say that it is wrong, especially if no one is listening.

    • NegativeInf@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Congrats, you won capitalism. Please proceed to the winners bunker for your prize. Non-compliance will be met with dinner forks.

    • EnderMB@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      Surely we can switch up point 2 and use AI as their sole communicator. Let them think they’re speaking to real people, but isolate them from the society that they think they control.

  • idiomaddict@feddit.de
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    10 months ago

    Podcaster Christina Randall, who has over 1.58 million subscribers, thinks so. Randall recently observed that Zuckerberg’s reported bunker is one of approximately 15 end-of-days projects being undertaken by billionaires worldwide and said the Biblical Book of Revelation, which predicts the end of the world, is being fulfilled. “Revelation 6:15 says that the kings of the Earth, the princes, the generals, the rich, the mighty and every slave and every free man hid in caves and among the rocks of the mountains,” Randall said.

    Okay, the guardian

    • EatATaco@lemm.ee
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      10 months ago

      Lol I came here to comment the same thing. What a fucking joke. Has the guardian always been so trashy? I don’t recall it.

  • masquenox@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    This just proves how capitalism rewards the inanely stupid - these parasites cosplaying as doomsday preppers (who already are not known for their firm grip on reality) don’t realize that any event which would cause them to need such a bunker would also most likely destroy the very thing that attributes any kind of value to the power-coupons they’ve been hoarding - ie, the economy that only exists thanks to the working class.

    Also, good luck to them when the well-armed rent-a-goons they hired to protect their little bunkers finds out the money they are being paid is all of a sudden completely worthless and that the governments that guaranteed private property rights is no longer around to protect them from the very same well-armed rent-a-goons. It would be a shame if nobody was around to film the anarcho-capitalist comedy that would ensue…

    • I Cast Fist@programming.dev
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      10 months ago

      Naaaaaaaaaniiiiiiii?? You’re telling me the people with guns will call the shots in an apocalyptic event because money will lose its value??? IMPOSSIBRU!!!

  • 🔰Hurling⚜️Durling🔱@lemmy.world
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    10 months ago

    I love how they think we’re going to try to break in and hurt them. We really are just going to entomb them in their bunkers and seal off any intake and exhaust.

    If we as a species survives the climate collapse and finds a way to flourish again, archeologists will find these bunkers and think they where built by slaves to celebrate their rulling pharaohs.

    Oh, and billionares getting bunkers is a new trend? Bill Gates has had one since he was CEO of Microsoft and HE was following the trend already.

    • SoupBrick@yiffit.net
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      10 months ago

      Naw, they have wealth of supplies in there, may as well get some construction equipment and break in.

    • m13@lemmy.world
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      10 months ago

      This is true. We will entomb them.

      Even if the world does turn to absolute shit and many of us die, it’s the not the billionaires in their bunkers who will the last ones standing.

      If there’s any hope at all it will be with the remaining pockets of communities outside who learn to abolish capitalism and just live and support each other in a sustainable way. No one can survive long alone.

      Any billionaire in their bunker will be entombed, and if they come out they’ll just get lynched.

  • kent_eh@lemmy.ca
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    10 months ago

    It’s a sign that they’re paranoid as fuck and never learned to share or play nicely with others.