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I know most of you aren't doing this but I hope this is helpful when talking to your friends and family about bitcoin. Specifically if they bring up Orange Man or have real issues with him.
First off we can see that most of the MAGA / Political Bitcoin cheer-leading is exclusively SoV/NGU and not freedom money. Its basically the crypto types. The shitcoiners. The scammers. I get why this will turn off people that don't love the orange man. I recently heard a technical podcaster say he didn't like being associated with bitcoin (though he said crypto and his co-host is a bitcoin only guy...). I'm here to tell you that's dumb.
Why? I know how dumb it is by experience. Back in the day I was a kid listening to Rush Limbaugh and he was destroying the sky is falling claims I was hearing in government schools. I used to come home freaking out about global warming and the destruction of the rain forests. This was in the 90s btw. Looking back on what Limbaugh said, he's been proven largely right. But that isn't my point. My point is that because of this and because of how dumb many of the environmentalists takes were, I ignored many environmental issues. I would turn off people that called themselves environmentalists. This was a mistake. I was ignoring many other problems with how we use resources and used weak reasoning on others. I seeded caring for the environment to the left. I let myself be sidelined by reactionary thinking.
A few years ago I learned about the Permaculture1 way of thinking and it kinda blew my mind. A guy named Jack Spirko said something that stuck with me. Everyone should be an environmentalist. At least to the extent that they care about the planet we all share. Of course we all know this but it flipped a switch in my head. I'd allowed myself to be a reactionary on the environment and harm humans do to the air, water, and soil as well as the creatures. I always cared about these things but it too a dude that I aligned with on many topics to snap me out of my programming.
I think a similar thing can happen with Bitcoin. Don't be reactionary. Just because some people you don't align with or like do like a thing... it doesn't mean that thing is bad. They could be representing it incorrectly. Bitcoin, if it truly is money is apolitical. Now, we can get into economics and dive into the deep end about hard money but the fact is that bitcoin shouldn't really be political in the sense of US politics on the ground. If you are just a voter or pleb you should be adopting bitcoin no matter what any politician says. The republicans and democrats are not that different on many topics and the MAGA movement is just pandering. Don't let the Orange Man turn you off from bitcoin. Don't let the number go up people turn you off. There are people living under oppressive regimes all over the globe that can be helped by bitcoin. We may need it in the US. Don't sleep on this because of a clown. Don't be dumb. Its a great way to stay poor and vulnerable.

Footnotes

  1. Permaculture is an ethical design science that uses natural systems to provide all human and ecological needs in a regenerative way.
Bitcoin doesn’t care about politics. Bitcoin is money for enemies. I don’t care who uses it, as long as they don’t lose their keys and come crying to me about it.
Bitcoin is and always will be a cypherpunk project. In the process of inventing value transfer over a communication channel, we also invented a pristine new capital asset that is and will change the world, precisely because they can not control it.
Freedom and control are always linked, and authoritarians will always seek control over you. Politicians and Wall Street sees this now and what’s coming is unprecedented.
It doesn’t matter who is the king or president or emperor of whatever country. President Xi has no more power over Bitcoin than President Trump or President Putin, which is nothing, except the ability to generate valid spending txs the same as you or I.
Bitcoin does not care.
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From a game theoretical perspective, it's advantageous for MAGA to turn off non-MAGA from Bitcoin for as long as possible. You want your allies to gain power and influence, not your enemies.
That said, it's unnecessary...
To push back on MAGA affinity at a retail level like this is a dead end because the anti-MAGA that falls for it would be viewing it from an identity and feels first framework, not a hard-money problem-solving framework, and therefore end up in scamcoins regardless of MAGA.
If an anti-MAGA hero were to emerge, and become vocally pro-Bitcoin, they wouldn't convert identity-first people not interested in Bitcoin's merits. Those people would simply slay that hero for stepping outside the groupthink.
Bitcoin-first yet anti-MAGA people will need a different angle to combat the MAGA with Bitcoin, one that isn't based on reason because you can't reason people out of a place they didn't reason themselves into. I don't know what that is or could look like, but my bias is that they're so naive that they'll only use Bitcoin once they've exhausted their tantrums and have little choice, inevitably bending-the-knee to "Bitcoin acceptance" in a poetic reckoning of "social justice".
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If an anti-MAGA hero were to emerge, and become vocally pro-Bitcoin, they wouldn't convert identity-first people not interested in Bitcoin's merits. Those people would simply slay that hero for stepping outside the groupthink.
I can totally see this. I mean we've seen it already on topics outside of bitcoin. The in-group out-group dynamic is key to understanding the modern left.
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I think you are talking about the worst kind of anti-MAGA people. This isn't who I'm thinking of. I'm thinking of people that are turned off by Trump and don't get how it all works. They aren't really awake. I tend to think these people are pretty lost, I just wish they could snap out of it as many are nice people that mean well.
Being reactionary is so easy and most of us have done it or are still doing it. Its a dumb way to live.
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It's all the same picture, being turned off by Trump and not understanding how things work is not something you reason your way into. So you can't reason them out of it. I'm not making a judgement on whether they're good or bad people, I see them as victims. It's a literal psywar out there.
The catalyzing event to snap people out of it is deeply personal, it's not a single topic, and ultimately some multiple of time.
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Yeah, that's pretty much what I think as well.
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Don't let the Orange Man turn you off from bitcoin.
A while back I was talking to an American no-coiner (apparently left-leaning) and he asked me with a serious face: “But isn’t Bitcoin controlled by Trump”?
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Wow, yeah we are early. I think we can assume to much with no-coiners. Its why I love asking people questions. Side bonus is that many people love to tell you what think and know and their guard can go down and you get to know them better.
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Isn’t Tesla controlled by Trump
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Nah, he's controlled by Elon... that Nazi. Wait... its Putin. Wait.. forget it.
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Great post.
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Don't sleep on this because of a clown
<3
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How does the Orange Man help to checkmate Bitcoin MAGAing and Political crypto cheer-leading ?
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