[bigger_inside]

you're mistaking me for a libertarian. Which is understandable, because you run into so many of those in the bitcoin space, so no hard feeling! :D They irritate me as well.

The problem with the current system is obviously not that it's not "free market" enough. I fully agree with you on property. And fiat currencies are fine with me in principle, the structural underpinnings of our current ones are the horrid part, and the power structures this underpins.

What I try to communicate is that bitcoin can also be a tech for leftist hope, because it uses the greed of the free market people to strengthen something that actually undermines the current corporatist capture of the state, and does so massively. It's decentralized and a real threat to the banking system and its wealth extortion. It's inclusive, as its permissionless nature will bank anyone with a phone. It also undermines US hegemony, as the US control over the banking system through SWIFT allows it to engage in economic warfare against everyone it doesn't like. The fact that bitcoin is an option for sanctioned countries is a medal for it in my book. And I know that's utopian and the US will try to find a way to kill it before it can actually do any f these things, but that's exactly the reason why people with critical attitudes to corporatism and US hegemony should help it along, not participate in the moral panics against it.

[hnbad]

Okay, but at that point from a leftist perspective it's just accelerationism and hoping that the revolution comes down in our favor without laying any of the ground work to prevent a rise of fascism (to "heal" the state) or a decline into feudalism (via stateless capitalism).

There's also no reason to believe that the existing hegemons won't be the ones ultimately controlling crypto if doing so becomes necessary to their survival. Crypto may be digital and out of reach for states, but the humans owning it are physical and very susceptible to physical injury. Capitalism has recuperated anti-capitalism, it will recuperate crypto if necessary (and some may argue it's already happening).

[bigger_inside]

well, I hadn't thought about it as accelerationism, and I'll have to think about it more. It's a good point.

My first reaction would be that it actually does help in steps beyond just strengthening existing structures, like I said, by banking the unbanked and freeing them from banking systems, by giving states ways out from under US sanctions, by whittling away at the hold corporatism has. Empirically, it's not the case that this is only adopted by the rich. Bitcoin use is massive in Africa, especially Nigeria and Ethiopia, among not so well-to-do people, in Central and South America, mostly for remittances and for peer to peer economies among people who have no bank accounts. And those are the first to really jump onto it, the corporate leeches are following, not leading. It's not just a toy for rich people. I'm far from rich by any metric.

But you're correct, the powers that be will absolutely try to capture it. Holders are not out of reach, though holding it can be dome quite clandestinely (as can supporting the network; you can run a bitcoin node, and nobody will know; and if you raid houses to take them, new ones will spring up.) The power of decentralization is rather persistent, as we have learned with filesharing over decades.

Bottom line, I wouldn't reject the idea that bitcoin can be reformist outright, but of course nobody can guarantee that.