Luxury can wait

While the FUD be strong, the road be long.

Last night I was with some friends on a terrace having a cider. The last time I did this was perhaps two years ago and it was nice to get out for a couple hours after the workday and shoot the breeze in the rare warmth and sunshine. Today, it is raining again.

There were only there of us there and while they are quite liberal in their thinking in many ways, when it comes to the economy, it is quite the opposite. I find this interesting, where someone can want freedom for individual decision making and expression, yet simultaneously do not see how not having financial freedom (this is much more than just having enough money) greatly limits a person, restricts them through economic pressure and slavery.

What is it that is so hard for people to accept when it comes to freedom of economy, why is a decentralized currency so hard to accept? Is it a question of ignorance, an unwillingness to take responsibility, the desire for convenience? When the world is crumbling in so many ways, when the wealth gaps are increasing and more and more people are becoming disenfranchised, disillusioned, depressed - Why is there so much resistance to trying something different? Why is even talking about these things seen as inflammatory with so many people?

Perhaps it is that most of us don't want a cure, we want relief. We don't want to actually solve the problems, we want someone to give us a pill so we feel better, feel less pain, feel as if we have agency, feel like we matter. Instead of actually improving the underlying systems, we act at the surface level only.

Over the years I have heard many of my friends talk about clothing, something I used to be far more interested in. We would be at a shop and one would say to another, "that dress is slimming on you". I think we have all heard these kinds of things somewhere - dark colors, cinched wastes, size and direction of stripes etc. However, none of these things are slimming, they just give the impression of making a person look slimmer whilst wearing them. The only thing that is actually "slimming", is losing size.

This is an analogy for most things though, because losing size takes effort, time and requires personal changes to routine, something that most people do not want to do, even when they want to do it. Everyone wants better results, but when it comes to acting toward it, it isn't worth their real attention. They do pay attention at the surface level, they do talk about what they read in the news or complain about the rich getting richer, but that is them feeling like they have agency, even though it is a flaccid action - it is putting on black dress that gives the illusion of changing contour lines.

For most of the things people find important and would like to change, are able to be influenced through consumer decisions. If you do not want to make the rich richer, stop consuming in ways that push money into their pockets. If you want to stop using oil for personal transport, makes consumer decisions that move away from doing so. If you want social media to improve, stop supporting platforms that are not acting in a way that you support - it literally is, be the change through consumption.

People want a healthier economy, yet what they consider "better" has conflicting ideas involved. They want more money in their pocket and more less economic disparity and less global poverty, but they want their country to be successful, even if it increases poverty and disparity in others. Currency and centralized control of individual's financial capabilities is a large part of the problem, as it takes a lot of the ability for people to consume differently away from them through restriction of options. A decentralized currency and economy that doesn't care about who or where it is used, opens up options and gives the responsibility to the user.

Perhaps this is what people are so scared of - once we have the responsibility of making our own decisions, we will have to face the fact that we are part of the problem and always have been. Firstly, we are part of the problem in what we buy, then we are part of the problem in not pushing for a change at the foundation level so that we are able to buy differently. For most, all that is really cared about is that they as an individual has what they want. Even when it is impossible, that is the goal being driven.

I will work hard for what I desire, in a system that makes it almost impossible for me to get what I desire, but never actually take any practical measures toward improving the system. I will use my value to satisfy surface level goals so that I feel like I am succeeding, even though fundamentally, I am not changing at all and quite likely, degrading. I will buy a larger shirt that makes me look slimmer, so I don't have to eat better or exercise. And next year when I don't fit into that shirt anymore, I will buy the next size up.

The crypto markets are depressing to watch at the moment, and it isn't just because I have watched massive amounts of value drain away over the last months. The real heart-wrenching thing is that it is indicative of the industry itself, where people are making the decision to pull away from change and drive themselves deeper into the status quo - the place where the rich get richer, the growing poor increasingly suffer. It is human nature, isn't it? Protect the self at the expense of others. If this was already a decentralized global economy, it would actually work quite well, but because it isn't it just becomes more oppressive.

This is the catch-22 of shifting over to a new economic model that empowers the individual, because it takes the majority of the world to collectively agree to make the change.

Taraz [ Gen1: Hive ]