Bitcoin Forum

Every once in a while — most recently with the collapse of online exchange site Mt Gox — the world starts paying attention to Bitcoin, the hacker-project-cum-digital-currency that has garnered the love of a certain subset of people on the internet. Who are those people? According to an online poll from Simulacrum, the average user is a 32.1-year-old libertarian male. By users’ accounts, those men are mostly white.

Breaking that down, about 95 percent of Bitcoin users are men, about 61 percent say they’re not religious, and about 44 percent describe themselves as “libertarian / anarcho-capitalist.” On the last point, the political ideology of Bitcoin users is evident from the fact that the whole idea behind Bitcoin is that it segregates economic markets and currency from a country’s government. Bitcoin aims to be a universal currency, connecting people “peer-to-peer” instead of through set institutions. It wants to replace our current economic system and practices in their entirety — changing the way we buy goods and distribute money. The libertarians, or anarcho-capitalists as the case may be, don’t trust the government to handle their money. They’re the same people who want to “end the fed.”

Those libertarian tendencies are generally held by white men. “Compared to the general population,” an American Values survey reported last year, “libertarians are significantly more likely to be non-Hispanic white, male, and young.” Specifically, 94 percent are white, and 68 percent are men.

Why does Bitcoin specifically have this demographic makeup? Well, there’s a fair amount of privilege built directly into the currency: In order to buy the sometimes wildly expensive currency, Bitcoin users need to be wealthy. And they can afford to put their wealth into a currency that isn’t widely accepted or even recognized. Plus, they move easily through the financial and digital space — the process of “mining” bitcoins demands it; it is all about knowing coding and decryption and how to use an exchange. The sum total of these things — advanced knowledge of computer science, wealth — are also markings of the young, white male.

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2014/02/27/3341411/bitcoin-privilege/

they are not really wise in using brain

Comment backup:
I have practically no advanced knowledge of computer science, am poor (but refuse all welfare), and a white male. But hey, using surveys non-representative of worldwide demographics, is all you need to justify defamation of and infringement upon those who want to exercise fundamental liberties, including economics.

Bitcoin is a great means of establishing wealth for population that wishes to resist government oppression and tyranny, but it can never practically be used as a tool to end this.  Bitcoin does not end the extraordinary disparity of wealth.  As it stands, a handful of people own vast amounts of bitcoins with a relatively low adoptance throughout the world.

If this were to become mainstream as a global standard of commerce, we would find ourselves with the same state of existence where a majority of the wealth is in the hands of few people and the remaining population has relatively very little.

Furthermore, it would be very simple for a couple banksters to drop their wealth into bitcoin and buy up extensive amounts of the market and thereby withholding their power and influence over the world.

Bitcoin was a wonderful tool to spread free market as well as decentralized ideology while simultaneously enriching the liberty aspiring common man, though it can not and will not bring us the change we envision in the world.  Bitcoin's purpose has been fulfilled.  To truly find freedom, peace and a lasting change in humanity, we must relinquish our greed based society for one structured around love and sharing.  The greatest advancements in human history await the day we act as the family that we are, that is when we will truly reap the rewards of what we are seeking.

Think Progress is racist.

The Facebook comments should suffice in describing how horrible this article is. The minute the writer tried to include the premise that Bitcoin enthusiasts use the currency to sway away from traditional banking systems ONLY because they are including "women and people of color" was the minute the facepalm came up.

I often wonder if these blog posts are deliberately and completely ignorant just to gain media and publicity buzz.

Some of us bought Bitcoin when it was less than 20 dollars.

You can still buy less than 20 dollars worth of Bitcoins and probably do nicely in the future.

I'm not rich (far from it) yet I own Bitcoin. All the people I know who do have a lot of money don't want to put money in Bitcoin because they believe in the established order and hold their money in a "secure" savings account. They have 0 Bitcoins.

HA!

it is racist :D

just kidding, the bitcoin community has plenty users from all nations and therefore making everyone wealthy and full of prosperity, nothing racist to see here :)

They should repeat the survey in China

Middle class, unemployed white male and also refuses welfare out of principle and the fact I just don't need it because me and my family get by on careful money management, I also follow a mixed ideology of Libertarianism as well as Anarchism and have had to re-learn basic mathematics and most thinks at home because school failed to 'educate' me properly and also their books have quite a bit of propaganda in them. I am mixed in my way of thinking as well when it comes to tackling problems but I tend towards right brain stuff like Art and Jewellery but I do like dabbling in extremely logical things because stuff like mathematics tends to only have one correct answer.

Maybe we should make a list to make people like this woman look foolish, if I were rich I wouldn't be here and I'd be hanging out in Japan :P

Well, that's a ridiculous error or lie.

I know many people who have half or a tenth a bitcoin.  They are not wealthy, they just have some and trade it for stuff.  Then they get on somewhere like coinbase and get another hundred dollars worth of coin.

But one think you can take for sure.

ThinkProgress is told what to say, and this is what they were told to say.

"Think Progress". With such a name one would think they would be Occupy WS lovers, not banker gangbangers. Just on principles. This tells you who their real masters are.

"Racist" is the liberals new favorite word, They throw it around very loosely at people that disagree with their views.

"Oh you don't like Obama? You're a racist!"

Actually, it's something that everybody on the internet does now, remember when everybody ( mostly Americans ) who had a disagreement called people Nazis? It's kind of like that but that got either too old or ridiculous to throw around now so they've stopped it and moved onto racist instead.

Funny thing is though that Americans still like to use the word 'Liberal' like it's an insult when it comes to people they disagree with, yes, I really do think this is the kind of shit only Americans tend to do.

Err... What? ;D

The word "liberal" is not an insult for many americans; those who believes average humans cannot move around without being ordered by a centralized power with billions of red tapes. "Liberal" or "progressive" is the same thing in the US.

The word "Liberal" is an insult only for any human with a brain :-)

In Europe being a liberal means that you are pro-business, anti-taxes and for a smaller government.

In the US it means the exact opposite.

only if you consider NSA loving, privacy hating censors of freedom in the US "liberal".  But I'd have some trouble putting that under "liberal social policies".

"Liberal" used to mean standing up for basic constitutional rights.  Now it means getting around them any way possible or outright ignoring them to suite the fancy of the current Fascist Obama.

Haha I like all the racist assumptions made that go into the conclusion that Bitcoin is racist.

Bleh, your post beat mine by 3 hours somehow:

Far leftist Jewish woman goes on racist rampage against "white male" Bitcoiners

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=493800.0

again, replace "Bitcoin" with "Early internet"

Breaking that down, about 95 percent of internet users are men, about 61 percent say they’re not religious, and about 44 percent describe themselves as “libertarian / cyberpunk.” On the last point, the political ideology of internet users is evident from the fact that the whole idea behind the internet is that it segregates telecommunications and information systems from a country’s government. The internet aims to be a universal network, connecting people “peer-to-peer” instead of through set institutions. It wants to replace our current telecommunications system and practices in their entirety — changing the way we get information and provide newscast. The libertarians, or cyberpunks as the case may be, don’t trust the government to handle their propaganda. They’re the same people who want to “end the information monopoly.”

I don't get extra bitcoins for my post. There is no competition. I will check out you link now  :)

Am I the only one here who is deeply disturbed that a person with these views exists?--let alone all those who agree with her.

How does a person like this happen?

The "Nature Versus Nurture" debate is still hot, all the way back from Plato, but those type of people have always been around us. When they finally get into power lots of blood starts spilling usually. The label "progressive" does not really matter, although I am having fun with it.

it's both, nature and nurture, I sometimes don't understand why this isn't obvious to some people.

Still, I don't think it takes a genius to realize the relationship between skin pigment and life-after-birth has very little to do with nature, aside from the determining factor as to what that pigment will be; in the very least, it's not as extreme as this lady is trying to make it.  This article is written by a person who sticks with her own "kind", for I can see no reason why a person who actually interacts with a diverse group would ignore all empirical evidence to the contrary and instead opt for stereotypical fantasies; in other words, it's always the closed-minded racist who is first to project her racism upon others.

Then ask Think Progress to donate their members assets to the deprived groups.

Hey "willy" I like that! ;D

Do you think it's daft because she's being racist/stereotypical only towards whites? Because the interesting thing is she says the exact opposite of people of colour and of women, claiming that they want small government and need support to be financially successful.


If she's not a racist or stereotypical, she is pretty stupid.

She has a condescending personality to say the least.

So maybe this just falls into the general category of "yet another reporter gets bitcoin wronger than wrong".  But I so like the other interpretations....they are so much more, well, fun....

and, like I was wanting to be in the Fun Percent....

No, this is incorrect.  Stereotyping does not require explicitly stating the "all", whether in a pejorative or positive use.  The "all" is readily implied.

The very use of phrases such as "rich whiteys' and "women and people of color" interjects the racial divide right into the middle of the conversation.

So I can't see how it is anything BUT a racist commentary.

If I reversed the comments, and wrote an article about "The long heritage of outstanding Caucasians in our community" WITH "Those black ho's"  and "Those black homie street gangsters" how would you like that?

Bam! There it is.
They seem to only have surveyed Americans. Using their logic I have determined the following facts about BTC:

1. Most bitcoin users are overweight.
2. All bitcoin users live in capitalist democracies.
3. Virtually all bitcoin users speak English.

Nope. She is not stupid. She is racist.

She holds extreme anti-white views, which is clear from her previous articles.

No, she doesn't have a point there, except at the top of her dunce cap. I hardly have a "good understanding" of finance, computing, and cryptography.

Yeah...no. Bitcoin is used by computer nerds. Computer nerds are mostly while males. Here, they just happen to be libertarian computer nerds, or computer nerds whom Bitcoin converted to libertarianism (like me). I think it's computer nerds who are racist  ;D

Most computer's skin color is white or of a beige descent. Apple tried to hide this tragic statistic in the past with their Black Macbook and now their latest Mini Babel's Tower of Perdition called the Mac Pro. But people like the lady from ThinkProgress won't be fooled again! Oh Noes!

Nerd's tools are racist.

Accurate re-write

Libertarians have above average skill and honest income, so Bitcoin is currently attracting them in large numbers.
ps. We appear to frighten the females  :D

No. Not the females. Just "her"

Above average skill and honest income would attract females, wouldn't it?

But the writer does have a point:  If your race/ethnicity/whatever were screwed from generations of free stuff handed to you in US dollars, why would you get involved in an alternative currency? 

TOTAL BULLSHIT!

I don't even know where to start.  The fundamentals of bitcoin are that it can be used on smart phones, and that it can be used in places far away, like Africa, and that it is useable for small transactions.

Thus it is the most powerful tool for economic and hence social justice ever invented.

And by the way, the lecturing on racial constructs wears thin.  Unless you've walked around some cities in Africa a bit...well let's put it this way.....even average blacks from the US doing just that are "rich whiteys".

Best part of this thread.

It is absolutely stunning to see self righteous anger these self styled progressives can build up.  I get the opportunity to watch this every day living in western Washington.  Interestingly the author claims that even though they have been wronged by the traditional banking system, the "unprivileged" would not want to to try a decentralized form of financial services.  Interestingly she leaves out the fact that government meddling in the traditional financial sector, promoting the increase in subprime lending precipitated a major financial crisis.  This crisis disproportionately affected those of lower means.  Instead she rails against things like payday lenders as if they are somehow comparable to bitcoin.  She also conveniently leaves out the presence of bitcoin communities in China and South America.  Last time I checked, there were not a bunch of non Hispanic white men in these areas.  Including individuals in these communities would unfortunately skew her numbers making her case for bitcoin as racist tool narrative incorrect.  All in all, the author is sadly ignorant about bitcoin.  Our banks touched off a global financial crisis and they still exist.  One bitcoin related service collapses and the author is about to piss herself with glee because thinks it proves her most hated demographic wrong, the white male. 

Ultimately, selling victim hood is a big business.  In a country such as the US, with a large diverse population, you prop up a group like white males, as some omnipresent boggie man, and then market literature promoting said stance to the rest of people.  I can't believe it hasn't been noted yet, but Think Progress is run by the center for american progress action fund.  This is the political funding arm of billionaire banker George Soros.  If I had to speculate, I would say this is simply a hit piece by a author who knows who pays for her dinner. 

 

Soros = CAP = Tprogress = Hit piece, calling bitcoiners racists, thus Soros = hit piece on bitcoin community with proxy puppet. Yes he is aware of it and wants to discredit it while "he is not to anyone's knowledge meddling with bitcoin"

Center for American Progress is a broader base group than Soros, it's where the current White House gangsters basically came from.

If we are seeing a shaping up of the beginnings of an orchestrated sentiment here along the lines of the....

"progressive left = bitcoin is evil"

...that is interesting...

What is the most amazing thing is, not knowing anything about bitcoin way back when,  I really thought it was a "product" from Occupy Wall Street (the smart ones, not the ones under the tent called "rape free zone)*
"Those lefties created bitcoin I am sure. They will use it to make OWS desires a reality" I used to think. Then I got into it and realized it was beyond any policital movement but a true paradigm shift if its potential is trully realized.. ANYWAY :D

Now it seems the progressives (the one in power and the one on TV, maybe not those here who believe in BTC) are actually defending the banksters, no matter what. How strange. Maybe I am reading this wrong...

* http://therealrevo.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/womens-safe-tent.jpg

I sort of doubt Soros would be anti-Bitcoin, considering how much anti-communist, anti-Totalitarian, and anti-shitty-government currency he is. My guess is he would still be undecided about it at this point.
Soros is not quite the boogie man the far right media paints him to be.

He is definitely anti-not-my-kind-of-communism, anti-not-my-kind-of-totalitarianism and so forth.  Obviously, he has worked with Obama to instigate totalitarian control systems in the USA.

He has always worked to subvert the US Constitution and has not a bit of respect for it.

People think the SATs are racist because they "use words designed to confuse minorities". If you can claim this and get people to believe it, you can claim anything is racist.

I thought he became the boogie man when he...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Wednesday

And of course all of those...
http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=58f_1289451491

Far right media is pretty powerful if none of these are true  :)

Source? From what I read about him, his actions, and the way things were reported about him, I got the sense that he viewed the Republican right as control-your-life corporatist big government crony types, and supported the more liberal side. I agreed with him: of the two sides, Republicans and Democrats, the Republicans have seemed way more imperialist, totalitarian, and downright crazy over the last decade. Moreso than democrats. And since he was supporting democrats and opposint republicans, the far right media painted him as some crazy socialist, communist, antibusiness boogieman type, despite him putting a ton of effort into undermining communist and totalitarian regimes. I always thought it was rather funny and ironic that Fox News pundits called him an Obama supporting communist, considering how much effort and finance he contributed to the downfall of USSR, and how anticommunist he is.

What you've typed above is in no way descriptive of Soros's career.  What I have bolded above in your post is ridiculous.  What you've spun off my comments is inaccurate.  See my bolded statement.

Most of the first Prius owners were white males. Should we all avoid buying a Prius because of the racial makeup of its early adopters?

Tesla?

The Internet?

I'm not totally sure, but I guess most people buying suntan lotion are white. Maybe the cosmetic firms which produce them are racist, too.

The black kings and emperors of Africa never freed their slaves.

The White President of the US, Lincoln, did.

Hmmm.... Deep.

Have never think about Btc in this way before! I am suspecious the it is so

Send me all those btc of yours as I may be a Grand Dragon from Louisiana...

Really? What else?

Here a lot of dialogue include racial discrimination, annoying.

Totally agree about your vision regarding what ThinkProgress is saying about the whole bitcoin ecosystem. Sad...

Well i have a feeling that many of us think that they are ignorant no I assume that makes us even?