We’ve already covered the search operation for the missing submarine Titan. On 22 June, the five people on board the Titan were likely to run out of oxygen. That day they were unfortunately pronounced dead, as the debris of the submarine were found.

Even though there is sympathy for its passengers on social media, the compassion is more than often dwarfed by unfunny jokes about the tragedy. Many of them concern the fact that the Titan was operated with a console controller, a gamepad, which is rather unheard of.

A sense of humour can sometimes be a constructive way of dealing with awkward situations. This is especially true when we disarm the seriousness of our own difficulties with jokes, even in objectively awful circumstances. Humour, however, should not be the only tool in dealing with crises.

In case of the Titan situation, social media jokes probably serve more to push away the intrusive thought of how we would feel being trapped four kilometres underwater with oxygen running out. They create an emotional distance between us and the passengers of the tragic voyage.

Emotional distance can also originate from other mechanisms. As with other qualities beneficial to community building, what we expect first and foremost from others is empathy. We ourselves feel it most towards people close to us or similar to us.

This is why we were able to react with such extraordinary and awe-inspiring energy to war in Ukraine. That is why the public reaction to the fate of the Syrian refugees on Belarusian-Polish border is so much different.

The situation of those aboard the Titan is so extraordinary that it does not arouse the reflex to identify with its passengers. And identifying with someone is the best guarantee of developing empathy. Few among us know what it is like to be a billionaire, and even fewer a person who decides to make the extremely expensive and risky journey to the wreck of the Titanic.

We probably feel most sorry for the youngest passenger, 19-year-old Suleman Dawood. It is because we perceive tragedies befalling young people, with their whole lives ahead of them, as 'unnatural'. This is why they cause us the most discomfort.

Another empathy-related thread on social media is the observation by many commentators of how different the response of authorities, the media and the global community to the disappearance of the Titan is from the sinking of a fishing boat on 19 June in the Mediterranean. In the latter tragedy, more than 300 Pakistani lives were lost.

As many commenters have noted, the traditional media has also covered the tragedy in the Mediterranean. However, it did not resonate with the global community as much as submarine missing at the Titanic wreck. It was not enough to keep the topic alive.