Saying crypto isn’t synonymous with anarchy, like the internet isn’t with pornography, sidesteps the point. Pornography is just one use of the internet — not its central purpose.
But crypto wasn’t just built to host financial activity — it was designed to restructure it, removing reliance on central authorities. That core intent isn’t a cliché; it’s a defining feature.
Comparing it to incidental internet content is a rhetorical deflection, not a real counterpoint.
It was designed to solve the double-spending problem with digital currencies, replacing the need for "a authoritative ledger" with a one difficult to forge.
The political project around this was to provide people with a deflationary currency akin to gold, whose inflation could not be controlled by government.
The lack of government control over the inflation of this particular currency, and the lack of an authoritative ledger, are an extremely minimal sense of currency protections (, freedoms). They have as much to do with anarchy as the internet had with porn.
> A purely peer-to-peer version of electronic cash would allow online payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through a financial institution.
Failed countries (ie: Turkey) rely on the financial system for taxation. Functioning countries shouldn’t care or be bothered by it.
You’re not supporting your central thesis that disintermediating finance is in any way related to removing government — and people using Coinbase, a service that is centralized and does collaborate with government regulation seems to directly counter your stereotype of the customers.
Their point is correct: people who match your fantasy wouldn’t be Coinbase customers — you’re relying on old tropes.
All of the victims are likely tax payers. Law and order is a fundamental service that a legitimate state must provide to all in its jurisdiction, even those who are only resident non-citizens and those that pay little to no taxes in a progressive tax system.