China has blatantly declared that all activities that are under the umbrella of ‘cryptocurrency’ are illegal, which in turn converges the power and attention to the centralized government as the primary agent once again. This news sparked up propaganda which created a schism where one end of the spectrum argues that if we adopt a technological lens to view the matter, we would see the convergence back to the centralized government as a good thing. Crypto currency is rudimentarily based in technology with any and all activities being performed on a screen via a technological device. That said, physical interactions in dealing with this facet in specific, is non existent. Hence, with the eradication of crypto in China, the use of technology as a means to check and engage with financial matters will drastically decrease. Now veering our attention to the other end of the spectrum, some would argue that the power skewed back to the centralized government is just as bad, if not worse, than crypto because we would be giving up our autonomy and putting it back into the hands of the system. Alas, technology and the stripping of autonomy are not mutually exclusive, in fact, some go so far as to say they are terms that are used interchangeably in this day and age. This issue leaves many people saddling on the fence which calls for a dire need to discuss and converse on the issue in hopes of fleeing from the grey area and finding some steady ground. So what are your thoughts on the matter and whether, using a technological lens of course, we are better or worse off with a centralized bank versus crypto.
My first thought is that crypto is an apex technology, and pretty much requires every sort of modern technology to work. Not only that, but it actually can only exist as long as technology keeps expanding. Flaws in cryptographic algorithms, computational power to attack it, advancements needed in case someone breaks (it allow forgeries), etc. In my mind, cryptocurrency is another catalyst for technological growth.
Now are people in China worse off because it was banned? Perhaps. And it is entirely possible that some form of cryptocurrency could be used for some sort of revolution. However, I think we also have to consider that once a technology becomes entrenched, it is hard to remove. Banks on the other hand have been around for a very long time and can exist with not much technology. So I think I would say it's probably better if cryptocurrency wasn't used at all in the world.
Cryptocurrency actually makes it easier for the government to control you because all of your transactions are fully traceable. Unlike cash where you can buy and sell things privately. That's why it was promoted by Silicon Valley and U.S. government affiliated organizations when it first started. That's also where the push to make cash unusable is coming from. China banned crypto because of how unstable it's stock market value is, that it doesn't want it's citizens losing their homes expecting the price to go to 100,000$.