Excessive authoritarianism is scary but the thing that people should really wake up to is the nuclear combination of authoritarianism and digitization.
As an example, capital controls.
I grew up in the 80s, which was largely cash-based. You got paid in cash, spent in cash, and gift/transact to others in cash. Oversight was severely limited, close to non-existent.
The concept is that you're innocent until proven guilty. It's your money, do with it what you want and it's nobody's business what you do with it. And should you engage in any illegal matters, then it's up to the government to build this case with due diligence: have a probable cause, collect evidence, maybe arrange a warrant, etc.
The important part is the very high barrier to building such a case. It's a huge amount of work just to do this for one case. Because of this, authoritarianism is kept in check. You could say it doesn't "scale".
Now we fast forward to our digital "cash" society. It's questionable if you actually own the money at all, but that's a technicality that is beyond the point.
You have no transaction privacy. Not only is it all on record, the threshold for a flagged transaction gets lower and lower. Buy a car and the bank knows and the IRS knows (in the Netherlands). There's a proposal to do laundering analysis on any transaction > 100 euro. You can't deposit or withdraw sizable money without caps or raising all kinds of flags.
The privacy is eliminated. There is no probable cause or warrant, you're treated as guilty by default and evidence is to be collected that you're innocent. A full reversal of assumptions, rights and freedom.
Which is only the beginning, because my true point is that this scales. A government now has the ability to do whatever the hell they want with your money. They can analyze millions of us and control it with the push of a button.
Wrong photo in iCloud? Money frozen. Political opponent? Assets seized. Spent too much of your money on high energy products? Programmatic tax applied.
You can make that list as long as you want, but let's take even the absolute simplest case of having that wrong photo. Imagine the analog scenario where a government regularly bursts through the door of your home to look at your photo albums. That would be the most absurd thing ever, not to mention ridiculously inefficient. Yet this is digitally happening as we speak, and nobody knows or cares.
This kind of digital insight and power over your life is a power that should not exist. Most people in this world live in authoritarian countries. Quite a few democratic one are edging towards it. Do the math.
As an example, capital controls.
I grew up in the 80s, which was largely cash-based. You got paid in cash, spent in cash, and gift/transact to others in cash. Oversight was severely limited, close to non-existent.
The concept is that you're innocent until proven guilty. It's your money, do with it what you want and it's nobody's business what you do with it. And should you engage in any illegal matters, then it's up to the government to build this case with due diligence: have a probable cause, collect evidence, maybe arrange a warrant, etc.
The important part is the very high barrier to building such a case. It's a huge amount of work just to do this for one case. Because of this, authoritarianism is kept in check. You could say it doesn't "scale".
Now we fast forward to our digital "cash" society. It's questionable if you actually own the money at all, but that's a technicality that is beyond the point.
You have no transaction privacy. Not only is it all on record, the threshold for a flagged transaction gets lower and lower. Buy a car and the bank knows and the IRS knows (in the Netherlands). There's a proposal to do laundering analysis on any transaction > 100 euro. You can't deposit or withdraw sizable money without caps or raising all kinds of flags.
The privacy is eliminated. There is no probable cause or warrant, you're treated as guilty by default and evidence is to be collected that you're innocent. A full reversal of assumptions, rights and freedom.
Which is only the beginning, because my true point is that this scales. A government now has the ability to do whatever the hell they want with your money. They can analyze millions of us and control it with the push of a button.
Wrong photo in iCloud? Money frozen. Political opponent? Assets seized. Spent too much of your money on high energy products? Programmatic tax applied.
You can make that list as long as you want, but let's take even the absolute simplest case of having that wrong photo. Imagine the analog scenario where a government regularly bursts through the door of your home to look at your photo albums. That would be the most absurd thing ever, not to mention ridiculously inefficient. Yet this is digitally happening as we speak, and nobody knows or cares.
This kind of digital insight and power over your life is a power that should not exist. Most people in this world live in authoritarian countries. Quite a few democratic one are edging towards it. Do the math.