Hacker News Reader

Comment by mark_l_watson | Hacker News Reader

Sorry to be off topic, but are most people here on HN as unhappy about Davos and the World Economic Forum as I am? I really dislike their "Young Leaders" program, going back decades (lots of US politicians, Canada's Prime Minister, etc. have been indoctrinated).

I am very happy to see Davos getting bad rap right now from independent bloggers and independent (small) news outlets. This helps push back against corporate owned media which pushes a positive slant on one world government, "in 20 years you will own nothing and be very happy", etc.

View on HN

Davos is officially sanctioned corruption for oligarchs, but the organization is also apparently a cult of personality that may not survive Klaus Schwab, so maybe it will just go away.[1]

[1]: https://www.theguardian.com/business/2023/jan/18/mutiny-erup...

I’m sure Henry Kissinger has other people lined up to take on that roll. The technique of using exclusive events to socialize and indoctrinate people is age-old.

Will he outlive Schwab, though?

At those ages it's a bit of a crap-shoot. Depends on who has access to the better adrenochrome (j/k)... I'm not sure if he needs to personally anoint the successor. It just surprises me that people don't realize that it's WEF is a continuations of a very old power structures that predates it.

I think it's abhorrent how supposedly democratic countries don't see an issue with a private event just for politicians and international corporations.

Information shaping has resulted in most not even knowing Davos exists.

I heard the new matrix doesn't try to hide, it's in your face gaslighting you and demoralizing you every time you observe it.

Who needs to conspire secretly when you can do it publicly, and then turn around and say it's not a conspiracy since it's out in the open?

Then it's not a conspiracy.

WEF/Davos is extensively reported on in mainstream media. And you can watch the talks and panels on their own YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/@wef/videos

It’s the more exclusive private parties where the real influence is wielded. Like convincing Japan to give Negative Interest Rate Policies a go as an experiment to see if it would work for the rest of us.

Just listened to The Economist podcast that hyped them that CEOs and politicians can meet once every few months, thus saving lots of jet fuel from private jets. Why do they need to travel at all? Have we forgotten that most travels don't need to happen because we have that online meeting thing?

It was supposed to sound like a good thing, but it was out of context, so made me think, why even mention it, almost like they have an agenda to sell here.

Online meetings leave evidence.

"Look at that big conspiracy event where the date and location are known and it's all over the Internet!"

Why do some HNers think Davos is a secret gathering where evil is planned? If they really wanted to have a secret gathering, they can do it Jeffrey Epstein-style with private flights and zero fanfare (even US presidents manage to fly to Afghanistan without many people noticing), it shows your lack of imagination if you think the widely announced and publicized event is supposed to be a conspiracy gathering.

I don't care about Davos one way or another, but I am sick of people trying to push online meetings in place of irl social events as "the same." A majority of people prefer to meet and socialize in person and it is going to stay that way for the foreseeable future.

Well fortunately, any of us have the opportunity to get to a place where we can offer insight and contribute to the light winds that somewhat influence the global economy. When you have a role to play in that, maybe you’ll be invited. I hear the Berkshire Hathaway annual shareholder meeting is a good time, if you are sad that you are missing out on something. As far as politicians, you might not like it, but we elect those politicians to represent us. So I am happy that they have a voice at these forums, even though sometimes that voice isn’t who I specifically wanted there.

What do you expect? A ticketed event for a price? Then you'll still moan about any rich douchebag being able to buy their way in. An "anyone can join" event? Then all the people with influence will just be busy because all their fans will want a selfie. The G7/8/20 is a forum where world leaders can have private conversations and maybe get other leaders to see things from their perspective and change their minds, what about doing the same with CEO's of big corps, who also run the world, whether you like it or not...

It's not like the WEF is super exclusive, I remember seeing a job offer from a small tech company who got bought for 10M Euro, I read about this company's history and found the founder's Facebook page. He had pictures of a prop plane, I think he spent some of the money learning to fly, and 2-3 pics where he's in Davos, including a blurry selfie of him standing in line for lunch at the WEF in front of Bill Clinton.

Remember like three weeks ago when the twitter files showed US congress texting and calling back and forth with the heads of major corporations? About how congress was polling in response to those corporations' actions and what they were both gonna do about it?

Yeah no one else does either.

There's short street interviews(or rather attempts) of WEF participants, booming on Twitter from Rebel News. To be fair, questions asked by interviewers are often just provocative, still, arrogance in behavior of, specifically, CEOs is just overwhelming.

“Sorry to hijack this discussion thread with irrelevant flamebait”

It feels like I'm watching a real life Villain-Con.

What corporate owned media pushes the concept of a one world government. I've never heard that concept mentioned on the news

Here’s how I think about it:

Davos is a religious gathering. You wouldn’t be happy/unhappy about other religious gatherings that you don’t participate in.

The elites really don’t have any control or vision over what’s going to happen, just like shamans and religious leaders of the past did not

How do 52 heads of state and 600+ CEOs of the world's largest companies not have "any control or vision of what's going to happen?"

Because the WEF is not controlled by 52 heads of state of 600+ CEOs. It's controlled by Klaus Schwab, a managing board and an executive committee: https://www.weforum.org/about/leadership-and-governance

10 people sit on the managing board, none of them household names: Børge Brende, Mirek Dušek, Julien Gattoni, Jeremy Jurgens, Adrian Monck, Sarita Nayyar, Gim Huay Neo, Olivier M. Schwab, Saadia Zahidi, and Alois Zwinggi.

I don't think he meant control of how the WEF operates but of the world economy.

> elites really don’t have any control or vision over what’s going to happen,

Is this satire, blindness, or just youthful optimism?

I like Davos and the WEF. Most people against them these days are far-right nutjobs and some don't even know they are becoming like that. Populism is a hell of a drug.

Can you elaborate, what specifically do you like about WEF?

It's basically the powerful people's version of an academic symposium. I watched a lot of panels last week on youtube and the discussions were informed, interesting and very down to earth in regards to real problems and plausible solutions (not utopic, naïve, or extremist ones). Collaboration between governments, states and business, etc. Stuff that actually have a chance to achieve something. In particular I felt they were on point about the Amazon and the reception the new Environment Minister of Brazil, Marina Silva, a person I absolutely trust about this matter at least, was a great signal the WEF is an org I can trust, even if I disagree with some guests (natural since it's politics and I don't want it all to be in line with what I want).

Clearly you must’ve missed the panel about secretly controlling the world, it was in between the one on vampiric bloodsucking and the one on mind control via mass media.

It’s truly disappointing how much the HN crowd skews towards conspiracy theorists these days. This place is becoming a cesspool for informed discussion.

To be fair there's also a lot of leftists who protest WEF, G7/8/20, etc. There is also left populism...

There's a lot of merit to face to face meetings - if you could have a date over FaceTime or in real life, which would you prefer? - and of course it's only the elite/influential people who are invited, they're the ones with the power to change things. Whether or not they're capable of fixing the world or if their hands are somewhat tied because of politics or shareholder motivations, is a different question.

For some populism: I do think most politicians/elites care more about their career/wallet rather than the world.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com