While global elites tout financial surveillance through CBDCs, Bitcoiners are demonstrating the human goodwill made possible through self sovereignty.
This is an opinion editorial by Nozomi Hayase, Ph.D., who has a background in psychology and human development.
In the middle of January, global leaders flocked in their private jets to a luxury ski resort in the Swiss town of Davos for the annual conference of the World Economic Forum (WEF).
Under the theme “Cooperation In A Fragmented World,” 52 heads of state and many corporate CEOs, along with celebrities and prominent social activists, talked about how to manage the risks that we will be facing in the next decade. Issues such as costs of living and climate change, along with the war in Ukraine, were placed at or near the top of the agenda.
U.S. Climate Envoy John Kerry praised his fellow participants, saying “It’s pretty extraordinary that we — a select group of human beings … are able to sit in a room and come together and actually talk about saving the planet.”
At the opening ceremony of the five-day planning meeting, Klaus Schwab, executive chairman of WEF, remarked, “Through collective responsibility, innovation, human good will and ingenuity, we have a capacity to turn challenges into opportunities.”
CBDCs And Programmable Money
One of the key WEF initiatives aims to strengthen global cooperation by creating a collaborative village on Metaverse, with the help of Microsoft. By engaging all stakeholders of society, their plan is to create a new digitized economy.
Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) play a critical role in their projected infrastructure. These digital forms of fiat money, overseen by a country’s central bank, give issuers total control, as they can monitor and restrict transactions. Combined with a worldwide adoption of digital IDs, CBDCs can be used to create a China-style social credit scoring system.
Under the slogan of “financial inclusion,” the IMF now pushes CBDCs as a central piece of infrastructure. This United Nations’ specialized financial agency aims to make centralized digital currencies become instruments for the government and private sectors to implement targeted policies such as consumption coupons and welfare programs.
Major technology companies and financial institutions are also coming on board. At the WEF annual meeting, Bank of America praised CBDCs as the future of money. IBM embraced them too. But as the hand-picked global elites in Davos, with a message of climate emergency, now try to bring the public into their universal digital payment network, we have an alternative.
Pleb-Powered Network
Created in the aftermath of the 2008 global financial crisis, bitcoin is the hardest form of money that we have ever seen. By eliminating a need to trust a central authority, this breakthrough of computer science enables censorship resistance.
Bitcoin’s innovative economic incentives, aligning everyone’s self interests, has organically begun to re-engineer the economy. We are now seeing this unfold in the Southern United States. Texas has recently become the Bitcoin capital of the world. The abundant energy and the low electricity rates (the majority coming from renewable sources), along with friendly regulations, are turning that state into a global mining hub. This has helped to accelerate energy innovation and generate a skilled workforce.
By celebrating the birth of this freedom money, Bitcoiners began to link one another. In the beautiful city of Austin, empowered by the protocol, orange-pilled locals have begun to actively collaborate in creating a strong foundation for the economy.
PlebLab_ provides resources and support for new business development, as well as hosting many local meetups and other events. Similar trends are happening all around the world.
El Salvador’s Economic Liberty
In El Salvador, even before the country officially adopted Bitcoin, ordinary people have been working together to build on top of Bitcoin. In a small surf town with a population of 3,000, backed by a donation of bitcoin from an early adopter (who wishes to remain anonymous), the project Bitcoin Beach was launched to create a resilient local economy.
Those grassroots efforts in El Zonte inspired El Salvador to become the first nation to legalize bitcoin as legal tender in September 2021. Nayib Bukele, the president of El Salvador, has now become one of the most notable Bitcoiners. At 41 years old, he understands the significance of this invention.
Adam Back, a cryptographer who was cited in Satoshi Nakamoto’s Bitcoin white paper, acknowledged El Salvador’s Bitcoin adoption as a genuine “self-conceived state orange-pilling.”
Bukele, who has an approval rating of more than 80%, aims to create financial inclusion by expanding the freedom that Bitcoin enables, seeing this as the birthright of each individual. With his policy of economic liberty, Bukele began to fight against the IMF’s financial dictatorship, thereby helping the country claim its independence and sovereignty.
El Salvador is already winning. It is on its way toward freedom. The president recently announced that the country made a full debt payment of $800 million despite mainstream media saying it would default because of its bitcoin investments.
The Bukele Effect
In the crisis of Western liberal democracy triggered by the corruption of governments, the world is now seeing great leadership arising from a tiny country of Central America, with a population of about 6.5 million.
The volcano blonde, fairy godmother and keeper of the vision, Stacy Herbert, together with her partner Max Keiser, has been helping orange-pill the world. As a new resident of El Salvador, she now focuses on helping El Salvador’s efforts for Bitcoin adoption.
In an interview on “Bitfinex Talks,” Herbert described Bukele as a father of hyperbitcoinization and talked about his art of statesmanship. Characterizing him as a second layer on top of Bitcoin, she explained how the president brought laws to protect the rights of his people.
Under President Bukele’s leadership, the rule of law has been restored in El Salvador. The country that had the world’s highest homicide rates is now quickly transforming itself into becoming the place where everyone wants to be.
Human Good Will
The economic liberty secured by Bitcoin, then furthered by Bukele, has begun to enable widespread, human good will. As the path for economic prosperity has opened, capital has begun to flow into this previously-impoverished Central American nation. It is now fueling innovation and entrepreneurship.
Using Bitcoin as a powerful philanthropic tool, companies can engage in charitable assistance to provide services for those in need. Paxful, a leading, global, peer-to-peer platform, has created an educational center in El Salvador providing resources and equitable opportunities to create real financial inclusion.
Paolo Ardoino, chief technology officer at Bitfinex, a leading digital asset trading platform, also invests in local educational efforts in El Salvador. In addition to his advocacy for Bitcoin, he is now building a technology that can secure the privacy and freedom of expression required by universal human rights.
Unlike the centralized Metaverse virtual space run by tech giants, Keet is a peer-to-peer chat app that is built without any central server and can integrate Bitcoin. This allows ordinary people around the world to set up their own collaborative village and take full control over their communication.
Orange-Pill Party
El Salvador has now become a leading nation for hyperbitcoinization. The government has established a National Bitcoin Office (ONBTC). It has recently passed digital securities law that serves as landmark legislation establishing a legal framework for all digital assets that are not bitcoin, as well as those issued on Bitcoin.
The relentless optimism that is growing in this Bitcoin country is now bringing people together from all around the world.
On January 30, 2023, Keiser and Herbet, the exuberant, OG Bitcoin couple, hosted an event in El Zonte to celebrate El Salvador’s victory. Tickets were sold out, with over 100 people on a waiting list. Bitcoiners from dozens of countries flew in to join the orange party.
At the event, Mi Primer Bitcoin, a non-profit educational organization in El Salvador raised 0.65 bitcoin by auctioning a bottle of whiskey. These funds will support the world’s first Bitcoin diploma project.
This kind of community collaboration brings people joy and love. Inspiring memes and the arts, it is enlivening culture, giving birth to a new global civil society.
Bitcoin can fix our fragmented world. Backed by human creativity, it begins to transform an economy that is driven by greed and selfish ambition into one which carries an altruistic impulse that promotes human welfare.
Now, we, the Bitcoiners, the network of sovereign individuals, can show the rest of the world how we can exercise shared responsibility. With innovation, good will and ingenuity, we can meet challenges to create life, liberty and pursuit of happiness for all people.
This is a guest post by Nozomi Hayase. Opinions expressed are entirely their own and do not necessarily reflect those of BTC Inc or Bitcoin Magazine.
