Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez are getting married in Venice, and the three-day wedding celebration will bring in nearly 100 private jets and a guest list full of billionaires and celebrities, including Oprah and Leonardo DiCaprio, Mercury News reports.
Streets have been closed, boats rerouted, and security teams stationed across the city for the event, taking place from June 26-28. Now, people who live there — and plenty of others online — are calling the whole thing over-the-top and extremely out of touch.
Protesters from Greenpeace and the group "No Space for Bezos" have taken to the canals with a life-sized Bezos dummy and potentially some floating crocodiles, according to GB News. In St. Mark's Square, the protestors hung a banner reading, "If you can rent Venice for your wedding, you can pay more tax."
The main party was supposed to happen in the Cannaregio district but was moved to the Arsenale shipyard after backlash and security concerns, Reuters reports.
Still, many residents are concerned that the damage is already done. The city is already packed with tourists and struggling with flooding, and locals say the billionaire wedding just adds more stress. One luxury lifestyle news outlet says the gaudy celebration "will transform Venice into a billionaire's playground."
The concern comes from the fact that Venice is especially vulnerable to climate change. Sea levels in the Adriatic have risen more than 30 centimeters — or nearly a foot — since 1872. Extreme flooding events, once considered rare, are becoming regular occurrences, according to scientific reports.
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Locals worry that these massive luxury events make it even harder to address the city's long-term challenges, especially as the tourism industry crowds out housing and raises costs for residents.
Private jets are one of the worst ways to travel when it comes to the health of the planet. One jet can pump out more carbon pollution in a single hour than most people do in a whole month. Multiply that by dozens of jets coming and going just for a party, and it's easy to see why people are angry. On top of that, the yachts, catering, lighting, and waste that come with an event like this all pile on.
In a related Reddit thread, commenters had much to say on the subject.
"Everything about this wedding seems to be solely for social status. Really sad…" one user wrote.
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Definitely 👍 Another commenter discussed hypocrisy: "While us plebs worry about recycling our plastics, the rich and famous are flying 10,000km by private jet for the wedding of a billionaire on a sinking island. Make it make sense."
"A billion of us rinse plastic containers so one billionaire can torch the planet in a weekend," a third commented.
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