'Fear really drives him': is Alex Karp of Palantir the world's scariest CEO?

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2025/nov/18/fear-really-drives-him-is-alex-karp-of-palantir-the-worlds-scariest-ceo

by mellosouls • 8 months ago

53 62 8 months ago

theguardian.com

JohnFen• 8 months ago

Fear is the most dangerous of human emotions. Fear makes us stupid, compliant, and cruel.

piva00• 8 months ago

Fear paired with confidence has created the biggest monsters we ever had, Alex Karp seems to embody both, don't see how he can escape the fate of becoming a monster...

helpfulfrond• 8 months ago

"Fear is the mind killer..." https://www.goodreads.com/work/quotes/3634639-dune

0_____02• 8 months ago

The US's power comes from its ability to project organized violence? What was Vietnam then? And what would have come of the Vietnam era if people could be individually and effortlessly targeted in their daily lives for going against it?

terminalshort4• 8 months ago

All power flows from the barrel of a gun

hat_monger• 8 months ago

Funny how people forget this when their guy gets shot [at]

fatbird• 8 months ago

what would have come of the Vietnam era if people could be individually and effortlessly targeted in their daily lives for going against it?

Nothing. The U.S. lost Vietnam, not because it lost battles, but because it offered no governing alternative to Ho Chi Minh that the Vietnamese accepted. Millions of Vietnamese died and still they rejected every colonial gov't the French and then the U.S. tried to prop up.

The U.S.'s power coming from its ability to project organized violence is really a statement about the limits of its power. It can blow up anyone it wants to. It still can't remake other countries as it wishes.

0_____02• 8 months ago

What you're saying makes sense, and I agreem. But I don't think Karp, as he is described in the article, agrees...

-snip-

Karp referenced the political scientist Samuel Huntington’s belief that “the rise of the west was not made possible ‘by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion … but rather by its superiority in applying organised violence’.”

-snip-

Karp seems to be using that idea to pat himself on the back for tapping into the stream of money that flows toward "the guns" so to speak.

Does he think about whether the US' global hegemony will flourish under domestic fascism that he's paving the way for?

andsoitis• 8 months ago

African American artist mother

I had no idea Alex Karp was black.

Anyhow:

On CNBC’s Squawk Box, he shook both fists simultaneously as he railed against short sellers betting against Palantir, whose share price has climbed nearly 600% in the past year: “It’s super triggering,” he complained. “Why do they have to go after us?”

This and a few other sections make me wonder how much introspection the guy has and whether he ever concedes that he is wrong.

UniverseHacker3• 8 months ago

This and a few other sections make me wonder how much introspection the guy has and whether he ever concedes that he is wrong.

Our culture is currently at a moment where it confuses the faux confidence of narcissism with strength, and promotes those people to positions of leadership. However, it's pretty much the opposite of that, it is escaping into an imaginary persona with faux infinite confidence, because you are too afraid to be a real person that has faults like everyone else.

graemep2• 8 months ago

Not only one culture or moment in history.

There have always been weird people in positions of power. Look at Alexander the Great, for example, or Mao or Idi Amin..

A few more examples here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TCahA0MP_G0

rsynnott3• 8 months ago

Quite a lot of tech CEOs get weirdly over-emotional about short-sellers. Musk does this, too, say. I get the impression that it's appealing to a certain audience, and may be performative.

Like, if you're trying to recapture the demented retail magic of the Gamestop moment, and I think a lot of these meme-aligned stocks are, then railing against short-sellers is probably a good way to endear yourself to that crowd.

close04• 8 months ago

Quite a lot of tech CEOs get weirdly over-emotional about short-sellers.

They just can't picture themselves ever being in the wrong. They are genuinely convinced they are the hero. Logically any opposition comes from villains.

With the ego of people like Musk and other idiosyncratic, autocratic, and sociopathic CEOs, I think there needs to be a rational strategy behind it.

terminalshort4• 8 months ago

It's not a new thing. CEOs have always hated short sellers. It's just that nobody ever heard about it since before meme stocks 90% of the general public didn't even know what a short seller is.

torginus• 8 months ago

Doesn't the success of a short come down to crowd psychology? If there's a company with a given stock price, and somebody convinces a significant portion of investors to short it, on the other side the CEO and other shareholders tries foil the short by using their free cash to buy up the new shares.

The success or failure of the short hinges on which side is manages to convince/intimidate/sway the majority stockholders regardless of fundamentals. If the short sellers manage to recruit more stockholders (by value) - they win (in terms of value), if the company's supporters are move more money - the price doesn't go down and the short sellers are left with the bills.

leoh2• 8 months ago

This and a few other sections make me wonder how much introspection the guy has and whether he ever concedes that he is wrong.

Quite a bit introspective and humble actually?? These are arguably defining qualities of Karp. See for example https://youtu.be/ChwSTuDa9RY.

pseudalopex• 8 months ago

What in the video did you interpret to show introspection or humility?

Karp interpreted the question if he regretted working with ICE as a question if he had suffered because of it. This was self centered.

He implied it had caused conflict between him and his family. He complained employees he liked left. He complained about protests. This was what he called suffering.

He said protesters protested him. Not Palantir. Not his work. This was self centered.

Were you impressed he said he asked himself if he would protest if younger and a student? Knowing your political views changed requires not much introspection and no humility.

The interviewer asked what was protesters' most valid criticism. Karp asked if 1 instance of injustice tarnished all instances of justice. But this was not protesters' criticism.

DeathArrow• 8 months ago

I had no idea Alex Karp was black.

He looks pretty white to me. I haven't find an image of this mother.

treetalker• 8 months ago

The poor, helpless victim!

Won't someone please think of the multi-billion-dollar corporations and ultra-high-net-worth individuals actively working to eliminate the tattered remains of our privacy and to install still-greater systems of surveillance and social control?

devJdeed• 8 months ago

this guy allows other people to invest money into killing others, mostly it'a arabs so far but yet again he looks like a chosen one. I hope his shit crashes

ecshafer• 8 months ago

Palantir is along with SpaceX, Anduril, and a few others some of the most important companies in America. They are the ones that are pushing America forward. Not selling ads. But upsetting the incumbents that are undermining the DoD and national security, and making real technical progress. These are the companies that if it comes to war are going to be pushing us forward.

hobs• 8 months ago

Palantir is currently ramping up their spying on American Citizens at the behest of the government, which war are we talking about?

lm284694• 8 months ago

These are the companies that if it comes to war

Well, if you keep preparing for one you'll be the one starting it...

graemep2• 8 months ago

"If you want peace, prepare for war."

terminalshort4• 8 months ago

And if you don't, you'll be the one losing it.

lunias2• 8 months ago

Huh? Does preparing for winter make it come faster? Do you cause the winter through your preparation for it?

slightwinder• 8 months ago

In the first place, they are pushing USA deeper into the dystopian hell. And they will likely start some wars along the way (if they haven't already), to justify their revenues. But I guess any direction is a forward..

pyrale• 8 months ago

In which direction are they pushing, though? National security as they pitch it look like security from citizen rather than for citizen.

wiz21c2• 8 months ago

I can assure you its tai chi stance on the picture is absolutely wrong.

arms way too open, body weight on both legs, right arm should not be bended, distance between two feet is way to long, left hand should be pointing up, etc.

leoh2• 8 months ago

If you’re flowing between postures I’d imagine that this happens.

wiz21c2• 8 months ago

For the body weight over the two legs, I can agree. But for the rest, no no and no :-)

And indded it's a single whip :-)

LargeWu• 8 months ago

Definitely single whip. Looks like he stopped to pose in the middle of it. He's also facing the wrong way; that body position should be on the diagonal if anything.

jebarker• 8 months ago

Fear really drives him

This is very common in the defense and national security industries

apt-get• 8 months ago

Palantir is firmly cemented into military-industrial infrastructure, and business is booming, but Karp is not letting up. He has said he wants Palantir to be as dominant and indispensable as IBM was in the 1960s, when it was the world’s largest computing company and shaped the way government and private companies did business.

I was thinking even before this line that he gives off the impression of really admiring IBM, especially their German stint from 1933 to 1945.

constantcrying6• 8 months ago

The headline seems a bit weird, the article later on goes to acknowledge what Karp is actually fearing, namely fascism, which he sees as an existential threat to him personally.

It also seems to be a bit weird to exclude his intellectual heritage, he got his PhD under Jürgen Habermas who is one of the best known anti fascist and pro liberal democracy scholars in Germany.

throwaway-11-1• 8 months ago

yeah man he's so scared of fascism that he's leading the world in racist ai for drone striking civilians and imprisoning normal working people into concentration camps without a trial

constantcrying6• 8 months ago

Could you at least try to formulate that into an argument? Preferably you could address the justifications alluded to in the article and maybe try to frame that discussion in the context of Karps intellectual history.

causal2• 8 months ago

A recurring theme in reading about Thiel, Karp and their supporters is a sort of "kill or be killed" mentality - implied if not stated outright. Likewise I've seen people say things like "well the other side was doing X anyway, so we should do it to them". It's disturbing to watch how easily fear and anger can be wielded to justify anything. Future generations, if they are lucky enough to learn from us, may well identify our addiction to anger as the great sin of our time.

UniverseHacker3• 8 months ago

The "other side was doing X anyway, so we should do it to them" claim is always paired by first falsely accusing others of doing what they eventually intend to do. It's a deliberate strategy of manipulation that preemptively normalizes something that otherwise would look bad.

I don't know if there is a name for this tactic, but it appears to be fairly novel, and I suspect it was invented by Roy Cohn, who was a mentor to Donald Trump.

It's an incredibly effective manipulation strategy, and I am not sure how to counter it.

causal2• 8 months ago

It's manipulation that closed communities recognize and call out and will ultimately expel people for doing. But if you happen to be born into extreme wealth you have something people need and normal social consequences no longer have the same potence.

nis0s• 8 months ago

What’s baby afraid of? We don’t need “defense” technologies that don’t soften the brutality of life, or of human nature. There’s no path to security without dealing with humans nature, and people invariably respond better to honey than poison.

'Fear really drives him': is Alex Karp of Palantir the world's scariest CEO?

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