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Those who aren't paying attention, anyway... In Canada, we just went through a 10-day period where, in an afternoon, the government casually made it retroactiv

Those who aren't paying attention, anyway... In Canada, we just went through a 10-day period where, in an afternoon, the government casually made it retroactively illegal to have supported a peaceful cause -- and began locking up peaceful, law-abiding citizens' bank accounts. In Russia, citizens have been instantly locked out of international financial transactions, and non-local currencies have become unavailable. It is likely that further, dramatic interventions in ingress/egress of wealth are forthcoming. In China, random decisions regarding the legality of Cryptocurrencies are regularly enacted. Huge businesses doing legal, ethical mining are one day accepted, and the next -- made illegal. Sorry, but anyone who doesn't find this worrisome is ... naive, for lack of a more charitable term.

dragontamer 5y ago
Meanwhile, MLRS systems are leveling entire neighborhoods in eastern Ukraine. Hospitals are collapsing as rockets bombard their foundations, cluster munitions deployed and thermobaric warheads causing the 2nd largest explosions known to man (only 2nd largest compared to nukes). Yes. We, as a society, have decided (rather quickly too) to use our financial resources to do what we can to fight back against these war crimes. That's not a bad thing at all. The only other thing that may serve as a deterrence is a proper and full war. If you've got other ideas for a deterance, now is the time to issue suggestions. Complaining that we've found a non-war way to deter Russia and their actions is callous, when compared to the millions of lives who suddenly had their lives upended last week. ------ > Sorry, but anyone who doesn't find this worrisome is ... naive, for lack of a more charitable term. Of course its worrisome that we have to deploy offensive tools (albeit financial tools rather than actual bombs). But what other choice do we have? Are you saying that Russia shouldn't have to pay for what they did? Are you saying that we should just forget about Ukraine's pains? Etc. etc. Money is a social construct. That's a good thing, for times like this. No, we don't want to live in these times and wish that things were more peaceful. But if someone hits you or someone else... you have to respond and deter them from striking yet again. Basic diplomacy.
claudiulodro 5y ago
Paying no mind to the "charitable" brush you're painting these situations with, it seems you're making a great argument for, like, a stash of gold coins more than for crypto. That'll outlast any government or online-network changes!
- pjkundert 5y ago
  Yup, fractional gold and silver coinage is probably wise to have on hand. That, and systems that solve the "network partition" failure mode endemic to Global Consensus cryptocurrency systems: https://holo.host https://holo.host. In the mean time -- create and fund a personal Cryptocurrency wallet with secure and reliable SLIP-39 backup Mnemonics: https://slip39.kundert.ca/macos https://slip39.kundert.ca/macos
kelnos 5y ago
I do find it worrisome, but probably not quite the way you do. I think having this sort of power is scary, because power always ends up getting abused, as we see in Canada and China. But I can't really shed many tears for the situation in Russia right now, with the caveat that I hate that regular Russian people (many of whom are against the Ukraine invasion) are getting hurt by this stuff as well. Money isn't (and IMO shouldn't be) just something you have, for often arbitrary reasons, something that allows you to do whatever you want without repercussion. Russia's leadership should not have access to the world's financial markets after the actions they've taken. Cryptocurrencies could help enable their bad behavior in this case. Yes, crypto can also help insulate regular people from the bad behaviors of their governments. But it's not all positives. Financial system access is a lever that can be used to influence behavior. On the scale of current Russia-Western relations, there are not many viable levers. One of them is armed conflict. I would much rather we mess with Russia's financial system than start sending NATO troops into Ukraine, and risk starting WWIII.
- dragontamer 5y ago
  > But I can't really shed many tears for the situation in Russia right now, with the caveat that I hate that regular Russian people (many of whom are against the Ukraine invasion) are getting hurt by this stuff as well. I still shed a tear, even for the Russian soldiers. The poor Russian soldier who was killed had his text messages (to his mom in Russia) read out to the UN. He didn't know why they were attacking Ukraine, is "only following orders" kinda setup. He was flabbergasted at how much the Ukrainians were angry at him. And then he died in battle. --------- That doesn't mean that Ukraine should stop attacking the Russian soldiers. It is clear that they are being forced into this as much as everyone else. If Russia simply pulls back their troops to the Russian border, then this war is over. But as long as they're in Ukraine, the world has to use every means necessary to try to help the Ukrainians out. Even if it means killing Russian soldiers. I don't think they "deserve" to die, but what choice does Ukraine have?
  - deleted 5y ago
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- 5y ago
gowld 5y ago
> locking up peaceful, law-abiding citizens' bank accounts. Did this happen, except in unsubtantiated tweets?
- gruez 5y ago
  1. AFAIK only a few dozen (I vaguely remember 70?) individuals were actually affected 2. that said, in the initial news reports, the criteria for who to freeze was quite vague. One source said >The emergency orders require virtually every participant in the Canadian financial system — banks, investment firms, credit unions, loan companies, securities dealers, fundraising platforms and payment and clearing services — to determine whether they possess or control property of a person who is attending an illegal protest or providing supplies to demonstrators. If they find such a person in their customer list, they must freeze their accounts and report it to the RCMP or Canada’s intelligence service, the regulations say. https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/emergencies-act-debate-parliament-weighs-declaring-a-public-order-emergency https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/emergencies-act-debat... That understandably made some people concerned. 3. regardless of whether they're actually "peaceful, law-abiding citizens" or not, that's for the courts to decide, not the executive branch.
dwater 5y ago
> In Canada, we just went through a 10-day period where, in an afternoon, the government casually made it retroactively illegal to have supported a peaceful cause -- and began locking up peaceful, law-abiding citizens' bank accounts. My understanding is that those citizens were using their money to support people who were intentionally blocking one of the main functions of a national government (regulating international trade). > In Russia, citizens have been instantly locked out of international financial transactions, and non-local currencies have become unavailable. It is likely that further, dramatic interventions in ingress/egress of wealth are forthcoming. Russians have no right to perform transactions using US Dollars, and as an American citizen I have no right to perform transactions in Rubles. Our governments regulate that (again, international trade). > In China, random decisions regarding the legality of Cryptocurrencies are regularly enacted. Huge businesses doing legal, ethical mining are one day accepted, and the next -- made illegal. In China, many government decisions are like that. Like when they overnight decided to restrict vehicle access to Beijing to try to reduce pollution leading up to the 2008 Olympics. I doubt actions like these come as a surprise to Chinese citizens. And, again, it's largely related to international trade. In our modern world of nation states, the individual citizen does not have unfettered access to all the world markets. Our governments place restrictions on trade, and they will do the same with cryptocurrency. You can try to evade it, either through bitcoin or gold bullion, but it is not your right.
- bmmayer1 5y ago
  Whether a government can do something is a different question of whether a government ought to do something...in any event you seem to be proving OP's point, which is that the ability of a government to do something is concerning in and of itself, regardless of whether one might feel an action is justified.
  - dragontamer 5y ago
    Lets just call the debate in terms of their actual terms. Is it a good, or bad, thing that we removed Russia from our collective financial systems? That's really all there is to it. If its a good thing, you need to be happy with the power to do so (and you must keep and protect the power during times of peace). If its a bad thing, then I'm curious why anyone would take Russia's side on this particular conflict. Its clear to me that the Russian economy is already getting pretty hampered due to these sanctions, so no one can really argue against their efficacy anymore.
isodev 5y ago
These are good examples of crypto tech trying to find a problem it can solve. There are much more sustainable ways to deal with situations like the ones you quote… none of which require a complicated use case misusing technology to create the illusion of independence or decentralization. For example, the peaceful cause you’re mentioning can be mitigated by providing better education and access to information for people in underdeveloped regions (e.g., clearly misunderstanding how medicine works or how to stage a peaceful protest).
boc 5y ago
I actually disagree. I think that democratic society should have the tools to wage economic warfare in the same way that they can wage kinetic warfare. Saying that it's "too bad" that Russian citizens are locked out of international financial transactions misses the point that they received that punishment because their nation invaded another nation. The social contract that citizens sign with their government doesn't guarantee them the right to untraceable global wealth. You have to use the currency of your nation to pay taxes and support your society. The Russian oligarchs that have profited from decades of draining wealth from the Russian people are potentially able to move their money via crypto, and you see efforts to stop that as "worrisome"? A world where currency isn't under the influence of nations is one where warfare is more likely to be waged by the oligarchs who feel none of the consequences.
- Teever 5y ago
  > The social contract that citizens sign with their government doesn't guarantee them the right to untraceable global wealth. You have to use the currency of your nation to pay taxes and support your society. Actually up until recently the social contract has anyone could put an anonymous coin into a newspaper box and pick up a news paper to read as much as they want without anyone knowing which articles they read and what they thought about them. Now we live in a world where the very basic act of consuming media is meticulously analyzed by hundreds of entities and logged for all time and that massive and that obsessive stalking behaviour is making its way into all of our transactions as we switch to digital payments. This wasn't the social contract I was born into and that goes the same for the current majority. I'm all for regulations that and actual enforcement of existing regulations against wealth people but don't try and tell me that the extension of digital surveillance to everyday little people transactions is anything more than a blatant power grab of unprecedented levels.
  - pjkundert 5y ago
    Sure it does. If you're one of the government-connected elites. Unlimited amounts of zero-tax wealth in non-extradition tax-free states. Just look at the Panama Papers. If you're a working-class slob, you get to pay 50%+ tax on every dollar you earn, and then get your after-tax money in your bank account frozen if you dare to contribute to a cause you believe in.
cheriot 5y ago
> law-abiding citizens While I wildly disagree with this description I do think international sanctions on Russia are an interesting test case for cryptocurrencies. Will normal people start using them when they're locked out of normal financial tools? Or are there more barriers to a wide use of crypto than boosters make it sound like?
panarky 5y ago
It's curious how advocates promote how crypto helps an aggressor nation evade sanctions, and how it helps purveyors of health disinfo to block bridges. Seems like these harmful and destructive use cases make most people hate crypto and despise its advocates. Wouldn't it be better for avocates to demonstrate the good crypto can do instead of how it enables ignorance and catastrophe? For example, how about crowdfunding bounties for Russian soldiers to surrender? Since rubles are becoming toilet paper, how about one full bitcoin to each soldier who turns in his vehicle and weapons. That might actually do some good and give crypto a more positive image among most people.
the_other 5y ago
The problem isn’t fiat currency it’s shitty government. If you have good government you wont have shitty fiat currency. Crypto is better on government getting worse whilst simultaneously absolving yourself of the responsibility of doing anything about it.
epgui 5y ago
I'm sorry, but comparing what happened in Canada to what happened in the other two is stupid, charitably speaking.
dghlsakjg 5y ago
> In Canada, we just went through a 10-day period where, in an afternoon, the government casually made it retroactively illegal to have supported a peaceful cause -- and began locking up peaceful, law-abiding citizens' bank accounts. No donor accounts were frozen according to the RCMP. And no verifiable information proving otherwise has arisen (tweets are not verifiable info). There were around 210 accounts frozen, belonging to less than 200 people. The majority of which were unfrozen after less than a week. The accounts belonged to those that were organizing or materially supporting a protest that had been deemed unlawful, or participating unlawfully in that protest. In other words the Canadian government briefly seized accounts that were being used to support a protest that was judged at least partially illegal by the courts system. Those affected by seizure are now allowed to request compensation under the same law that was used to seize the accounts. https://thehill.com/policy/international/595526-freeze-lifted-on-bank-accounts-linked-to-canada-protests https://thehill.com/policy/international/595526-freeze-lifte...
fleddr 5y ago
I think your comment raises a very good conceptual point which is completely missed by those responding. People should forget for a moment whether they agree with a protest/sanction or not, that's not the point at all. The larger conceptual point that people should think about is the extreme fragility of digital/online money. I'm old enough to have lived in a largely cash-based society, and I'm still only middle aged. In such a society, it is extremely impractical and difficult for any entity (government or business) to seize or freeze your assets. Now we have a dramatically different situation where with the push of a button, your fortune is gone. Could be because you joined the wrong protest. Or because you were born a Russian. Or because you live in China and didn't live up to social standards. The reasons will vary but in any case it's an extreme power grab by authorities. The assumption that you're a great person living in a stable country so it won't happen to you is naive. I'm under no illusion that it will not continue, but at the very least I think there should be laws protecting individuals against the arbitrary seizure of assets.

dragontamer 5y ago

Meanwhile, MLRS systems are leveling entire neighborhoods in eastern Ukraine. Hospitals are collapsing as rockets bombard their foundations, cluster munitions deployed and thermobaric warheads causing the 2nd largest explosions known to man (only 2nd largest compared to nukes). Yes. We, as a society, have decided (rather quickly too) to use our financial resources to do what we can to fight back against these war crimes. That's not a bad thing at all. The only other thing that may serve as a deterrence is a proper and full war. If you've got other ideas for a deterance, now is the time to issue suggestions. Complaining that we've found a non-war way to deter Russia and their actions is callous, when compared to the millions of lives who suddenly had their lives upended last week. ------ > Sorry, but anyone who doesn't find this worrisome is ... naive, for lack of a more charitable term. Of course its worrisome that we have to deploy offensive tools (albeit financial tools rather than actual bombs). But what other choice do we have? Are you saying that Russia shouldn't have to pay for what they did? Are you saying that we should just forget about Ukraine's pains? Etc. etc. Money is a social construct. That's a good thing, for times like this. No, we don't want to live in these times and wish that things were more peaceful. But if someone hits you or someone else... you have to respond and deter them from striking yet again. Basic diplomacy.

claudiulodro 5y ago

Paying no mind to the "charitable" brush you're painting these situations with, it seems you're making a great argument for, like, a stash of gold coins more than for crypto. That'll outlast any government or online-network changes!

pjkundert 5y ago
Yup, fractional gold and silver coinage is probably wise to have on hand. That, and systems that solve the "network partition" failure mode endemic to Global Consensus cryptocurrency systems: https://holo.host https://holo.host. In the mean time -- create and fund a personal Cryptocurrency wallet with secure and reliable SLIP-39 backup Mnemonics: https://slip39.kundert.ca/macos https://slip39.kundert.ca/macos

kelnos 5y ago

I do find it worrisome, but probably not quite the way you do. I think having this sort of power is scary, because power always ends up getting abused, as we see in Canada and China. But I can't really shed many tears for the situation in Russia right now, with the caveat that I hate that regular Russian people (many of whom are against the Ukraine invasion) are getting hurt by this stuff as well. Money isn't (and IMO shouldn't be) just something you have, for often arbitrary reasons, something that allows you to do whatever you want without repercussion. Russia's leadership should not have access to the world's financial markets after the actions they've taken. Cryptocurrencies could help enable their bad behavior in this case. Yes, crypto can also help insulate regular people from the bad behaviors of their governments. But it's not all positives. Financial system access is a lever that can be used to influence behavior. On the scale of current Russia-Western relations, there are not many viable levers. One of them is armed conflict. I would much rather we mess with Russia's financial system than start sending NATO troops into Ukraine, and risk starting WWIII.

dragontamer 5y ago
> But I can't really shed many tears for the situation in Russia right now, with the caveat that I hate that regular Russian people (many of whom are against the Ukraine invasion) are getting hurt by this stuff as well. I still shed a tear, even for the Russian soldiers. The poor Russian soldier who was killed had his text messages (to his mom in Russia) read out to the UN. He didn't know why they were attacking Ukraine, is "only following orders" kinda setup. He was flabbergasted at how much the Ukrainians were angry at him. And then he died in battle. --------- That doesn't mean that Ukraine should stop attacking the Russian soldiers. It is clear that they are being forced into this as much as everyone else. If Russia simply pulls back their troops to the Russian border, then this war is over. But as long as they're in Ukraine, the world has to use every means necessary to try to help the Ukrainians out. Even if it means killing Russian soldiers. I don't think they "deserve" to die, but what choice does Ukraine have?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
5y ago

gowld 5y ago

> locking up peaceful, law-abiding citizens' bank accounts. Did this happen, except in unsubtantiated tweets?

gruez 5y ago
1. AFAIK only a few dozen (I vaguely remember 70?) individuals were actually affected 2. that said, in the initial news reports, the criteria for who to freeze was quite vague. One source said >The emergency orders require virtually every participant in the Canadian financial system — banks, investment firms, credit unions, loan companies, securities dealers, fundraising platforms and payment and clearing services — to determine whether they possess or control property of a person who is attending an illegal protest or providing supplies to demonstrators. If they find such a person in their customer list, they must freeze their accounts and report it to the RCMP or Canada’s intelligence service, the regulations say. https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/emergencies-act-debate-parliament-weighs-declaring-a-public-order-emergency https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/emergencies-act-debat... That understandably made some people concerned. 3. regardless of whether they're actually "peaceful, law-abiding citizens" or not, that's for the courts to decide, not the executive branch.

dwater 5y ago

> In Canada, we just went through a 10-day period where, in an afternoon, the government casually made it retroactively illegal to have supported a peaceful cause -- and began locking up peaceful, law-abiding citizens' bank accounts. My understanding is that those citizens were using their money to support people who were intentionally blocking one of the main functions of a national government (regulating international trade). > In Russia, citizens have been instantly locked out of international financial transactions, and non-local currencies have become unavailable. It is likely that further, dramatic interventions in ingress/egress of wealth are forthcoming. Russians have no right to perform transactions using US Dollars, and as an American citizen I have no right to perform transactions in Rubles. Our governments regulate that (again, international trade). > In China, random decisions regarding the legality of Cryptocurrencies are regularly enacted. Huge businesses doing legal, ethical mining are one day accepted, and the next -- made illegal. In China, many government decisions are like that. Like when they overnight decided to restrict vehicle access to Beijing to try to reduce pollution leading up to the 2008 Olympics. I doubt actions like these come as a surprise to Chinese citizens. And, again, it's largely related to international trade. In our modern world of nation states, the individual citizen does not have unfettered access to all the world markets. Our governments place restrictions on trade, and they will do the same with cryptocurrency. You can try to evade it, either through bitcoin or gold bullion, but it is not your right.

bmmayer1 5y ago
Whether a government can do something is a different question of whether a government ought to do something...in any event you seem to be proving OP's point, which is that the ability of a government to do something is concerning in and of itself, regardless of whether one might feel an action is justified.
- dragontamer 5y ago
  Lets just call the debate in terms of their actual terms. Is it a good, or bad, thing that we removed Russia from our collective financial systems? That's really all there is to it. If its a good thing, you need to be happy with the power to do so (and you must keep and protect the power during times of peace). If its a bad thing, then I'm curious why anyone would take Russia's side on this particular conflict. Its clear to me that the Russian economy is already getting pretty hampered due to these sanctions, so no one can really argue against their efficacy anymore.

isodev 5y ago

These are good examples of crypto tech trying to find a problem it can solve. There are much more sustainable ways to deal with situations like the ones you quote… none of which require a complicated use case misusing technology to create the illusion of independence or decentralization. For example, the peaceful cause you’re mentioning can be mitigated by providing better education and access to information for people in underdeveloped regions (e.g., clearly misunderstanding how medicine works or how to stage a peaceful protest).

boc 5y ago

I actually disagree. I think that democratic society should have the tools to wage economic warfare in the same way that they can wage kinetic warfare. Saying that it's "too bad" that Russian citizens are locked out of international financial transactions misses the point that they received that punishment because their nation invaded another nation. The social contract that citizens sign with their government doesn't guarantee them the right to untraceable global wealth. You have to use the currency of your nation to pay taxes and support your society. The Russian oligarchs that have profited from decades of draining wealth from the Russian people are potentially able to move their money via crypto, and you see efforts to stop that as "worrisome"? A world where currency isn't under the influence of nations is one where warfare is more likely to be waged by the oligarchs who feel none of the consequences.

Teever 5y ago
> The social contract that citizens sign with their government doesn't guarantee them the right to untraceable global wealth. You have to use the currency of your nation to pay taxes and support your society. Actually up until recently the social contract has anyone could put an anonymous coin into a newspaper box and pick up a news paper to read as much as they want without anyone knowing which articles they read and what they thought about them. Now we live in a world where the very basic act of consuming media is meticulously analyzed by hundreds of entities and logged for all time and that massive and that obsessive stalking behaviour is making its way into all of our transactions as we switch to digital payments. This wasn't the social contract I was born into and that goes the same for the current majority. I'm all for regulations that and actual enforcement of existing regulations against wealth people but don't try and tell me that the extension of digital surveillance to everyday little people transactions is anything more than a blatant power grab of unprecedented levels.
- pjkundert 5y ago
  Sure it does. If you're one of the government-connected elites. Unlimited amounts of zero-tax wealth in non-extradition tax-free states. Just look at the Panama Papers. If you're a working-class slob, you get to pay 50%+ tax on every dollar you earn, and then get your after-tax money in your bank account frozen if you dare to contribute to a cause you believe in.

cheriot 5y ago

> law-abiding citizens While I wildly disagree with this description I do think international sanctions on Russia are an interesting test case for cryptocurrencies. Will normal people start using them when they're locked out of normal financial tools? Or are there more barriers to a wide use of crypto than boosters make it sound like?

panarky 5y ago

It's curious how advocates promote how crypto helps an aggressor nation evade sanctions, and how it helps purveyors of health disinfo to block bridges. Seems like these harmful and destructive use cases make most people hate crypto and despise its advocates. Wouldn't it be better for avocates to demonstrate the good crypto can do instead of how it enables ignorance and catastrophe? For example, how about crowdfunding bounties for Russian soldiers to surrender? Since rubles are becoming toilet paper, how about one full bitcoin to each soldier who turns in his vehicle and weapons. That might actually do some good and give crypto a more positive image among most people.

the_other 5y ago

The problem isn’t fiat currency it’s shitty government. If you have good government you wont have shitty fiat currency. Crypto is better on government getting worse whilst simultaneously absolving yourself of the responsibility of doing anything about it.

epgui 5y ago

I'm sorry, but comparing what happened in Canada to what happened in the other two is stupid, charitably speaking.

dghlsakjg 5y ago

> In Canada, we just went through a 10-day period where, in an afternoon, the government casually made it retroactively illegal to have supported a peaceful cause -- and began locking up peaceful, law-abiding citizens' bank accounts. No donor accounts were frozen according to the RCMP. And no verifiable information proving otherwise has arisen (tweets are not verifiable info). There were around 210 accounts frozen, belonging to less than 200 people. The majority of which were unfrozen after less than a week. The accounts belonged to those that were organizing or materially supporting a protest that had been deemed unlawful, or participating unlawfully in that protest. In other words the Canadian government briefly seized accounts that were being used to support a protest that was judged at least partially illegal by the courts system. Those affected by seizure are now allowed to request compensation under the same law that was used to seize the accounts. https://thehill.com/policy/international/595526-freeze-lifted-on-bank-accounts-linked-to-canada-protests https://thehill.com/policy/international/595526-freeze-lifte...

fleddr 5y ago

I think your comment raises a very good conceptual point which is completely missed by those responding. People should forget for a moment whether they agree with a protest/sanction or not, that's not the point at all. The larger conceptual point that people should think about is the extreme fragility of digital/online money. I'm old enough to have lived in a largely cash-based society, and I'm still only middle aged. In such a society, it is extremely impractical and difficult for any entity (government or business) to seize or freeze your assets. Now we have a dramatically different situation where with the push of a button, your fortune is gone. Could be because you joined the wrong protest. Or because you were born a Russian. Or because you live in China and didn't live up to social standards. The reasons will vary but in any case it's an extreme power grab by authorities. The assumption that you're a great person living in a stable country so it won't happen to you is naive. I'm under no illusion that it will not continue, but at the very least I think there should be laws protecting individuals against the arbitrary seizure of assets.