Bitcoin: A View From The Left with Ben Arc - WBD453

Location: London
Date: Thursday 13th January
Project: LNbits, NOSTR
Role: Bitcoin and free open source software
advocate


What are the politics of Bitcoin? Satoshi in a post in 2008 said
“It's very attractive to the libertarian viewpoint if we can
explain it properly.” And, it certainly has garnered a strong
libertarian following, principally because of its unique utility
to undermine governments’ control of money.


However, Bitcoiners are a broad church. The original cypherpunks
philosophy was predicated on anarchist ideals, to work outside of
government controls. This attitude is analogous to a wide variety
of political philosophies, including those on the left who feel
disenfranchised by the current global capitalist hegemony.


There is a strong and growing group of left-leaning Bitcoiners,
who see the protocol as a radical means of achieving a fairer
society where the levers of power and organisation are controlled
by a community rather than elites.


This may trigger a powerful section in Bitcoin whose views are
antithetical to those on the left. And yet, this broad range of
communities with divergent dogmas have all enabled Bitcoin to
develop its critical mass. This is because early adopters viewing
Bitcoin as a philosophy, whatever that philosophy may be, has
inspired ardent advocacy and robust hodling behaviour.


It surely underlines the genius of Bitcoin’s protocol if those
with seemingly divergent opinions can all lay claim to the
benefits of the technology. Furthermore, history has shown that
robust societies are ones where ideas are debated, tested, and
then synthesized. If we can do this as a community we have a real
opportunity to lay the foundations for a more open and fair
society.


In this interview, I talk to Ben Arc, an industrious Bitcoin and
free open source software advocate. We discuss the attraction of
Bitcoin to those on the left, Bitcoin as a commons for society,
developing open source applications to take on big tech, and
Marxism.