I would be remiss not to point out to you that none of those suffering the most in Venezuela benefit in any way from crypto. Those are the now millions who have taken what little they have and crossed into bordering countries.

Those who have money and means and access to the technology (most of all phone/internet connections) are the well-off. And , plainly, the majority of the “beneficiaries” of crypto are the oppressors, since they are also largely the only ones who have access to dollars or euros to buy crypto. And they are just looting and crypto makes that way easier.

And this is pretty much the case everywhere. Almost the only folks in these non-democratic, corrupt countries who benefit from crypto are those who are a) doing the oppressing or b) benefiting from it. Or they just plain had a bunch of money and were able to get it into crypto. For this reason, every time someone makes the argument that crypto is helping the poor and oppressed, there are two possibilities: they are either very naive or they know better and this seems like a good way to burnish the otherwise dark character of the majority of crypto activity and use.

I know there is a tendency among crypto folks to accuse the “mainstream” media of being skeptical or critical. But, like our president (USA), they are behaving like most people who don’t understand how empirical analysis works and are unfamiliar with journalistic practices and standards, such as multilevel fact-checking. The result is often comical in that when something positive is reported in the “mainstream” media, there is an undifferentiated citation plastered all over. When it’s negative, it’s a “mainstream” media conspiracy, since the “alternative” media operated by the advocates and other interested parties gives another and exclusively positive spin.

Thanks again for hearing the other side.