100% agree.

Crypto today is the only way how you can take control of your own funds.

What use is the money in your Bank account if the ruling political party can label you an ultra-right extremist and retroactively lock all your money down, just because of a single 1$ donation you did to a cause you believed to be right, like Canada did?

No one had their accounts closed in Canada purely based on a donation.

There were a number of reports coming from conservative MPs of this very thing happening. Regardless of the veracity of their claims, the financial systems in place were able and prepared to do this, before the measures were lifted.

> Even a $20 donation to the Freedom Convoy after Feb. 15 could result in the donor’s bank accounts being frozen, a Commons committee heard Tuesday.

https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/even-small-donation-t...

So what justified closing their account instead?

> can label you an ultra-right extremist and retroactively lock all your money down

Nitpick: about half the time (on sufficiently long term average), they'll instead label you a ultra-left extremist (most infamously anti-COMINTERN initiatives in the 1930s-1950s, but it tends to wobble back and forth depending on what's politically convenient).

> Crypto today is the only way how you can take control of your own funds.

Well, digging a hole in the forest and storing money there technically remains an option.

May be more viable than crypto for certain rare use cases.

Wouldn't expect any less from HN, but can't blame them much when people like Senator Warren make up lies about terrorist funding.

I am always surprised how HN folks fall in hook line and sinker for Democratic talking points from senators FAR removed from any understanding of technology and insistent on curbing basic internet freedoms. The previous version of this was the proposal to ban encryption because bad actors can have a private conversation. If you oppose banning encryption but are in support of banning crypto, I would encourage folks to think more deeply about their positions

Because HN folks don't want to live in the anarcho-capitalist libertarian dystopia, where whole world "money" is controlled by a few criminals in the offshores, like Zhao, Giancarlo, Sun, Sam, Alex, etc. and by a small mining cartel controlling every transaction consisting mostly of the same people. They don't want to have their transactions blacklisted (like all those "tainted" bitcoins for example) and don't wasn't to be dependent on the centralized exchanges controlled by criminal, on on the decentralized exchanges also controlled by criminals and relying on shitty spaghetti code (just today Uniswap was exploited, but tokenbros don't write about it, interesting right?). They don't want to live a world where every single thing is monetized and rent is extracted forever by a few "early adopters" of said tokens.

Sure, there are problems with banks and goverment overreach, but those need to be fixed, not completely replaced with a worse alternative.

There is no better fix than Bitcoin. Banks and governments will always try to be fiscally irresponsible by removing a gold standard even if it were brought back. Bitcoin is the easiest way to impose rules on the system. Let me know what you think is a better alternative

Genuine observation incoming: I am always surprised how HN folks like yourself fall in hook line and sinker for party line politics, even here.

It's very hard for any layman to gleam even surface level tech info from the news, politicians etc. because any statements from politicians are by definition influenced by lobbyists.

Senator XXXX not understanding (or feigning ignorance) of a tech issue has nothing to do with the color tie the politician is wearing. Democrats and republican parties are for-profit businesses that aren't a part of our constitution, and are lobbied by the tech industry to lie to you.This is all public information.

Fun fact I love to reiterate: Neither of the major party presidential candidates in 2016 knew how to use a desktop computer IE; windows, keyboard, mouse. But they both have made millions from investing in tech. But they would not know how to make a cursor move in windows 11. That should be a terrifying signal about our politicians and the effect they have on downstream tech-thought.

I can't edit my comment but happy to include Republicans too. The Democrats have been more vocal about Bitcoin lately but agreed they're all part of the lobby machine. I have no love for either party :)

On the other hand, crypto provides copious evidence for the need of some level of regulation.

The technology no, the tradfi companies that "use" it (aka custodial user funds) then yes, but those regulations exist since they're no different than any other financial product company.

For conversations sake I'm curious about specific evidence. It's also fun to consider which country or group of countries would provide the regulations and enforcement.

Consumer protections. Until there are rigorous consumer protections, crypto is only fit for scams imo.

> Consumer protections.

Those are covered by local laws. What protections do you think are missing from crypto that is different from other areas?

The ability to undo fraudulent charges and claw back illegitimately stolen funds.

[delayed]

Ah yes Crypto definitely solves all of the problems. Please ignore the rich men behind the curtains shutting down exchanges and stealing money, the numerous ways people have had crypto stolen from them or how volatile crypto is in general.

Make sure to hold my bag for me.

Technically, people wishing to use crypto as a bank account would care as much about the exchanges as a ‶normal″ bank customer should care about regulation enforcement on some random bookmaker; both run on [insert currency], but that's about it.

To OPs point, everything you said is why criminals use it too

He's not wrong