Bitcoin and Human Rights

[ChiBitCTy]

Great article where human rights advocates fire back after “prominent” group of technologists write letter to US congress bashing cryptocurrency/blockchain ( https://concerned.tech/ ). What do you guys think about the letter written to US congress bashing cryptocurrency, as well as the human rights advocates support of bitcoin?

“ A week after prominent technologists publicly slammed crypto for being too risky and unproven in a letter to Congress, human rights advocates from around the world have sent a rebuttal to U.S. lawmakers defending digital assets for the access they provide to people in countries where “local currencies are collapsing, broken, or cut off from the outside world.”

Some 21 human rights supporters from 20 different countries said in the letter that they’ve relied on bitcoin and stablecoins, which allow the trading in and out of crypto without going through a bank, “as have tens of millions of others living under authoritarian regimes or unstable economies.

Bitcoin provides financial inclusion and empowerment because it is open and permissionless,” the latest letter said. “We are not industry financiers or professional lobbyists but humanitarians and democracy advocates who have used bitcoin to assist people at risk when other options have failed.”

https://www.cnbc.com/2022/06/07/human-rights-advocates-say-bitcoin-critical-in-authoritarian-countries.html

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[mk4]

Honestly, huge props to Alex Gladstein (Human Rights Foundation CSO). He's been promoting and has been a huge proponent for Bitcoin for a while now, despite knowing how sort of 'controversial' it is to the public to be on Bitcoin's side.

[GreatArkansas]

These kinds of advocates are great as they started talking about Bitcoin too, which means that Bitcoin is worthy and very important, especially during these times.
They will help to educate and for sure spread good words about Bitcoin, especially to some government groups. I would love to see more countries that talking about this and being involved.

[Kakmakr]

I am very happy that someone stood up against the giants of the industry....    They actually flashed their flaws in front of their face, because their interest is "Profit" ......and by them only focusing on "Profit" ...they excluded a lot of people from the financial sector. (Their view has always been... if you have money, we will support you... if you are poor, we ignore you)  

Well Done! I hope a lot of those people will sit there with red faces, because the world should not just be profit driven. We know what their agenda is..(money).. so Satoshi's technology filled a gap in the market.. that they deemed unprofitable.  

[Jemzx00]

Upon reading the article you've mentioned, both sides has their own reasonable opinions in regards with crypto. It is a good thing the more people and organization are fighting for bitcoin and the whole cryptocurrency. With the effects of inability of other countries such as Nigeria, Turkey and Argentina to their local currencies, Cryptocurrencies was able to provide assistance for them as well as with the current war happening with Ukraine and Russia. Whereas, Ukraine was able to receive was financial assistance through cryptocurrency.
However, the crypto critics also has their own reason such as the significant volatility on various crypto and NFTs. Also, with various hacking issues that have rose in the past few years which doubt them with the technology of crypto.
Anyways, I fully support crypto and I hope that the Congress won't make irrational decision of restricting access on cryptocurrencies as it will make a huge impact with its citizens.

[davis196]

I don't get it. So basically USA has to be a crypto-friendly country, because millions of people around the world live in countries where:

“local currencies are collapsing, broken, or cut off from the outside world.”

And also:

tens of millions of others living under authoritarian regimes or unstable economies.

This doesn't make any sense. USA isn't some global empire(despite being the actual global empire). The US legislation is NOT global legislation.
The cryptocurrency regulations in the USA have nothing to do with the millions of poor, oppressed people, who are living under totalitarian regimes. The countries with authoritarian regimes have their own laws and regulations.
The people, who are living in countries with weak national currencies and political oppression can still use cryptocurrencies illegally.

[Rruchi man]

“ A week after prominent technologists publicly slammed crypto for being too risky and unproven in a letter to Congress,

I come across articles like this and i feel sad, not for these prominent technologists, but the people who have taken them as role models and subscribed to their ideologies and now may just accept this their undercooked knowledge of bitcoin without wanting to find out on their own. Some of these people mean are very rigid traditional thinkers who do not easily accept change. 

Good work from those Human rights advocates taking action really quick to ensure that as the US Congress were quickly informed of what seemed to be disadvantages, they also needed to know the advantages that crypto holds.

[Uang_kartal]

maybe this is included in a petition which will then be forwarded to the government. Good cooperation between several people who care about bitcoin and unions in 1 leadership structure.
bitcoin (crypto currency) deserves to be voiced for empowerment, development and adoption.
between human rights and other rights to access, use and exchange in exchange.
I agree with other friends that if we do it together, it will make it easier to voice and fight. Bitcoin is a resource.
and as for any role bitcoin it is true too.

[so98nn]

That’s something good for the bitcoin ecosystem. God knows when Government will understand the real humanitarian value of bitcoin. 
They should understand that they can’t control it. Far stretched they can only impose few regulations now and then where it could be tax related, or perma ban. However, crypto still works under tunnel through p2p network. So loop holes will always be there.
It’s better they should act humanly and let us use it as and when required.

On bigger timeline there is not much impact on the centralised system so not sure why are they scared of?

[avikz]

It's indeed true! But you need to understand that every government is prominently funded by banks so it's no wonder that therr will always be a group within government that will support a complete ban on cryptos and will always highlight the deficiencies of crypto ecosystem. There will always be an external group as well to support such initiatives because banking wants to control everything and crypto will not let it happen. So we will always see such kind of issues unless a government clearly states their position on the crypto matter.

US is playing diplomacy since a long time on cryptocurrency. It's hugh time to declare their stand on it.

[Bttzed03]

I tried reading the letter submitted by the computer scientists, software engineers, and technologists but stopped reading further after this:

Blockchain technology cannot, and will not, have transaction reversal or data privacy mechanisms because they are antithetical to its base design. Financial technologies that serve the public must always have mechanisms for fraud mitigation and allow a human-in-the-loop to reverse transactions; blockchain permits neither.

^ I don't know about you but that is a complete opposite of what Bitcoin is all about (forget about other blockchains). If people supports what this group is asking the US Congress, maybe it's time leave crypto and go back to full fiat transactions.

[kryptqnick]

It's a good initiative, but they could reach out more more the human rights letter to make a stronger case. For instance, 20 countries is quite good, but why there are 2 people from the US and Russia and one person per country from other places? They could reach more organizations, make the list bigger. It would also help if they gave specific facts and examples (for example, in context of Ukraine they could mention that both the government and non-governmental foundations raise money to help end the war in cryptos, and that they've raised at least tens of millions this way).

[ChiBitCTy]

“ A week after prominent technologists publicly slammed crypto for being too risky and unproven in a letter to Congress,

I come across articles like this and i feel sad, not for these prominent technologists, but the people who have taken them as role models and subscribed to their ideologies and now may just accept this their undercooked knowledge of bitcoin without wanting to find out on their own. Some of these people mean are very rigid traditional thinkers who do not easily accept change. 

Good work from those Human rights advocates taking action really quick to ensure that as the US Congress were quickly informed of what seemed to be disadvantages, they also needed to know the advantages that crypto holds.

Yeah I feel the same way. I posted this article in a bitcoin discord group Im in last night and we were looking in to these “prominent” technologists and most of them are absolute nobody’s. The first guy we looked up on the list had like 12 twitter followers. This isn’t even something congress is going to take seriously.

[Next-door]

Watch now

[justdimin]

It's indeed true! But you need to understand that every government is prominently funded by banks so it's no wonder that therr will always be a group within government that will support a complete ban on cryptos and will always highlight the deficiencies of crypto ecosystem. There will always be an external group as well to support such initiatives because banking wants to control everything and crypto will not let it happen. So we will always see such kind of issues unless a government clearly states their position on the crypto matter.

US is playing diplomacy since a long time on cryptocurrency. It's hugh time to declare their stand on it.

Unfortunately banks do not fund governments, it is the other way around, governments fund banks. We have seen plenty of times when banks are not doing that well, and the government ends up helping them out and save them because they are getting bribed heavily by those banks. Hell even in 2008 crisis caused by banks, they gave out 800+ billion dollars worth of "loan" to them, and did they profited from it?

Sure they did, but if I ever bankrupt like that, I can bet you that government wouldn't just save me and give me a huge loan, and neither would any bank? Because if something is bankrupted, it's bankrupted, no need to save it for free, you either buy it out completely, or just let it die.

[Gyfts]

This doesn't make any sense. USA isn't some global empire(despite being the actual global empire). The US legislation is NOT global legislation.
The cryptocurrency regulations in the USA have nothing to do with the millions of poor, oppressed people, who are living under totalitarian regimes. The countries with authoritarian regimes have their own laws and regulations.
The people, who are living in countries with weak national currencies and political oppression can still use cryptocurrencies illegally.

I think the logic they're aiming for is that the U.S. should support crypto currency usage and expand the industry, which would promote other countries to use crypto.

Even then, it doesn't make much sense. Do the folks living in countries of oppression and human rights abuse really free themselves by having access to Bitcoin? Would people in Afghanistan benefit from using Bitcoin under the leadership of the Taliban? It's possible. The penalty for circumventing traditional currencies in these regimes might be death so I don't expect many Afghanistan residents to be liberated by having crypto in their wallets. It could help, just minimally if at all.

[pooya87]

Even then, it doesn't make much sense. Do the folks living in countries of oppression and human rights abuse really free themselves by having access to Bitcoin? Would people in Afghanistan benefit from using Bitcoin under the leadership of the Taliban? It's possible. The penalty for circumventing traditional currencies in these regimes might be death so I don't expect many Afghanistan residents to be liberated by having crypto in their wallets. It could help, just minimally if at all.

Most of the problems that people face in such countries have nothing to do with currencies and usage of bitcoin. For example AFAIK bitcoin is not illegal in Afghanistan, in fact many of them are using bitcoin freely and it is not solving the real problems they are facing such as terrorism which is sadly sometimes funded by the same "human rights" foundations!
Which is why I'm hesitant about being happy about these people suddenly advocating bitcoin in this context.

[Flexystar]

I think changes in the nature of currency usage, food, exchange for and idk what else, everything has it's own evolutionary timeline and this has to be understood by the controlling authorities. Yes we get it, there should be some sort of control over how everyone is using their money these days (laundering, drugs, crime etc) but have it ever stopped when we switched from stone to gold and gold to fiat and whether its gonna be any different if we go to the bitcoin in full fledged actions? I don't think so, and I am not sure why in the name of criminal activities, environmental hampering, they are always behind bitcoin's ban plot.

Good to see how these activists are bashing it. Hopefully this will increase multi folds in the future and resistance will come up from all over the world. May be this could initiate some sort of barrier against centralised side of the transactions.

[Zilon]

Both parties made their points and it is indisputable that crypto-assets are highly volatile and risky but it has saved lots of dying economies specifically in the African regions where their economy is suffering severe set back most especially Bitcoin and stable coins. The problem with Crypto asset lies in the numerous shitcoin failed projects that has stirred up more doubt for the crypto-cycle.

I am glad 21 human right activist who might not know much about the technology underlying the crypto-asset and how it functions were able to defend this assets because they have had the opportunity to make transactions using Bitcoin and most stable coin and saw the ease and transparency in their public ledger distribution. I wish there are mediums where Bitcoin could be made even more popular so the masses could also have a taste on how this decentralized assets work so they too don't just swallow all the hear from this tech experts

[glendall]

one thing that is good for the bitcoin ecosystem because human rights are the rights of every human being.
and this is a good cooperation from the supporters of bitcoin. hopefully bitcoin can be adopted mass later.