I'll call it, f l o o d i n g.

I’m sharing one of those… shall we call them, brutal truths? The Titanic sank because of gradual flooding. Yes, it’s true — and despite the movie being the first to gross a billion dollars, the ship itself went under.

You may, however, contend that there is no substantial weight in stating such an obvious a fact. But hear me out. Illustrations don't always reveal the full extent of the story; sometimes you need actual words to make sense of what you are seeing. So just reflect for a moment; reflect on all the compartments in the vessel (gradually) drawing in water, one compartment at a time — until a maximum threshold is reached that no design could survive — and then imagine the ship being torn asunder and sinking to the ocean floor. Consider the victims in the great expanse of the ocean, struggling alone in the dark, almost like ants on the surface of a large pitcher of water. Eventually, and with the elements and the fatigue setting in, they drown.

A trained medical doctor who was also a legendary author and screenwriter, Michael Crichton, perhaps put it plainly in one of his novels: Micro. In this novel, Crichton described a situation where a weaker swimmer could easily endanger a stronger one: simply by pulling them under as a consequence of their inability to stay afloat — not out of malice, but instinctually and out of sheer survival. Of course, the setting is different — the scene encapsulates miniaturized people and a flash flood in the Hawaiian wilderness, but the physics is identical, and it mirrors what occurred on the Titanic.

It goes without saying that only so many people can be saved. Only so many resources can be allocated at any given time before they are exhausted. Only so many lifeboats are aboard the ship, and Captain Edward Smith was well aware of the fact that there were not enough lifeboats for everyone. Of course, when this fact of limited availability mattered most…There was a shortage; such was the fate of the people aboard.

Not only does this relate to drowning, but it can also relate to the economy. An economy floods the same way — losses are absorbed quietly, compartment by compartment, until one threshold gives way and the whole structure goes under — all the while creating illusions of stability. The 2008 crisis is the clearest real-world version: losses accumulated throughout the financial system; banks failed one after another, like compartments. Though some were 'rescued,' the rest of the ship — the wider economy — insisted it was fine... That is, until it buckled. Luckily, it didn't quite implode.

So how do you save a nation that is tanking? Is a bailout the only solution? In the case of America, the Federal Reserve pumped money into the system and saved the banks. Unfortunately, there was considerable contention as to who would receive funding, and homeowners were not given the same special treatment, so a lot of foreclosures took place as a consequence.

Water-like imagery is used a lot when economists talk about the economy. So I hope you liked my puns up until now. River banks and financial banks, though they may have different origins, are connected more so by a useful analogy: Both are structures that help channel flow through a larger system.

Perhaps this particular article can also relate to one of your pinned stories on Vocal (though not nearly in as dramatic a fashion, of course). Consider that originally your published story rises and holds, with views, but eventually it is bound and shackled and plunged into the abyss — under the flow and weight of everything published after it; perhaps never to be visited again, save for some great expedition where it is brought to the surface once again.