vanitas

With respect, I found @ErikVoorhees' keynote to be jejune, anti-democratic, and disingenuous. It may be effective as a rallying cry for libertarians, but as a strategic framework for the global adoption of crypto, it is so divorced from reality as to be worthy of ignoring. The speech's strongest points centered around the notion that "code is better than law." There is merit to the claim that transparent, mathematically-based rule-making can yield superior results to an opaque, politically-based process. I also agree with his characterization of the right to transact as fundamental to human existence. However, I disagree with the perspective that American democracy is so deserving of disdain as to be rejected. Voorhees' conflation of the "state" as a single entity ignores the variety of political systems across the world and their relative levels of freedom. Democracy is categorically better than totalitarianism, and to reduce both to the machinations of men with "dead eyes and weak hearts" is to deny millennia of political progress, as well as the suffering of those under more oppressive regimes than the one Voorhees himself is subject to. Voorhees' political framework reveals a level of hypocrisy and immediately crumbles when applied to the real world. Does he not comply with the subpoenas issued to him by the regulators he calls out in the audience? Does he not pay the income taxes that he castigates at the beginning of the speech? Would he have the creation of roads, bridges, and highways mediated through smart contracts today? There is a place for decentralized finance; there is also a place for the actions of a centralized state on behalf of its people, and to deny that is childish. Voorhees says: "The political class... that legion of bureaucrats suckling at the teat of plundered wealth, with all their ornaments of authority, with all their hubris masked as confidence, with the inauthenticity of their smiles matched only by the absurdity of their ideas, and I see no reason to submit to the permissions under which they seek to restrain me. To such people, we owe nothing." The reality is that Voorhees - and all of us - do submit to these permissions because we recognize the rule of law under a democratic system, arrived at through voting and lawmaking. The process is never perfect; it can even be corrupt; yet, we comply because we have faith that the inclusive political institutions that propelled America to become the financial hegemon will eventually recognize the importance and utility of crypto. It is reasonable and just to seek the consent – i.e., the permission – of the governed; that is democracy. I strongly question a strategy which alienates all those involved in government as weak-willed and immoral. What does painting with such a broad brush achieve beyond revealing your own biases? In government, like in crypto, there are good people and bad people. We should aim to excise the bad people and have the good people in both spheres work together towards an open, global financial system. I have much respect for Voorhees as an OG of crypto, and I understand that his perspective is a large part of how crypto came to be as big as it is today. But it is an untenable perspective weighed down by its idealism, dogmatism, and hyperbole and will slow down the adoption of crypto as we approach its next phase of global adoption. To wholly reject the democratic state is libertarian propaganda and is of no use for the growth of crypto as an open, global financial system. We should instead recognize the merits of democracy and use them to further expand the reach of crypto.