Quote:
Originally Posted by GP_Matt
If the death rate of driving was 2.09% per trip then I would agree that both are selfish acts.
Something that rarely comes up is that a lot of the people who die on the mountain were left behind by the rest of their team. Often times this is done on the way up, meaning that the rest of the team has decided that reaching the summit is more important than the life of their teammate.
On a side note, take a look at how many motivational speakers are out there who have climbed Everest.
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I'm not sure if you're pointing to this as a good thing or a bad thing?
I've sat through a couple of these speeches though, and I'm sure that this opinion won't make me terribly popular, but they were terrible. For some reason hearing that the guy on stage has done something that has been done by hundreds (or maybe thousands?) of other people is hardly inspiring or motivational. Despite their attempts to add drama and explain things the reality is that you already know the end of the story; they live and they climbed a big mountain!
One of the speakers I saw was the first "all women" team to make it (or something like that). Her speech was tied in with business success and goal setting and such. It was pretty lame. Maybe its just me, but it kind of feels like "I had this hobby and it was pretty cool. How can I get paid to tell people about it?"
I won't mention who the other Everest speaker was or what their circumstances were. I'll just say that at the end everyone gave a standing ovation for their talk and I felt obliged.
Who knows. It could be just me? I've seen some incredibly inspiring presenters and have nearly been in tears both in terms of sadness and laughing so hard because they were so engaging though; I don't have a heart of stone and I like a good story that is well told. The Everest speakers I've seen were just not there though.