Are audiophiles still out of their minds?


I've been in this hobby for 30 years and owned many gears throughout the years, but never that many cables.  I know cables can make a difference in sound quality of your system, but never dramatic like changing speakers, amplifiers, or even more importantly room treatment. Yes, I've evaluated many vaunted cables at dealers and at home over the years, but never heard dramatic effect that I would plunk $5000 for a cable. The most I've ever spent was $2700 for pair of speaker cables, and I kinda regret it to this day.  So when I see cable manufacturers charging 5 figures for their latest and "greatest" speaker cables, PC, and ICs, I have to ask myself who buys this stuff. Why would you buy a $10k+ cable, when there are so many great speakers, amplifiers, DACs for that kind of money, or room treatment that would have greater effect on your systems sound?  May be I'm getting ornery with age, like the water boy says in Adam Sandler's movie.
dracule1
A trolling we will go, a trolling we will go, high ho the dairy oh, a trolling we will go. One might as well wonder, hmmmm, how does Mercedes justify their prices? Or how does a pro basketball or baseball player justify his price? Or how does the military justify $339M for an F-22 Raptor?
ji35, by the same logic, if you bought a $100k ultradef 80" flat screen TV, it would be logical to spend $10k-20k on a coaxial video cable? Thank god videophiles are not suckers. 
 I have never compared cables on a $100k+ amp or $100k+ speakers...I have never heard a system that expensive...I sort of assume that for those who spend $!00k on cables, that that is relative pocket change to them...
I'm sure they get a good discount as part of a seven figure system and room rebuild
Yea, it may be pocket change to them, but it's still $100k.  You wonder why people like Paris Hilton get so much hate.  But you do have people like Bill Gates and warren Buffet who actually haven't gone off the deep end given their immense wealth.  May be I'm just old and cranky.