Freedom Convoy is a Good Incident for Bitcoin

This time, I'm going to explain "Freedom Convoy."

Freedom Convoy started when a group of truckers gathered in Ottawa to protest COVID-19 vaccine mandates for truckers.

Crisis of democracy

Please look at the following tweet:

The government can freeze the people's bank accounts who join "Freedom Convoy." What do you think about this? Let me explain in this article.

Table of Contents

  • 1. What's the problem with Freedom Convoy?
  • 2. Freedom Convoy is a Good Incident for Bitcoin

1. What's the problem with Freedom Convoy?

Freedom Convoy becomes bigger and bigger. The reason is below:

The Freedom Convoy demonstrations initially focused on Canada's vaccine requirement for truckers entering the country but soon morphed into a broad attack on COVID-19 precautions and Trudeau's government.

I don't know about the Canadian government and don't care about it much, but I care about the rights of freedom. But, unfortunately, the action of the Canadian government has a problem, so I'm writing this article.

The problem: freezing the accounts

I think the action of freezing a bank account is a big problem. It's out of control of democracy. Please take a look below:

The thing is that we need money to protect our rights. The action of freezing the bank accounts is like an "end game." The citizen cannot continue their action without money.

freeze the accounts ≠ absolute evil

I don't say that freezing the accounts is always bad. Sometimes it's a good decision. But the thing is "Due process." For example, take a look at below:

Jesse Powell is the CEO of Kraken Exchange, one of the biggest crypto exchanges. I agree with his opinion.

In this case, protesters have a problem because they block the bridge, which means that the problem of logistics happens. If that happens, it affects citizens' daily lives (e.g., causes inflation because of lack of daily essentials).

Sometimes, we need strong politics. But always, we need discussion before carrying it out.

The family of protesters is a victim

If your husband is a trucker and goes to the demonstration, I think you support him by sending money or food.

We need money and food when we do some demonstrations. So thanks to the support, we can make it possible to continue it. But please look at the sentence as follows:

Freeze the accounts of anyone directly or "indirectly" supporting the protests.

It means if you support protesters and then your bank's account has been frozen. What the heck is this? It's too much.

In this scenario, the government is always the winner without any discussions. Furthermore, the more bad things will happen.

Continuously being unbanked

This is a big problem. Can you imagine that you attend the demonstrations, and then you and your family's bank accounts have been frozen. In addition, the bank rejects you from opening a new account. HELL.

In this situation, no one would attend the demonstrations. It's a too high risk to attend. But, again, this is out of the control of democracy.

The future is worse

These days, you can hear the word "CBDC = Central Bank Digital Currency."

I agree with the future of CBDC, but we need to take care of our privacy. Because the government can track all of the money transactions in the near future. So, what happens next?

The government is too strong

Let's say a big demonstration happens in the future world that is completely adapted to CBDC. And then, the government stop will stop it easily like below:

  • STEP1. Specify the bank accounts of protesters
  • STEP2. Then, freeze them without further notice
  • STEP3. Then, freeze account related to that(e.g., Family's bank account)

That's it. And let's imagine that the world completely adapted to CBDC, which means people cannot use their cash. The protesters cannot live without CBDC.

The result? The protesters quit the demonstration.

Furthermore, the data of protesters will share with the financial institutions so that the protesters will add to the blacklist. As a result, they will suffer from being unbanked.

Crowdfunding is useless

Please take a look at the sentence below:

She created a GoFundMe campaign for the "Freedom Convoy" which raised millions of dollars before it was suspended by the platform.

The source is from CNN. You can see the raised funds have been suspended. This is happening in Canada, the country that loves freedom.

Additional bad news

The funds of GoFundMe had been suspended, so the funds went to another crowdfunding website, GiveSendGo. But unfortunately, the website has been hacked. And leaked the personal information of people who donated for the demonstration.

It is probably worth noting all of these people, from the donors to the hacker to the press, are now getting death threats.

The source is Pirare Wires, written by Mike Solana, famous as an entrepreneur and philosopher. Today, crowdfunding is kind of risky.

That's it for the first part. Next, I talk about Bitcoin.

2. Freedom Convoy is a Good Incident for Bitcoin

freedom-convoy2

Because of the Freedom Convoy, we realized the followings:

  • The government can take action ignoring the voice of the citizen
  • The government can freeze the bank accounts of protesters
  • The supporters of the demonstration also become the victim
  • Sometimes crowdfunding is dangerous coz of security reasons
  • The power of the government becomes bigger with CBDC

Many problems here, but we have a solution.

The solution: Let's use Crypto

Take a look at the tweet below:

Fortunately, we have a good technology today, which is Crypto. So, let me explain how Crypto solves these problems.

✓Problem1: The government can take action ignoring the voice of the citizen
--> We cannot solve this using Crypto.

✓Problem2: The government can freeze the bank accounts of protesters
--> We can solve this using Crypto.

✓Problem3: The supporters of the demonstration also become the victim
--> We can solve this using Crypto.

✓Problem4: Sometimes crowdfunding is dangerous coz of security reasons
--> We can solve this using Crypto.

✓Problem5: The power of the government becomes bigger with CBDC
--> We can solve this using Crypto.

Let's take a look one by one.

Problem1: The government can take action ignoring the voice of the citizen

We cannot solve this problem using Crypto. The people who stay in the center always have a strong power. This is inevitable.

So, we have to seek a way to resit it when the government seems to make a wrong decision. Without it, we'll see another Adolf Hitler in the future.

That's why we need Crypto. Let me explain more in the following paragraphs.

Problem2: The government can freeze the bank accounts of protesters

Crypto is non-custodial so that no one can freeze anyone's account.

Let's imagine your cash in real life. Is there someone who can freeze your cash? It's impossible, right?

In the near future, we will see the adoption of CBDC, which means the government easily monitor your money flow and freeze your account.

To escape from that or resist it, we need a way to secure the citizen's privacy. We can do this using Crypto.

Problem3: The supporters of the demonstration also become the victim

Please take a look at below:

This is the biggest problem In this sequence of events. Especially the below:

freeze the accounts of anyone directly or "indirectly" supporting the protests

But fortunately, we have Crypto. We have a so-called Privacy Coin(e.g., Zcash and Monero).

Of course, we can use Bitcoin and Ethereum to protect privacy. But, the strongness of privacy is not so big compared to the previous ones(=Zcash and Monero).

I guess the privacy coin is compatible with crowdfunding websites. So in the near future, we will see it.

Problem4: Sometimes crowdfunding is dangerous coz of security reason

The solution is Blockchain. No one can hack Blockchain because the database is decentralized.

  • Normal server: Centralized. Sometimes becomes a target of hackers.
  • Blockchain: Decentralized. No one can hack it. Secure/open database.

More details, there is a 50% attack, which is the typical attack for the blockchain. If someone has over 50% of a blockchain's hashing power, he/she can attack the blockchain. But famous blockchains, for example, Bitcoin and Ethereum, have a strong hash power. So the 50% attack is too difficult to do in reality.

Problem5: The power of the government becomes bigger with CBDC

We can prevent this using Crypto. It's like a division of power.

  • CBDC: Governments can hold their power.
  • Crypto: Citizens can hold their power.

So, it's a balance. We need CBDC. We need government. But also, we need Crypto. If there are no other choices, the situation is not good.

Let me explain using Big Tech. We are seeing the movement of Web3 which is the kind of escaping the govern from Big Tech.

I'm worried that the government will become the Next Big Tech using the power of CBDC.

The power of the Big Tech is data. They have big data so that they can control us using it. The government has already known it.

So, what's happening next? The government is the Next Big Tech. The government create CBDC and adapted it in their country, which means they have all money flow data.

If we don't have other choices except for CBDC, the power balance between the government and citizens is not fair. That's why we need Crypto.

Crypto = Cash of the internet

The article is ending soon, but before that, there is one topic I want to say.

Today's internet is not working well

Let's say if you donate your money to Freedom Convoy using a donation box in the convenience store, the leak of privacy cannot happen, right?

We can do this without internet technology. But if we use the internet, it's become difficult. Because of the risk of a cyber hack.

Why don't we have a "Cash of the internet," which is non-custodial, meaning an individual can save it without a bank and has privacy.

Cash of the internet is Crypto.

Without Crypto, the power is going to a central organization, for example, government and payment gateway company.

We need to improve today's internet, which is not mature yet. The future of the internet with non-custodial and privacy create a better world than now.

Lastly, thanks to 6529

Please take a look at below:

This is a very long Twitter thread that has value to read. This is absolutely inspired me to write this article. Thanks to the owner of the tweets, the name is 6529. Your opinion made a future world a better place.

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