As others have said, it's truly anonymous, it's not a fork of Bitcoin, fully open source, didn't require a trusted setup, is fully decentralized, and it's truly fungible. Most coins are not fungible. This is important because if a coin is not fungible, such as Bitcoin (Andreas Antonopoulos, a former BTC Core Dev, has talked about this. There's a link to it in the Bitcoin Mixer section of
https://moneroforcash.com/monero-vs-dash-vs-zcash-vs-bitcoinmixers.php), then coins can be marked and/or blacklisted. If you have coins that a government deems to be used in illegal activities, even if you had nothing to do with the activities, they can put pressure on the exchanges not to accept your coins. This has already happened in some instances. Now those coins are worth less than others. They're not fungible. That can't happen with Monero.
Plus, all transactions are private by default. There is no rich list...it's not possible with Monero. You don't want people knowing how much money you have even if you have nothing to do with drugs. An example used by Gingeropolis is that if you pay your rent in BTC, it's possible that the landlord could determine how much money you make and/or have. They could charge you more as a result. Or if people knew how much money you have, it could make you a target for theft, extortion, etc. If they knew how little you have, that opens the door for other potential problems as well. Most people wouldn't post their paystub or credit card statement online, but that's what happens when you use a transparent blockchain. While this is good for businesses, it's terrible for people. It's not difficult to analyze the blockchain to get a good idea of your spending habits and/or salary if paid in BTC. There are steps you can take to mitigate these risks, but it's not a possible risk with Monero.
There was a price spike when a few of the darknet markets started accepting Monero. This did not make Monero the real deal. Rather, it was recognition that Monero is the real deal when it comes to privacy and fungibility.
For me, it comes down to this: I don't believe others should know how much or how little I have, or where I spend money. With all of the hyper surveillance in almost every aspect of our lives, I want privacy.
