Several friends of mine used to all work at a company that provided concierge services for high end credit card customers. As you say, really rich folks aren’t researching things. They’re calling a concierge to arrange things for them. They assume that if they want to eat at a certain restaurant, or see a certain show, they can pick up a phone and someone will make it happen. And it’s the concierge company’s job to set aside tickets and reservations at the most in-demand restaurants and shows just in case Richie Rich calls.
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I suspect that the even richer folk who bought “The Most Dangerous Game” Package were equally disappointed with the prey.
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I heart your post. this is good business sense, have two bites of the cherries.
:hattip:
set fire to the undergrowth ( or tents, in this case ) flush them out.
Now see, I’d call the “merely” wealthy quite privileged. Maybe not at the height of it, maybe not the most demanding - but we’re also talking about young people who simply might not have learned how to deal with situations that fall below their expectations, yet.
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I signed up for the “Criminal Camp” package where I went through a brief workshop on pick-pocketing and was then provided with actors to try my new skill on.
I was told to return all the wallets in a big box when I was done so they could sanitize them and reuse for the next group.
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I really don’t get it.
Yea, rich kids do something stupid. They get beaten by security, have the stuff stolen, spend the night in dnagerous circumstances… and people on-line think this is funny.
I really, truly, don’t get it. In my estimation the line between schadenfreude and victim blaming should not be that thin…
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Sure and no doubt these thing are graduated, my life of living as a working man in Auckland, New Zealand is quite privileged, compared to my copies life in Ivory Coast, I expect.
The extreme privilege I was talking about though, was like the owner of one of the boats berthed beside one I worked on in France.
He liked to ride his bike, early of a morning. Flunky held it for him to mount, two other flunkies, one with a nice jacket that would stop a pistol bullet, rode behind him.
Chase car with three men of a “We killed all of them, sir, just to be sure” disposition followed. Light van followed them, so if it suited owner to stop somewhere for a coffee, flunky held his bike for a moment, light van pulled up, put bike in back, drove around the block to a parking spot, left engine running for when they got the nod, drove up gave bike to flunky to hold, owner steps on, procession proceeds to next stop. Back at vessel, TWO flunkies help him to dismount, then ostentatiously wash and groom bike for next time.
The armed men he was always surrounded by failed to stop whoever shot him to death one morning, as he sat on his toilet though. 
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Wow.
As much as I’m not a fan of elitism and ostentatious excess, this scam sounds horrific (although the comparison to Lord of the Flies just might be a little hyperbolic.)
As the disparity between the ‘haves’ and the ‘havenots’ increases exponentially, I sadly expect there to be more disturbing scenarios like this one, where masses of clueless ‘people of privilege’ are targeted for a setup.
That the story reads like an overly melodramatic movie is doubly disturbing; for once, I feel no sense of schadenfreude, only a deep sense of foreboding …
Sign o’ the times.
O_O
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Me too. I want to be able to laugh about it without a hint of guilt.
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The thing is, while this keeps getting pegged as a “$12k per ticket” scam – and it was, for some – the normal passes started at $1595, which included a chartered flight on a customized airplane, “luxury” accommodations, all of your food, and two days’ worth of concerts. That’s pricey, but consider that festivals like Coachella cost upwards of $400 just for tickets… heck, my local Boston Calling festival, which is just at an amphitheater at Harvard, costs $270-$500 just to get in. Add in the costs of a ‘charter flight’, a hotel, food, etc, and $1500 isn’t a crazy price by any means.
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Yes, incidents like this are a warning sign. But no, I can’t muster up a lot of sympathy for an adult who dropped $4000 on this aspiration-exploiting scam. That doesn’t make Ja Rule and the incompetents and confidence artists who duped the victims any less bent, but I’ll save my sympathy and larger societal concerns for someone who’s forced to sign a one-sided EULA in order to make use of a mobile phone or someone who’s forced to sign away his right to sue in order to open a bank account.
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What an appropriate metaphor for the times we live in that a bunch of rich tech and celebrity types paid way too much money to accidentally take part in the 76th hunger games, because they weren’t able to consider the fact that they could fail or that things could go wrong.
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It looks like some shyster went to Burning Man, and asked themselves, “what might this look like, if no one had to bring their own (or anyone elses) food, shelter, or art? Except surrounded by water instead of desert? And then we could sell turnkey camp tickets? , That sounds like fun!”
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Yes, This is where I lose the train. Certainly these people got conned. But some posts make it sound apocalyptic. They are in the Bahamas, a relativey safe country, focused on tourism, where people speak English and accept USD. It should be pretty easy for a US tourist to walk to another hotel, hail a cab, go to a restaurant, or enjoy a beach.
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When your wallet, passport, and money have all been stolen, as some are reporting, ‘enjoying the beach’ or heading over to Sandals isn’t exactly going to be top of mind.
From the sound of things, the festival is trying to get people out of there and back on flights as their first priority, and until then, there’s very little food to go around and people are sheltered in FEMA tents. If I was in that situation, even with some money, I wouldn’t really want to party.
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The apparent assumption that everyone in attendance was somehow “ballin’ out of control” is part of the issue with a very problematic situation.
One of my first thoughts was about the poor schmucks who were working this event, not to mention any ‘less affluent’ attendees who might have saved up all their rainy day pennies just to attend a “lavish once-in-a-lifetime experience.”
Talk about a nightmare.
See the paragraph above.
Remember Jason Chaffetz’ ignorant ass comment about iphones, which showed his biased perception about other (poorer) people’s ‘lifestyle choices?’
Same thing here, I can’t assume that just because someone bought a pricey concert ticket that they don’t ‘deserve’ any sympathy for being fucked over and needlessly put in harm’s way.
Not that I’m saying “won’t someone think of the rich people?” or that anyone should feel any particular kind of way about this story; like I said, above all I find it very disturbing, especially amid all the over-the-top ‘crazy’ that’s been afflicting society as of late.
Ja Rule?!?!
Oh FFS; that should have been a major warning sign, right there…
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I think I’d agree with you (and, to be clear, getting scammed like this regardless of cost sucks), but, reading people asking for government intervention when they’re a few minutes walk from a nearby resort? That brings it out of “actual or perceived peril” and into “OMG real world for the first time” schadenfreude for me.
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Sure, but that kind of crap happens in the Bahamas all the time. I’ve been there less than a handful of times and regardless of method of travel (packaged tour once, plane and my own accommodations once, cruise once), they all warned not to leave your important shit anywhere public or accessible.
The Bahamas, like most small, tourist-powered nations, has a definite undercurrent of unsavoury folk looking to prey on tourists. I humbly submit this entire episode as exhibit A of why one should never assume they’re safe and everything is fine in a foreign environment. Always keep your important shit close at hand and exercise heightened vigilance at all times.
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That’s just Bob. He’s cool. He likes ham and cheese sandwiches.
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Seen on Facebook:
Trump Has Banned all Refugees coming from Festival Frye Festival 2017
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