> It is all about motives.

I was speaking of the motives of the institution with the power. In the crypto case, the people with the power are motivated by greed. In the government's case, it could be anything, but at least they are theoretically accountable in a representative democracy.

> The issue is that people with morality and dignity believe that the government is doing something wrong by violating the privacy and human dignity...

What does this have to do with reversibility of financial transactions? If you think there is some government conspiracy with the 'bankers' against you or your group, what is taking away basic consumer protections going to do to help you?

>what is taking away basic consumer protections going to do to help you?

You define centralized control over wealth and the ability of an individual to send and receive payments to whomever they choose, without sanction, as "basic consumer protection", while I define it as unacceptable authoritarianism. Yes, it is true, an all-powerful governing entity that has complete control over how everyone sends, receives and stores their own money has the power to reverse fraudulent transactions, which is desirable in some circumstances. It also has the power to monitor, regulate, control and prevent individuals from sending and receiving their own money, as well as punishing them for sending, receiving, or trying to send or receive, money from those who are frowned upon by the controlling authority - which is incredibly undesirable.

>If you think there is some government conspiracy with the 'bankers' against you or your group

There's no conspiracy - this is happening right out in the open - and the powers-that-be are happy to brag about their unfettered power.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-60383385

https://www.wired.com/2010/12/wikileaks-congress-pressure/

> You define centralized control over wealth and the ability of an individual to send and receive payments to whomever they choose

No, I define that as 'oversight' which is necessary for a functioning macroeconomic system. If we can't do that then we can't collect taxes. If you are opposed to all taxation then we have a fundamental disagreement on the function of society.

> There's no conspiracy - this is happening right out in the open - and the powers-that-be are happy to brag about their unfettered power.

You linked to two things from the past that were proposed and never occurred. What does that prove? The government is working as intended and bad ideas are usually stopped in their tracts. The difference is that if money is the be-all-end-all of power, then any rich person can just make their own laws, and I fail to see how that is a better option than a government accountable to its citizens.

> If you are opposed to all taxation then we have a fundamental disagreement on the function of society.

If you think that the government should have the power to monitor every transaction, communication and movement of everyone, all the time, so that they can make sure people aren't cheating on their taxes, then we have a fundamental disagreement on the function of government and society. If the government can't figure out how to raise revenue without violating the privacy and human dignity of every American then that government should not exist.

> The government is working as intended and bad ideas are usually stopped in their tracts.

We clearly live in two different realities. In my reality, people have had their ability to send and receive funds to a wide variety of locales and causes blocked by the government. In my reality, the credit card companies blocked the ability of individuals to send donations to Wikileaks just after they were publicly threatened by Senator Joe Lieberman (but before the founder of Wikileaks was thrown in a dungeon at the behest of the US government).

>The difference is that if money is the be-all-end-all of power, then any rich person can just make their own laws

Money isn't the be-all-end-all, but centralized control of money comes very close. It is very different to be a rich person with a lot of money and to be a government entity that decides, at the point of a gun, who is allowed to have and/or spend money and what they are allowed to spend it on. The right to privacy, the right to human dignity, the right to autonomy, and the right to send your hard-earned money to whoever you want to send it to is all part of the same struggle for human rights and freedom. The push to eliminate privacy, to eliminate cash, to consolidate the power of government to control every facet of your personal, medical and financial life are all inextricably linked, and are all leading to an incredibly dystopian future that in many respects has already arrived.

You have pivoted the conversation completely from crypto lacking certain abilities consumers find crucial, specifically reversing transactions and protection from fraud, into a conversation about state surveillance. I am not going to defend police states or mass surveillance.

>You have pivoted the conversation completely from crypto lacking certain abilities consumers find crucial, specifically reversing transactions and protection from fraud, into a conversation about state surveillance. I am not going to defend police states or mass surveillance.

A conversation about the power of the government to have real-time, granular information about every dollar you spend, send or receive and total control over whether to allow or prevent your transactions is a conversation about state surveillance.

Almost no one is going to give up the benefits of consumer protections because of the possibility that their government is out to get them. Thus I don't see how any of this is relevant.