Frederico Machuca
Noted Pervert 🧄Boobs.
(edit: improved post)
Uptime: ∞@bean Pretty sure their idea of fun and yours are completely different. You have fun by seeing someone smile. They have fun by seeing someone suffer. If they had fun the way you want to have fun, they probably wouldn't be billionaires.
betalars 
@home
Justin ⏚
Paul BarnfatherAnd they're always so miserable!! 🤷♂️
I have no interest in that kind of money (and heck, I'm not the life and soul of the party either), but if I /did/ have that kind of money, every day would be absolutely frickin' hilarious. In my head, it'd be like KLF media stunt day. Without the boundaries 🤪
I have no interest in that kind of money (and heck, I'm not the life and soul of the party either), but if I /did/ have that kind of money, every day would be absolutely frickin' hilarious. In my head, it'd be like KLF media stunt day. Without the boundaries 🤪
The Wolf of South End@clanger9 A long time ago…like maybe even 2010, i saw a meme that said something like “i dont want to be rich, i just want to not have to worry when the check engine light comes on on my car”.
Oh 💯this!
I never heard that before, but yes absolutely 👍
I never heard that before, but yes absolutely 👍
dwardoric
Roger Moore@clanger9
I think the only way to get that kind of money (other than inheriting it or getting it in a divorce settlement, or something) is to be a humorless, money-driven monomaniac. It's basically a personality disorder, but our society celebrates it instead of treating it as a serious problem, both for the sufferer and society as a whole.
I think the only way to get that kind of money (other than inheriting it or getting it in a divorce settlement, or something) is to be a humorless, money-driven monomaniac. It's basically a personality disorder, but our society celebrates it instead of treating it as a serious problem, both for the sufferer and society as a whole.
Alan Langford 🇨🇦🧤🧊摏@VATVSLPR @clanger9 Back in the early days of Microsoft, there were a lot of folks who got in early, saw their stocks make them rich, cashed out and retired early (we called them Microsoft Millionaires), used the money to build a nice house and then sit on the rest of the cash, living off the interest, slowly working the principal down. At the time their wisdom eluded me.
So it's possible without being obsessive, but we never hear about them.
@alan @clanger9
Those people aren't billionaires, though, which is exactly the point. People who want to do fun things with their money tend to stop obsessively accumulating more when they get enough to do whatever it is they think of as fun. It's only people who think getting the money is the interesting part who keep grinding for more when they already have way more than they and their descendants will ever need.
Those people aren't billionaires, though, which is exactly the point. People who want to do fun things with their money tend to stop obsessively accumulating more when they get enough to do whatever it is they think of as fun. It's only people who think getting the money is the interesting part who keep grinding for more when they already have way more than they and their descendants will ever need.
neotoy@VATVSLPR @alan @clanger9 I would argue that trying to "understand" billionaires in the conventional sense is futile. These are people with a severe and exotic mental illness that society largely refuses to address or treat because capitalism relentlessly and forcibly conditions people to view limitless currency accumulation as unconditionally good and healthy.
FranksAgain
argonaut@bean so empty they instead have to absorb the lives of those around them to feel like they’re breaking even.
as Joseph Heller famously said when Kurt Vonnegut pointed out that the billionaire throwing the party they were at, had likely made more money in one day than Heller's famous novel, Catch-22, had earned in its entire history: “I have something they will never have: enough”
Will Deakin@argonaut @wirbelkoepfe a poem in memory of Joseph Heller
"Joe Heller
True story, Word of Honor:
Joseph Heller, an important and funny writer
now dead,
and I were at a party given by a billionaire
on Shelter Island.
I said, “Joe, how does it make you feel
to know that our host only yesterday
may have made more money
than your novel ‘Catch-22’
has earned in its entire history?”
1/n
@argonaut @wirbelkoepfe "And Joe said, “I’ve got something he can never have.”
And I said, “What on earth could that be, Joe?”
And Joe said, “The knowledge that I’ve got enough.”
Not bad! Rest in peace!”
— Kurt Vonnegut
The New Yorker, May 16th, 2005
Source: https://medium.com/@bobsutton/kurt-vonnegut-joe-heller-and-a-thanksgiving-message-8a31ca397888
@argonaut @wirbelkoepfe both Heller and Vonnegut were important to me as authors when I was growing up.
So it goes....
3/n
bstow
Juha Autero
BartyDeCanter@bean The local eccentric rich guy in the small town I grew up in did some things like that. He got a license and learned how to do a great fireworks show every year, and a cool light display for Christmas. Got his pilots license and would fly banners for the city and local events. Donated heavily to local charities and volunteered at them. Of course, he was small town rich, not billionaire rich.
Kadin@BartyDeCanter @bean I suspect there's a difference, in that you can be small-town rich and still be part of the community; modern tech-bro billionaires... aren't. The only community they're part of is made of up of other obnoxious billionaires.
I don't know if I'll live to see it, but someday they're going to learn that while they may not care about the opinions of the little people, those people have strong opinions about them, and not even Louis XVI could afford not to care about that.
@Kadin2048 @bean That’s exactly it. He grew up in the community, went to the same public school as everyone else, and lived there his whole life. His money was an inheritance, and everyone knew he was the rich kid growing up, but it wasn’t so much that he was completely isolated from everyone.
Colin McMillen@bean Good persons don't become billionaires
Dr Suzanne she/her
Johan Pelck Olsen@colin_mcmillen @bean At the very least they don’t stay billionaires
Mre. Dartigen [maker mode]@bean Hell, fund random research scientists because you got bored and were scrolling a science news site. Or fund stuff that sounds like classical mad scientist avenues but is like, actually happening, for the hell of it. (Or in areas that you wish you had the chops to be doing that research in, but you don't so you're choosing to live vicariously by funding it instead.)
I would've wanted to keep funding mRNA research just to piss off the people who wanted it stopped. And if they started trying to call.me a super villain obviously I'd have to find a stylist and tailor to make sure I look the part.
apophis
Vio
Carl
Owlor 
@bean It's definitely not the most important thing they could do with the money, but what really gets me about billionaires is the lack of drip. Like, you have all the money in the world and you can't find a better thing to wear than a plain hoodie?
It basically falls under the "commission some artist" category, you could order a custom outfit and spend every day cosplaying as your own anime OC.
Elton John doesn't have nearly the same amount of money and he can afford to have a seemingly endless supply of cool glasses.
@Owlor @bean
The dumb hoodie thing is aping Steve Jobs. Jobs reputedly decided to save time thinking about clothes by standardizing on a single outfit that he'd wear everyday. It became part of his mystique that has been endlessly copied by wannabes. "See, I'm so single minded about my business, I've given up thinking about clothes! Just like Steve Jobs!!!"
The dumb hoodie thing is aping Steve Jobs. Jobs reputedly decided to save time thinking about clothes by standardizing on a single outfit that he'd wear everyday. It became part of his mystique that has been endlessly copied by wannabes. "See, I'm so single minded about my business, I've given up thinking about clothes! Just like Steve Jobs!!!"
@VATVSLPR @bean Come think of it, it reminds me a bit of the turn fashion took in the late 1700s, where menswear started moving away from powdered wigs and ruffles and started moving towards the more subdued outfits we pretty much still use as formalwear to this day.
For a while there, it was actually the servants who wore the powdered wigs, cus the way to show you're really fancy, but also humble, is to have the people serving you dress more formally than you.
The same sort of dynamic might be happening with business suits. If you're really rich, you don't wear expensive business suits, you employ the people wearing expensive business suits.
64 Islands Aroha Cooperative@bean the real problem is that people with imagination never become billionaires or successful politicians
Gareth
bananabob 
🇺🇦 🇵🇸@bean Billionaire: Yes I understand your concern, but my penis is so small.
levampyre
mxk
Dash
The Tattooed Nonna 🧙♀️@bean you might like this glimmer of light in a dark world. https://apnews.com/article/christian-bale-foster-homes-palmdale-dark-knight-0f7e046c7bd1c636efd78d44947fc1a6
Christian Bale breaks ground on foster homes he's fought for 16 years to see built
Christian Bale has broken ground on a project he’s been pursuing for 16 years -- the building of a dozen homes and a community center intended to keep siblings in foster care together. The Oscar-winning actor who played Batman in the “Dark Knight” trilogy shoveled dirt alongside local politicians and other officials Wednesday in Palmdale, a community about 60 miles north of downtown Los Angeles. The British-born Bale has lived in Southern California since the 1990s and sought to build the community after hearing about the huge number of foster children in Los Angeles County — and learning how many brothers and sisters had to be separated.
Ives@Tattooed_Mummy @bean And here's another example from a while back:
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/mar/10/michael-sheen-interview-secret-million-pound-giveaway-port-talbot
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2025/mar/10/michael-sheen-interview-secret-million-pound-giveaway-port-talbot
‘It’s not because I want people to think I’m great’: Michael Sheen on paying off £1m of his neighbours’ debts
The actor grew up poor, got rich, then lost everything backing the 2019 Homeless World Cup. Now he’s giving away more of his money to help 900 total strangers. Doesn’t he think he’s done enough?
Thomas Depierre@bean i have an answer but people hate hearing it
nivs
Androcat@bean Empty like a black hole.
Like, aggressively empty.
A person doesn't become a billionaire without that emptiness.
Jenica Lake เหล็ถเลถ
trillytrill@bean
They didn't get stupidly rich being fun-loving creative people. They're a bunch of miserable, selfish bastards.
They didn't get stupidly rich being fun-loving creative people. They're a bunch of miserable, selfish bastards.
Fardels BearThe robber barons of the previous Gilded Age were utter bastards, but at least some of them were philanthropists. The Carnegie Libraries, for example.
It might not have stopped his soul from burning in Hell, but it was a nice gesture.
SPICY EVIL CAET🍬🍭🎄
@bean i would SO shamelessly buy everyone's affection if I were rich lmao
UkeleleEric@bean The process involved in having and making that much money kills them inside - little imagination, and they think that the only thing worth doing is to 'impress' others by doing the same sort of things as others with loadsa cash. They're under the impression that it impressed normal people - the same attitude that says that driving around in a noisy car with a personalised numberplate makes them look big. But most people could tell them it just makes them look a big wanker.
melocipede 
@bean we should stop waiting for billionaires to do something good with their money, and just take their money to fund something good. beauty. and health. and decent life. for everyone.
not all their money, just a small part. let's say 5%.
they'd still be billionaires, we'd be a better society, we might even help the environment getting better for mankind, in the process.
not all their money, just a small part. let's say 5%.
they'd still be billionaires, we'd be a better society, we might even help the environment getting better for mankind, in the process.
0x4d6165 (Julie or Mae)
LionelB
Deixis9
Schroedingers_Cat@bean I know if I had more money than Smaug I would buy properties in an overpriced rental area and rent them out at lower rents - make them affordable. And hope to drive all rents down.
Then move onto somewhere else and do the same.
I would sponsor local events and make them free. I would sponsor festivals and make sure that they could attract the bands they want. I would go to loads of festivals and look for new causes to support.
I would have the most amazing fun. And make sure others had a good life.
I would always be looking for other places to help - not just wherever I was living.
Knud JahnkeI think the boring (and often bullying and fascist) billionaires are just the one's you read about. I'm sure there are vast amounts of rich people that simply do stuff, but don't post about it and don't have newspapers do homestories.
We had a local billionaire who had to be convinced that a lecture hall should be named after him, and it's a small plaque and the name isn't really used. He gave ~15b€ to a foundation for the benefit of science.
cuan_knaggs@bean like the Medici. very bad people with way too much money and power but at least we have some amazing art and architecture because of them
soc