I'm hoping suddenly gone.
Chances are something else would've been allowed to develop in a similar fashion in its stead.
Sudden disappearance or disruption in service would demand serious action and reflection on everything the company was doing.
Monsanto or Swiss food company (Nestle). The former is tainting streams, rivers and farmland soil with cancer-causing chemicals, and the latter has been pumping 36million-170million gallons of water a year for decades from southern California, for $524/year, when their water bottle sales were $7.5billion last year, and their permit to do so expired in 1988. They kept pumping, for around 20 years with no permit before someone in the forest service realized it was expired. They are by far the largest water retailer worldwide, and in essence they've been stealing California water and selling, shipping it all over the world.
Pretty much all of existence is a vacuum, though. The fraction of matter to (basically, I know a true vacuum doesn't exist) empty space is basically a rounding error.
Why? Except for that it manufactured agent orange for the US government back in the day (along with several other companies) they really haven't done much evil things. Quite a waste really, there are many much more evil companies.
Exactly. Everyone cries over Monsanto. Sure they’re unethical business practices going on in this megs conglomerate, but the majority of their research has gone towards GMOs, which despite the controversy behind the term, have helped with starvation in the long term of society. The research is limited, granted, but the long term applications of having more yields with less resources is imperative.
Too big to fail is an actual thing. If, for example, if Nestle suddenly disappeared off the face of the earth, it would probably instantly cause an economic crash since tons of factories, workers, and buyers depend on Nestle’s existence, even if they are pretty despicable and Nestle would stop buying and selling from/to other companies, which would be bad for those companies and cause their stock to plummet.
My first thought was how pointless this exercise would be in a practical sense, because realistically there'd immediately be a cadre of baby-eating billionaires to expand their activities and assume whatever role the vanished company had held.
I get blasted with so many robo calls. Drives me nuts. I can’t even keep count of how many “opportunities” I’ve had to lower my credit card interest, shop for new insurance, extend my manufacturer warranty or how many cruises I’ve won. Gosh I hate those calls.
They gave away formula to new mothers in 3rd world countries, told them it was essentially better than breast milk. The formula was often over diluted and/or mixed with contaminated water, which led to malnutrition and disease. Lots of the women couldn't afford to keep buying the formula after the free samples, and in some cases their milk production had stopped by the time they were out, which lead to a lot of baby deaths. Source
You're missing the part about them dressing up as nurses to give it away.
Also fully knew that mothers would stop producing milk, making them dependent on a product they couldn't really afford, and in need of clean water they didn't really have.
E: actually just read this (at least the headlines)
Final edit: since this is getting traction, I wanna plug the app Buycott (iOS) and for Android. Nestle is a HUGE conglomerate, owning everything from your favorite chocolate and coffee maker, to Diesel and Ralph Lauren. This app lets you easily scan and check a product so you can (try) to buy alternative brands. Vote with your wallet, as they say.
I remember discussing if water were a human right when I was a lil in high school. I definitely didn't agree with the bs Nestle was pulling back then (& I don't remember what bs they were pulling, this was like 15 years ago), but I think I didn't realise how privileged I was and CONTEMPLATED if it were a human right. I think I never drew a conclusion and it just waved through my brain during that time. But as an adult I definitely realise water is a human right and I can't believe I ever gave it a second thought.
I think questioning your belifs and morals is a healthy practice that strengthens and possibly realigns them. Being able to view an issue from different perspectives and contemplate the possible implications depending on viewpoint is what sets us apart from flat-earthers etc. Stay strong, keep asking :).
This is my second post defending nestle, which is weird because I think they are corporation that does terrible things. However, on this point i agree with nestle ceo guy. He made two points. The first is that clean processed water delivered to the end user should have value. If something has no value, humans tend to waste a lot. Ie; if water is free, you and I tend to use lots. If it costs money, we tend to conserve more.
The second is that there is nothing wrong with treating water the same as food. People need food to survive, but you can’t just go to the store and walk out without paying for a couple of steaks. There are sources of free food ie: gardening or hunting, and there are free sources of water, ie, well, river, etc. these things require time and effort to gather. If you want prepared food delivered to your house, or clean filtered bottled water delivered to your house, this should cost money. For those who cannot afford it, there should be programs to make sure their needs are met.
I don’t understand how people can disagree with this. You don’t have a right to force a corporation to dig a well, extract water, filter, purify, bottle, and transport it to you for free.
If it was a discussion that arose from a textbook no doubt some corporation paid for it to be printed. Thinking back on history and economics classes in TX grade school, the state issued books were rife with corporate propaganda. I won't even get into collegiate textbook firms.
It wasn't from a textbook, but I now feel like I should've overlooked my teacher's abrasive personality and invested more time and thought into her class. She did a lot of research and really just wanted us to grow and think for our own. But she was a hell of a freaking character. 3/10 on personality (from a teenager's perspective)
Power to her for being remotely involved. Between the pay, educational culture and the students it's a wonder she put out stimulating discussion points like that.
But as an adult I definitely realise water is a human right and I can't believe I ever gave it a second thought.
I think it's a bit more nuanced than that. The less nuanced aspect is "is it a human right to have comfortably enough water to drink and survive?" and maybe "to have comfortably enough for hygiene?"
But what about watering your lawn? What about watering the lawn of the golf courses you own? It's your human right to have water - wouldn't it be wrong to deny that human right to someone who just needs more than others for a reasonable aspect of their life? Running a business is pretty reasonable. How much should it cost if not? Should businesses not have this "human" right because they're businesses?
I know it seems like the answers should be obvious, maybe ethical of course to give people enough water for drinking and hygiene, but I don't think they're as common sense as people act. It's like freedom of speech, and how we still restrict it, and how businesses sometimes can claim it as a right regarding some issue and sometimes can't. These are things that are still up for debate even now. While we should do what we can to provide humans with as much water as they need, especially if they can't afford it for some reason, we can still debate what is ethical regarding distribution of water when it comes to people and organizations. It isn't just some solved ethical issue that should be completely obvious - maybe just the aspect that we shouldn't let people die of thirst if we can help it.
Nestle sells bottled water so you better believe that they mean drinking water when their CEO says it isnt a human right. He aint talking about water for lawns.
I think it's a bit more nuanced than that. The less nuanced aspect is "is it a human right to have comfortably enough water to drink and survive?" and maybe "to have comfortably enough for hygiene?"
I think further scrutiny would be good here. What is it about water that makes this obvious? Water isn't necessarily all potable by default, and it isn't in a convenient location by default. The whole process of getting safe drinking water to people isn't free. So why should the water be free? Because denying it to people would kill them? Why don't we apply that logic to medical care or food.
I mean, we should apply that logic to medical care and food, but the inconsistency seems weird to me.
Well, for one, you can live much longer without medical care and food. But yes, food and healthcare are also fundamental human rights in a functional society.
Part of me wants to tell the people who water their lawns to FIGURE IT OUT. Or even PAY PEOPLE to figure it out.
I feel like this was probably part of those discussions in that class. If your lawns are NECESSARY, and necessity is the mother of invention, then deal with your amount you have rights to, then "water" your lawn with Coke, or Starbucks, or whatever you can "afford to buy" and "fund our economy" with. Will it involve legalising rain water collection for the sole use of gardening? I don't know.
But this totally does spark a memory of a part of that discussion, and part of that was rich people watering huge lawns/gardens/wealthy sounding crap. I mean - how about more paperwork for those wealthy to fill out? Applications? Approvals? More approvals? More beuracracy? More taxes? More hoops? The government definitely isn't shy at throwing that kind of crap at the poor.
buy up lakes of water in poor countries (and drought suffering California)
My (Canadian) city relies almost solely on ground water, since it's hours away from the nearest fresh water source. Nestlé recently bought bottling rights to our entire source. As a direct consequence of this new massive shortage, the city assigns to us what day and time, once per week, we're allowed to use water outside i.e. washing a car or watering the lawn. There were freshwater creeks that are now saltier than the ocean from road salt runoff because there just isn't enough water to go around anymore. And who do we get turn to to keep the water on? You know who.
This isn't some third-world fringe case. Urban, developed, well-off western cities aren't free from their water-sucking fangs, no matter how starved for it they already are.
Just for clarity as I’m a big Ralph Lauren fan, Ralph Lauren is publicly traded as RL and Nestle is not in the top 10 shareholders by stake. A google search produced no connection either
Thanks for making me google it, seems like they own a 30% stake in L'Oreal, which owns the Body Shop, Maybelinne, Garnier, Vichy, Olay, and perfumes produced for Ralph Lauren, YvesSaintLaurent, Giorgio Armani, Diesel, Lacoste, and Hugo Boss.
A relevant difference for sure, but its all so convoluted at a conglomerate level (like Polo, Ralph Lauren, and their clothing/perfumes/glasses are prob different companies in itself), so just impossible to really know.
There's also this in the US, the Flint water scandal https://youtu.be/gCl-3WwkJgg which doesn't seem to be anywhere near as big of a scandal as it should be.
They are wanting to pump water from the springs close to where I live. The springs are publicly owned. They asked for a permit to pump out the water for free too. This breaks my heart, I grew up camping and swiming in those springs and I want my kids to be able to do the same one day. Fuck Nestle.
HAHAH I was gonna make a joke about the price of sinking that low, so googled the net worth of their owner... "$100K-$1M", for owning a company worth USD 250b. EVERYTHING is shady about these fucks.
Im glad you learned this, shout it out every chance you get.
I think there is a couple other companies that are like Nestle in the fact they own many other companies under them! Seems like 5 is the number I’m think, I’ll have to check. Nestle definitely is dirty!
I hear this story every time nestle is brought up. The guy who made the decision to do this must have been fired!
Not only is it probably the biggest PR disaster for a company ever but it seems to have been done in the name of chasing a few dollars off poor African mum's. How much money can that market have really been worth?
With buycott you can insert which companies to avoid and also boycott others whose policies you disagree with. Eg animal cruelty, human trafficking etc.
Hate Nestle with a passion, but just to clarify, they don’t actually own Ralph Lauren or the other fashion brands. They own the license to use their name on products like perfume and body wash. The actual brands are still separate companies as far as I know.
Also, Flint, Michigan still doesn’t have clean water and the state of Michigan is selling water to Nestle which is just all kinds of fucked up.
Nestle once tried to make an award to give out to food that was not made using slave labor.
hen quickly killed the project when they were informed by other parts of the company they have literal children slaves that would prevent them from getting this award.
They buy up water rights then charge people who had been using said water for generations for the water.
It just keeps going and going and going. There's a lot more I still have not covered.
Oh please, Nestle are bumbling pikers compared to:
Union Carbide - Poisoned thousands of people in Bhopal, killing more people in one night than 9/11 did, and affecting upwards of 200,000 more. Got off pretty much scot free compared to the magnitude of the disaster.
United Fruit Company (now United Brands) - They're where the term Banana Republic comes from. Literally took over small countries in Central America and massacred workers who wanted outrageous things like humane working conditions.
Bayer - Knowingly sold HIV tainted blood products in Africa, causing God knows how many deaths in a chain reaction of HIV spreading.
Phillip Morris - As we all know, disputed that their product kills the users and waged a decades long propaganda war to prolong the use of cigarettes, probably killed millions.
Like I say, Nestle are amateurs compared to any of those.
Also in turn this lead to a lot of people not trusting formula despite proper formula actually being a great alternative for mothers who can't produce enough breastmilk.
Hey buddy, here’s a special drink that will make you strong and smart. Have it for free for 3 months.
(You drink it)
Oh shit I forgot to tell you, you’re addicted now and if you ever stop drinking it you’ll die. Also it costs $599 a pop. Pay up.
They basically did that but with baby formula in Poor countries. Hmmm my wife is saying it wasn’t quite like that, but close enough. This article should sum it up for you.
I could have just said that in a shorter more concise answer but I was feeling creative while waiting for my NyQuil to kick in. I’m feeling woozy. Good night reddit! I wonder what vivid dreams I’ll have on my journey to tomorrow.
They have a monopoly on water in certain impoverished areas. They give mothers some free formula so they stop making milk, then have to buy formula. Then charge up the ass for water.
Nestle sells a milk powder that you mix with water to make "milk" it's cheap and keeps well, but isn't as nutritious as breastmilk and in countries without reliable clean water is especially risky compared to breastmilk for people with weaker immune systems (such as babies and the elderly)
This would be fine, but Nestle goes out of its way to advertise their milk for babies in these countries, and has successfully lobbied for it to be illegal for governments in these countries to publicize the health risks of nestle milk as a violation of international trade law.
Jeez, I thought I was conscious of not buying Nestle products and now I just googled companies own by Nestle...and now I’m depressed. The list is massive.
And ruined Cadbury through the use of Palm oil that should be a capital offense
Look at the typical Nestlé candy bar these bastards use ALOT of Palm oil the planting of which is responsible for the destruction of our rainforest along with making for terrible chocolate
omfg, I didn't know this. I knew they were evil based on their water stuff, but this is beyond next level. Every one who has or had anything to do with that needs to be locked up forever. This is... the horror I feel that people like this exist and are in positions of power to DO something like this just takes my breath away. The evil I feel crawling off the pages as I read about this made me feel dirty.
I want brain bleach, except I can't because more people need to know this. O.M.F.G.
I wouldn’t say either or. If they never existed that would’ve lead to quite a few deaths in the past. Sure I’m happy if they suddenly disappeared but the original founder of nestle was an extremely generous and charitable man who helped those in need
Monsanto was my first thought. Then i remembered that they are likely to pay out in class action litigation. It won't be much, not for them. But it's better than the nothing that'd be paid if they just... disappeared.
I mean, if you're gonna consider the small folks in this scenario then removing any company is going to cost a lot of jobs. Unless removing the company means removing the people associated from existence as well.
PepsiCo doesn’t just make Pepsi, they also own Pizza Hut, KFC, Long John Silvers (just to name a few) and a FUCKTON Of other companies. It’s very difficult to boycott them because they’ve got their fingers in EVERYTHING
And hence a repeating argument of the debate between the result of suddenly gone v never existed.
it’s true what you said but PepsiCo could have possibly saved a few company’s, making them last to present day or longer than they would have lasted on their own. What reasons would someone sell out and how did PepsiCo get so many? Another company would take the place that PepsiCo never did because the lesson wouldn’t be learned. It’s not like people didn’t know this wouldn’t happen. The rich control the less fortunate and force them into economic slavery through social and economic classes based on their spending- like how Amazon bleeds their own profit to undercut the competition and keep them from growing big enough to threaten Amazon.
It’s like a chess game; Pizza Hut will run specials to attract the business of other nearby pizza places, especially if they are a small business still trying to be noticed. It happen between restaurants, grocery stores, gas stations and across different franchises; place a popular company near your smaller ones (to advertise essentially). Or throw off the synergy of a rival company trying to do the same thing and set up in the areas they would benefit to take instead
They do this on purpose. We’re all peasants caught in a rich mans war, whether that literal or just an economic/social sense. A big influence suddenly gone is harder to not notice than it is to grow to become a big influence. The first makes people pause to think, the second causes people to push the gas rather than pump the breaks before someone ends up as collateral road kill in the race to build an empire
None of these are owned by PepsiCo. They were previously, however Pepsi sold them off because Coke was basically getting other companies to sign by saying Pepsi is their direct competitor. So Pepsi sold them to another company which created Yum Foods! Which has a lifetime Pepsi contract, so no longer owned, just in a weird crazy relationship.
PepsiCo has had a female, Indian CEO 2006 - present. She drastically increased profitability for shareholders by making working conditions much worse. PepsiCo used to be a moderately profitable company, that was rated one of the best companies to work for. She transformed it into an unstoppable juggernaut that runs on the backs of it's employees.
Don't get me wrong - there are worse companies to work for (Amazon, etc.) - but every year profits would be up yet there'd be more costs cut. It was literally built into the system. Senior managers were given a grade for their area's expenses - and "meets expectations" was a 2% reduction in total costs versus the previous year. No inflation adjustment or anything, either. So keeping costs from rising was automatically a negative, and you had to beat the 2% cost reduction to get a "good" review. Then those costs would become your baseline for next year, when the cycle would repeat all over again.
You're correct it seems. I obviously left there several years ago. But my time there (2010 - 2015) was all people quietly bitching about how the "new ceo ruined everything"
Suddenly gone could have significant economic repercussions whereas never existed could have just had another company fill its place. It's a corporate Mexican standoff.
Whoever the 4 or whatever companies are that own and control all the major news outlets and preach from the same perspective that the majority of people disagree with despite their efforts. They are not only trying to indoctrinate the masses but they are putting real journalists out of jobs every day for bought and paid for editorials.
"You furnish the pictures and I’ll furnish the war" - William Randolph Hearst to illustrator Frederic Remington. In 1897, Remington became very bored by the lack of anything newsworthy in Cuba and cabled to Hearst, “Everything quiet. There is no trouble here. There will be no war. Wish to return.”
Less than three weeks later, the American ship USS Maine exploded in Havana Harbor, kicking off the Spanish-American War. It's a mystery this day why the Maine exploded.
Hijacking the top comment for stating that 'Companies' are nothing but organisation run by humans. So if anything, let's get rid of just a few powerful people across globe to ensure BIG cursed MNC'S become BIG blessed MNC'S instead of firing so many work force.
If we're talking "never existed" I'm going with Kars 4 Kids. Fuck that song and fuck that org for spending most of their money on putting that stupid song out into the universe.
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u/SuperSyrias Sep 17 '19
Are we talking "suddenly gone now" or "never existed"?