Comment by paxy
9 hours ago
If the use case is tax avoidance, bribes, theft, scams, money laundering, funding terrorism, evading sanctions, ransomware payments, extortion, illegal purchases then crypto is immensely successful.
9 hours ago
If the use case is tax avoidance, bribes, theft, scams, money laundering, funding terrorism, evading sanctions, ransomware payments, extortion, illegal purchases then crypto is immensely successful.
these use cases exist with all forms of cash too
True. With the proliferation of digital payment systems, I'd argue that a significant portion of cash transactions are illegal. That portion will only grow in time as people get used to the convenience of these systems.
If governments ban crypto then they will without fail ban cash as well.
Edit: For additional context, I live in a country where fees and transactions related to government and regulated services (including telecom) are required by law to use our national payment system exclusively, and it is hell for people who fall through the cracks (e.g. problems national ID that blocks payment systems). I've seen first-hand on multiple occasions people standing outside government buildings begging others to pay their fees in exchange for cash so that they can get unblocked from the payment system.
Whether through malice or incompetence, human institutions can never and will never be perfect. Cash and cash-like systems (inc. crypto) must remain or a lot of innocent people will get hurt, even if it enables criminals.
I do not excel at this, but that's why it's important to continue normalizing activities that protect our freedoms, even if they seem inconvenient on their face. Shops should accept cash, people should use cash, people should expect and demand privacy. Laws and judicial interpretations are often based on the public's expectation of certain services and rights.
Sure, but accounting existed before Excel. That doesn't mean excel didn't change things tremendously.
Whataboutism like this always misses the scale of it. Imagine Breaking Bad but with Crypto - suddenly all of Walt's cash logistics problems go away because doing crime in cash is not the same as crypto - the scale and ease are very different.
not to be whatabout... but... anything of value is used for all that too, in much larger amounts.
it is wild to me that people expect that crypto is supposed to solve a problem that is as old as currency.
It does solve that problem pretty well, just nothing else positive.