Bitcoin Forum

Is the system of cryptocurrencies helping to create a world caste system?  Caste systems or class systems have always existed in all organizations but the biggest exception has been the cultural, regional, monetary boundaries that existed between nations that prevented a person from easily hopping from one society to another and being excepted as the person within the same class (i.e.: a lawyer from one country moves to another and becomes a janitor due to different national laws and language).  By the way, I am not dissing janitors; I know a few who have worked their way to own their own janitorial businesses and are now millionaires.  English is widely becoming a world language.  Cultural boundaries are becoming thinner due to a growing population of international relocation and ...Youtube.  The last factor of this world-merge is a world currency.  It seems as though Bitcoins are becoming the first-world currency with other cryptocoins filling out other monetary values around the world.  I see this world-merge as neither good or bad.  A worldwide caste system would mean that the hope of moving to another region on earth to change one's position of life would be diminished, though changing one's position in life through hard work, education, and luck would still be possible.  A merged world would mean less wars but of course murders and other human ugliness would still exist; more people may also be on prescriptions such as anti-depressants and etc.  So why am I writing this?  Probably because I'm drunk. :D

unless bitcoin miners demand less transaction fees. then people trying to gather dust from faucets wont be able to start, or trade it much.

and only the guys moving 100's of coins would do so, because to them the fee's are 0.000001%

but for daily users wanting a 50c pack of gum. or in thailand a 40bhat beer the fee is about 2%-5%

I don't necessarily see it as a caste/class type of system. As long as exchanges and intermediaries exist between bitcoin and altcoins (with percent based exchange fees rather than flat exchange fees), I don't think it'll cause a financial schism effect as you're proposing. But I can imagine certain parts of the world being drawn to different crypto-currencies.

The socio-economic caste system was here LONG before cryptocurrencies.

Thanks, capitalism.

True, but cryptocurrencies may aid in combining all different caste systems to create a single caste system applicable to the entire world.  Which is neither good or bad, in my opinion.

Don't know what the hell you're talking about, but capitalism is already a worldwide socio-economic caste system. And again, it has been this way for a very long time.

http://thesocietypages.org/graphicsociology/files/2009/05/conley_champagne_distribution.png

Cryptocurrency is our first chance since the adoption of capitalism at changing this paradigm, do you understand?

This is the most exciting time we could possibly be alive. We will see more social evolution in the course of the next decade than we have seen in the previous five decades combined.

By comparison, even the internet is mere entertainment, child's play.

There is a legit use for alt coins:
Super-low transaction fees.

Why would bitcoin change capitalism?   Its just a proposed currency.   Not a economic system unto itself.

Decentralized banking and deflationary (gold backed) curency are pre Modern.   Didn't work back then so why would it work now?   Study the history of money and banking and you'll see

True free-market capitalism has NOTHING to do with today's conditions, since we do not have free-market capitalism.

Right now there are institutions that taking high fees from little people. I don't think income difference is same thing as cast system. For cast system you need to regulate it by law and execute it by force. I looks a bit like it in US since bankers get money from government from taxes of little people and little people get completely ignored after mass protests around the country. It was regulated by law in some way.

Altcoin and bitcoin will make bank system much weaker.

Yes, crypto-currencies will put the bank system on their heels. Although I'm not sure if it will make the system significantly weaker if banks somehow adopt bitcoin vis a vis new regulations/laws. But it is definitely true that bitcoins provide a chance for most people to leverage an advantage that the larger banks enjoy.

As a side note, income parity is not the same thing as a caste system (like you said). However, most caste systems were not regulated by law and executed by force. Most of the time, they were done via societal pressures and the laws were just codified to justify the established castes.

It seems you have accidentally stumbled upon Bitcoin's purpose for existing.  It's been known for a long time that the USD as a world reserve currency isn't sustainable and will implode.  Bitcoin is being allowed to exist as a eugenics program where people who are somewhat likely to be able to contribute to society are being given bus passes to the next stop.

If BTC ever becomes mainstream, it'll be because the banks put it there.

Any currency in our current economy cannot be sustained without large banks.

True Dat.

Your mythical "free market" capitalism is like Atlantis: It has never existed, and will never exist, because markets imply coercion, and coercion is antithetical to liberty.

Michael Albert will explain. He begins speaking 90 seconds into this video: http://vimeo.com/4041228 - Recommend watching for 10+ minutes.

Free markets do not imply coercion. Exactly the opposite. Free markets involve nothing but voluntary exchange.


I watched ten minutes. All I got was the guy explaining some microeconomic aspects of a single exemplar enterprise organized as some 'workers council'. I know several businesses organized in this manner working within our current capitalist (admittedly crony capitalist) system. I don't understand -- what's your point?

Such astounding naiveté. Your cup is full. Empty it. I'm afraid I cannot teach you any truths about capitalism until you have prepared your mind by unlearning the myths you have believed your entire life.

This is no small feat my friend, it is damn near equivalent to a theist unlearning religion. I wish you luck in this intellectual journey, as it will surely be forced upon you in the decades to come.

P.S.
If you haven't found ten minutes enlightening, consider watching beyond ten minutes. It is a two part series with a full three hours of lecture and discussion. Here is part 2 (http://vimeo.com/3998605), if you ever get there.

Is Bitcoin attracting enough concern trolls to create its own singularity?

How do you propose I 'unlearn the myths' without you providing any actual information?

Or do you think that a drive-by firebombing equates to an argument?

eta: you have failed to address the point that your suggested ten minutes of your linked video failed to add any value to this discussion.

Become your own teacher (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yhzNhLgPX9o), and you will answer your own question. Were you not born a curious creature?

Truth is all around you, all you have to do is take off the blinders of indoctrination. No, this will not be easy. It will be slow and painful, and in the end you will be consumed by furious compassion.

I have no illusions that I can convince you of anything, this is after all an internet forum. I'm only here to plant seeds of doubt, in the hopes that a few readers will nourish them and allow them to grow.

Resistance to change and fear of the unknown is perfectly normal. All I ask is that you recognize fear when it arises in your mind, and do your best to route it out. Once the fear is gone, only truth remains.

You are the first ParEcon advocate I've come across on these boards.

I want to be explicitly clear that I do not believe pareCon is the be-all end-all of economics. I only want to demonstrate that, contrary to popular belief, capitalism is not the be-all end-all of resource distribution.

Those who believe capitalism is "the only way, the best way", are very much alike those feudal lords who believed the same about the Divine Right of Kings.

Economics is a collection of rituals and myths, capitalism is the modern manifestation of our acting out these rituals. Remember my original premise... capitalism is poor science.

If a first-time visitor to this planet were to evaluate the way we humans distribute resources in an objective, empirical manner, they would surely be flabbergasted.

Modern capitalism incentives terrible behavior that is bad for everyone, and only marginally good for the tiny handful of elites who benefit. Even for them, the benefits are often fleeting.

Consider this: Why is charity such a central and inextricable feature of modern capitalism (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpAMbpQ8J7g)? Try to imagine a capitalist world with NO charity whatsoever.

Millions (more) would starve, and bloody revolution would not take long at all. Is it not inherently self-contradictory to have a winner-takes-all system with an escape valve of giving back spoils to the loser?

Well, you basically have three choices for a distribution system, centrally planned, market, or managed by the actual individuals taking part in the economic activity. This is the alternative to having a remote individual who merely benefits from the generated surplus rather than participating in production themselves.

ParEcon is a way that individuals can "work for themselves" collectively. This is a pretty solid basis for a social system, if you ask me.

Superior to our modern dog-eat-dog hierarchy and exploitation-based system, that much is certain.

I agree that this is the case in the present, but I think after a cycle of several generations, this could be completely switched around. I wouldn't be surprised if the ideology behind big banks is completely turned after a few hundred years. But while we are all still here, the status quo will mostly be intact. (After all, there are quite a few big banks in the US that have been around for as long as the country has existed.)

It's basically just using actual democracy for governance instead of a system of "show democracy" that is really controlled by business cartels.

In the current system private capital makes almost all economic decisions, builds the entire infrastructure of social production, controls the media that informs the public, and manipulates markets to serve their narrow interests so basically what is left is voting for the blue talking head or the red talking head, both of whom work for the special interests that have captured the entire bipartisan system.

PareEcon is one path of avoiding this outcome. The creators have purposely left it open ended to the user can adjust the concept for their unique criteria, and that is the major step it takes beyond current sociopolitical thought, for the most part. That is why I find the concept interesting anyway.

Oh cut with the crap. Now you're just being evasive.

I've been my own teacher since I awoke somewhat before the turn of the millennium. I've already dug out from under layers of indoctrination on several topics. I'm willing to consider another viewpoint, but you've got to give me a starting place. Your vaunted ten minutes of whomever Michael Albert was absolutely worthless in this regard. And your Matrix reference even less so - was that meant to waste my time?

People from different ends of the spectrum have diverging definitions of the word 'capitalism' - which is why I've not challenged any behavior attributed to capitalism in this thread.

However, I did make an assertion about free markets. The concept of 'free market' is quite easy to understand - the unfettered and completely voluntary exchange between parties according to each of their desires and capabilities.

Unless you have a differing definition of the free market, then free markets are by definition free of coercion.

So tell me which aspect of this understanding is incorrect, lest I brand your initial response to me as nothing but trolling.

edit: see underline & strikethrough

Your definition of "free market" is about as close to reality as on-paper socialism was to the reality of soviet "socialism" under Stalin.

Therefore, your definition is worthless, and totally without merit for any discussion.

Look, the problem I have with debating capitalists about capitalism is this: In my experience, it is very much akin to debating theists about god. They vehemently defend the idea without critically thinking and reject any suggestion that an alternative could or would be better. I've long since learned my lesson about debating the indoctrinated believers of myths.

Please don't take it as a sign of disrespect that I won't struggle to convince you how awful capitalism and "free" markets are. The truth is though, it's pretty goddamn awful. mgburks77 is spot on in his/her analysis two posts above.

I'll leave you with this to think on: 850 million people on this planet are malnourished or starving RIGHT NOW. There is no argument in the world that can justify this cruelty and indifference, especially when you consider how much food our planet produces (http://www.ted.com/talks/tristram_stuart_the_global_food_waste_scandal). We COULD feed them, we CHOOSE not to, because of the profit motive of capitalism.

If you're genuinely interested in learning about anti-capitalism (which I doubt), read an Anarchist FAQ section C (http://www.infoshop.org/AnarchistFAQSectionC).

thx