Bitcoin is not only for criminals/bad people and get rich quick!

[Lucius]

Some may disagree, but if you mention the word Bitcoin somewhere outside this forum, those who have heard something about it will probably have some bad associations that will be associated with various financial frauds, ransomware, the term fake money or even the claim that Bitcoin is responsible for climate change (due to mining). There are some truths in all this, but why just point out the bad sides that ordinary money has anyway, when we have very positive examples that not only Bitcoin, but also the people who use it are not bad at all, but on the contrary help the community.

I will only cite a few examples that I have noticed on this forum, and they relate to charity in general terms, but especially with an emphasis on the pandemic caused by the COVID-19 virus.

Someone donated 2 BTC (1 for each charity), which, along with other donations, made it possible to help hundreds of families. And all this, of course, mostly without asking for any recognition and in an anonymous way (as far as donations are concerned).

1 BTC donation & 1 BTC donation
Bitcoin donations saving Italian lives and helping to protect first responders on the frontline.

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[LFC_Bitcoin]

Dude, bitcoin hasn’t been seen as taboo for many years. Most of us here are good people simply using it as a tool for payment & or an investment.

[AB de Royse777]

1 BTC donation & 1 BTC donation

One of the received address is the project COVID-19 and I can tell you that so far we have served 190 families in two thirdworld county.
90 in Nigeria and 100 in Bangladesh.
We have also sent 100 masks and 100 pair of gloves in Iran too.

[20kevin20]

Dude, bitcoin hasn’t been seen as taboo for many years. Most of us here are good people simply using it as a tool for payment & or an investment.

That's just here, on the forum. It's usually associated with the darknet and the darknet is usually associated with "red rooms", "black markets", "hackers" etc. The image most have in their mind when you mention "Bitcoin" out loud is in almost every case one about some criminal activity. Unless you do a bit of research (which is just a Google search really), you'd have this idea from the MSM.

People tend to remember the bad stuff and forget the good.

[serjent05]

Dude, bitcoin hasn’t been seen as taboo for many years. Most of us here are good people simply using it as a tool for payment & or an investment.

That's just here, on the forum. It's usually associated with the darknet and the darknet is usually associated with "red rooms", "black markets", "hackers" etc. The image most have in their mind when you mention "Bitcoin" out loud is in almost every case one about some criminal activity. Unless you do a bit of research (which is just a Google search really), you'd have this idea from the MSM.

I believe the Bitcoin name is just dragged on these things.  Criminals will use everything just to do their bidding and sadly, they found Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies to do their bidding much easier.  And this criminal activity associated with Bitcoin was already in the past.  We can see Bitcoin now associated with legal merchants and accepted by the open-minded government.  

Aside from that, Bitcoin is seen by people not only here in the forum as a mode of payment and I think, there is much more people outside this forum who use it as payment.  Btw, isn't fiat currency have higher cases when it comes to corruption and criminal activities?

People tend to remember the bad stuff and forget the good. Smiley

Sadly, that is the truth, negative things linger much longer than the useful one.  Oh well, that is media for us.

[Bttzed03]

Some may disagree, but if you mention the word Bitcoin somewhere outside this forum, those who have heard something about it will probably have some bad associations that will be associated with various financial frauds, ransomware, the term fake money or even the claim that Bitcoin is responsible for climate change (due to mining).

An online friend recently asked me if I know bitcoin and I said yes. He then asked me if I joined bitcoin and I was like wuut!
I laughed at the other things he said after that (he was talking about some investment scheme) but I still ended up explaining to him that bitcoin not a company and that he doesn't have to join any group and invite people to earn. I hope he was able to learn from our discussion.

It's a fact that some ignorant/uneducated people are quickly drawn to quick income and there are those who takes advantage of that using bitcoin's popularity.

~
People tend to remember the bad stuff and forget the good.

Effect of too much TV/Media/Social Media I guess.

[Assface16678]

From the previous years of the bitcoin, we experience also came from the history of it that this is one of the payment methods into the dark web, deep web and more kinds of stuff that is more on illegal also by the included of the movies most of them are portrait the bitcoin as the use for bad payments but today by the time goes by it becomes more popular in terms of investment because the people see the other side and potential of this coin. Now we are using bitcoin as the payment and transaction method because of a lot of benefits of it like transparency, security, integrity, blockchain, faster transaction, and less tax.

Bitcoin is now changing the images of it because some of the people stated by the OP wants to become anonymous users but still they are helping other people which is a good aim.and changes the perspective of the other people to encourage to use this kind of coin for the near future.

Some may disagree, but if you mention the word Bitcoin somewhere outside this forum, those who have heard something about it will probably have some bad associations that will be associated with various financial frauds, ransomware, the term fake money or even the claim that Bitcoin is responsible for climate change (due to mining).

An online friend recently asked me if I know bitcoin and I said yes. He then asked me if I joined bitcoin and I was like wuut!
I laughed at the other things he said after that (he was talking about some investment scheme) but I still ended up explaining to him that bitcoin not a company and that he doesn't have to join any group and invite people to earn. I hope he was able to learn from our discussion.

It's a fact that some ignorant/uneducated people are quickly drawn to quick income and there are those who takes advantage of that using bitcoin's popularity.

~
People tend to remember the bad stuff and forget the good.

Effect of too much TV/Media/Social Media I guess.

Still some people becomes ignorant of the use of the bitcoin becomes of the mindset inserted on them because the bitcoin is came from the bad side only and they didn't see the possible potential of this coin to help them to increase their funds and elp other people.

[LeGaulois]

I stopped to talk about Bitcoin with people IRL, it's a waste of time. I'm tired of hearing people talking nonsense. Just repeating what they heard on TV, without even really understanding what they were talking about on top of that. And when you explain to them the reality to debunk it's like if you are lying. LOL.

From, Bitcoin is the official money of the dark web, only used by criminal, to it has no value, it's dead. You know, the same arguments we were listening to here...
(I know money talks more than a speech) I believe only Bitcoiners know BTC is not only for criminals.

Another older examples like in OP that a lot of us know are the donations for Hal Finney fund, or when Antonopoulos organised a fundraising campaign for Dorian Nakamoto (50BTC), and himself received 100BTC as a donation

[Krislaw]

Too much of wrong info from media is the cause of this. Fear created by the government is also part. When people hear the government threats, they would back off from listening to people preach to them.

Friends are the only set of people that can be easily preached to about cryptocurrency.

[asianguy845]

No, when I mention bitcoin to people, they don't think I'm doing something illegal or something.

Bitcoin is used because it's anonymous, and granted, that's good for criminals. But other people do use it for everyday things (Buying pizza with bitcoins, everyone remembers that right? ) or sometimes even good things (OP mentioned charity).
No, I think the age of people thinking bitcoins is only for criminals is gone.
Also, people also use bitcoin for fun or just for daily payments (since it is irreversible and efficient).

[dunfida]

I stopped to talk about Bitcoin with people IRL, it's a waste of time. I'm tired of hearing people talking nonsense. Just repeating what they heard on TV, without even really understanding what they were talking about on top of that. And when you explain to them the reality to debunk it's like if you are lying. LOL.

From, Bitcoin is the official money of the dark web, only used by criminal, to it has no value, it's dead. You know, the same arguments we were listening to here...
(I know money talks more than a speech) I believe only Bitcoiners know BTC is not only for criminals.

I agree on what you have said thats why i dont waste up my time anymore trying to convince out people on whats Bitcoin is all about.
Even my own family doesnt even believe me on what truly is it and just directly say that it is a scam or fraud.Trying out to educate but still
useless in the end of the day.

Even telling my co-workers in real life is still useless.They would make you look like some crazy old guy that been murmuring into something
that they dont know about and when you try to explain they do just argue you with nonsense without even trying to dig deeper.

As we all know, you cant please anybody!

[famososMuertos]

I am going to refer specifically to your title, taking your OP as the north or orientation of your idea, but not wanting to go much deeper than what you very well say in your OP.
__
The first movie I saw in which they talk about bitcoin is about of students who sold drugs and used Bitcoin for their online sales ... Hollywood accommodates everything and has a happy ending, in the history of the boys.

I would dedicate its title as a synopsis of this film because I would close it with the phrase… The good ones also fall at their feet ”, that is to say;

Bitcoin is not just for criminals / bad people and get rich quick! The good ones also fall at their feet ... or their nodes.

In reality it is what sells and in rumors from people to person, positive feedback gets stuck among those who understand it and the bad spreads more quickly among the ignorant.

[hatshepsut93]

I'm not seeing a lot of comments about Bitcoin being a tool for bad people, or some get rich quick scheme, but I do see opinions that Bitcoin is useless, that it's a failed experiment, that Bitcoiners are just crazy libertarians and so on.

I think the fact that Bitcoin is alive, traded for such a high price, and has so many people in its community  and even used by some merchants easily proves that it's not useless. Maybe it didn't bring the global financial revolution like early bitcoiners have hoped, but some adoption is better than no adoption at all.

[KrisAlex18]

I think it's not all about that thing, bitcoin is not only good for bad people or for doing taking things like hacking and scamming or even in the dark market that process some drug transactions, etc. There are some people who only use bitcoin fo normal things like a fiat currency, they just converted it into fiat currency so they can spend it for their needs and wants. There are some people who ate earning this kind of cryptocurrency through good things like freelance, online jobs, forums, trading, investing, etc. Its not all about the bad things because bitcoin can be considered really good for everyone.

Dude, bitcoin hasn’t been seen as taboo for many years. Most of us here are good people simply using it as a tool for payment & or an investment.

Well said, just like me most of the time I used it for online transactions, like paying bills, e-loading, buying some stuff. There are many usages that bitcoin can give us.

[20kevin20]

I believe the Bitcoin name is just dragged on these things.  Criminals will use everything just to do their bidding and sadly, they found Bitcoin or other cryptocurrencies to do their bidding much easier.  And this criminal activity associated with Bitcoin was already in the past.  We can see Bitcoin now associated with legal merchants and accepted by the open-minded government.  

Aside from that, Bitcoin is seen by people not only here in the forum as a mode of payment and I think, there is much more people outside this forum who use it as payment.  Btw, isn't fiat currency have higher cases when it comes to corruption and criminal activities?

Don't take this as a "I support criminals" statement, but without the Silk Road and all the illicit activity that happened through BTC on the darknet we maybe wouldn't have known today about its existence yet. Criminal activity is associated with lots of things, IIRC there was some kind of candy (or soap) cartel at one point

Governments aren't as "open-minded" as they seem imo: they push for a "legalizing & accepting Bitcoin" narrative while implementing rules that go against Bitcoin's fundamental ideas. And yes, you are right, fiat is used way more in criminal activity & corruption than Bitcoin is. Here's a quote from one of my older replies (will translate from Romanian):

In 2010, Australia spent $7.100.000.000 on drugs.
According to a study, Americans are spending approximately $150.000.000.000 per year on drugs.

Combine the two and just from these alone, just from Australia + USA, $157.100.000.000 are spent annually on drugs, those also being part of the "illicit activities".

Now compare this figure with the $1.000.000.000 used last year in BTC on the "dark web" for criminal activities.. yet the dollar still exists (..)

Effect of too much TV/Media/Social Media I guess.

Very true. That's the moment when you literally only take what you see on TV & MSM for granted without ever questioning a narrative. Sadly, too many people are going through this nowadays.

[samputin]

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. . .

It's a fact that some ignorant/uneducated people are quickly drawn to quick income and there are those who takes advantage of that using bitcoin's popularity.

And once dragged to such schemes and the outcome wasn't in their favor, the ending is that they would only see bitcoin as a tool of fraud, something bad, and not as something good. They're then too blind to see the benefits bitcoin can provide.

If only they would make a bit of an effort to learn about things first and not just go into something they know nothing or little.

[AB de Royse777]

Another older examples like in OP that a lot of us know are the donations for Hal Finney fund, or when Antonopoulos organised a fundraising campaign for Dorian Nakamoto (50BTC), and himself received 100BTC as a donation

We are seeing here amounts but there are donations that are not much as amount but still they are donations, there are donations which never been talked about in anywhere - I am pretty sure there are millions of cases we will find if anyone takes a project to find bitcoin donations.

If I bring the example of Project COVID-19 then you will find we are only talking about the 1 BTC donation that made but except that one there are more 20 entries I have in the spreadsheet and all of them are donations that came from good people.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/112dk74xnUlgMHSREP4Ny0kqwrRSEUSAHrGjMJVwXQfY/edit?usp=sharing
Row 7 to 36

Bitcoin is a currency like we have other fiats. It depends on the person how he wants to spend it.

[Lucius]

The purpose of this topic is for some to understand that Bitcoin has its other side, the much brighter and nobler one. I think I saw somewhere that there are about 7000 active users on this forum per week, maybe so many more are read by the forum without logging in. That’s a really small number of those who get some information about what’s really going on, and the rest are left to the mainstream media who write mostly about Bitcoin in a negative context.

For those who don't believe this is the case, try asking one of your friends, acquaintances or family members what they think of Bitcoin.

I stopped to talk about Bitcoin with people IRL, it's a waste of time. I'm tired of hearing people talking nonsense. Just repeating what they heard on TV, without even really understanding what they were talking about on top of that. And when you explain to them the reality to debunk it's like if you are lying. LOL.

That's right, I've even been called a criminal on several occasions because it's all one big scam, ponzi scheme or multi level marketing that will collapse sooner or later. After such things, I no longer want to enter into any discussions when it comes to crypto, not only because of discussions in which I always turn out to be a bad person, but also because of the security risk.

[Agios]

I think every object will have both good and bad sides, whether it's fiat money, knife, crypto etc, can be used to commit crime, but because Bitcoin has an anonymous or less transparent nature so people will find it easier to commit fraud and crime.

[bitbollo]

we are all aware about this, unless someone can't agree... but this is the reality.
I have discussed about bitcoin even in job interview or company meeting since I am feeling pretty sure about what I am talking.
If people are "fast to judge" bad it's not my fault

BTW about "criminals" also police know very well that just a very small portion of cryptocurrency has been used for trading illicit stuffs:

Just as example, 15 millions of euro (cash!) have been seized in Italy (find below more details, Italian language).
https://milano.corriere.it/notizie/cronaca/20_giugno_08/15-milioni-contanti-nascosti-muro-trafficante-droga-hashish-massimilano-cauchi-fd11763e-a97e-11ea-b9d7-2bd646fda8c5.shtml

It's very interesting declaration made by head of the Milano's DDA Alessandra Dolci that has run this operation:
"This is proof that international drug transactions, even those involving tons of drugs, take place only in cash. Narcos are often thought to use cryptocurrencies or elusive digital payments. This must ask us about the use of this money and its circulation ", explained the head of the DDA Alessandra Dolci.

«Questa è la prova che le transazioni internazionali di droga, anche quelle da tonnellate di stupefacenti, avvengono solo in contanti. Spesso ci si immagina che i narcos usino criptovalute o fantomatici pagamenti digitali. Questo ci deve interrogare sull’uso di questo denaro e sulla sua circolazione», ha spiegato il capo della Dda Alessandra Dolci.