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by valj 3102 days ago
You're comparing apples with oranges. A drug dealer is a peon, someone at the very bottom of an enormous multinational pyramid who sells a commodity product in a market where every disgruntled customer has the ability to put them behind bars, rather than just leave a bad review online.

This is actually the most prime example of an 'untrusted' relationship. If it weren't for the total imbalance of power you have to bring the full force of the government down on a drug dealer without any need for a reason, you wouldn't do business with them at all.

If, on the other hand, you had to do business with the head of one of these multinational drug syndicates, you would start to understand this power dynamic more completely, as the power balance would flip. All of a sudden, the person you are dealing with no longer fears law enforcement. They are no longer a peon - they have bought off people in the government, acquired arms, trained a small army of their own, and now have to power to kill you or your associates without fear of reprisal. Would you still describe doing business with these people as a 'trusted' transaction? Of course not. You would start showing up to all your business dealings with your own goons, weapons, and armored vehicles. There would be zero trust that each transaction wouldn't end in a firefight.

Compare this to walking into your local bank branch, where with the correct documentation a typical local branch manager can give you a loan for over $1M without having ever done business with you before. That is the definition of a trusted transaction.

You've just become so desensitized to the marvel of it all that you might not be aware of what the alternative looks like.

2 comments

This is actually the most prime example of an 'untrusted' relationship. If it weren't for the total imbalance of power you have to bring the full force of the government down on a drug dealer without any need for a reason, you wouldn't do business with them at all.

How does a buyer do that on the darknet? Hell, how does the buyer do that on dealer that's part of a well set up network? Do you think cops don't know who many of the dealers are already? They can't or won't touch them, and as a buyer you have zero power to make that happen.

I don't know how's the market where you are, but I can assure you that nobody I know who buys or bought drugs ever even considered going to the cops - even when they got robbed and smacked around by a dealer.

The local bank manager is also a peon.

If you were considering selling your company to Jamie Dimon - well, you can probably trust that he's not going to kill you, but you will show up with an army of lawyers and investment bankers to make sure you get a fair deal.