Authoritarianism – why are there so many Bitcoiners that are so weary of authority and yet proudly proclaim their personal authoritarian ideals? I was recently having a chat w/ a person from the crypto world and was trying to explain why things are done differently here. “No, we don’t have foundations, we don’t trust them”. “No we don’t do that as that would be a concentration of power”. Etc. etc. And I love that about Bitcoin! A desire to remove the concentration of power in the world that comes from fiat money is what brought me to the Bitcoin world. And so I am perpetually stumped by this strange dichotomy of so many seemingly anti-authoritarian Bitcoiners who also embrace patriarchy and Christianity. [Jesus was often anti-authoritarian, but unfortunately most modern American Christianity does not follow the teachings of Jesus and is intensely authoritarian] So how can these things co-exist in the same people? How can a person be such a fan of personal autonomy, free markets, free choice, freedom of speech, self reliance, not trusting others, etc. … and yet want their partner in life to submit to them, and think that others must conform to their way of life or justly suffer eternal damnation? Please do tell me, how the fuck can that co-exist in the same person???

And bro, are you being persecuted, or are those just the consequences of your actions?

Remember, facts don't care about your feelings! ...but I do 😉🫶

“Positive regard”. It means understanding someone’s inherent worth and assuming a core of goodness in them. It does not mean agreeing with them or condoning any of their actions. Positive regard is necessary for having productive conversations on a difficult topic. If you want to discuss a difficult societal issue you’ll find that you can do that productively with other reasonable people... when you are looking through a lens of positive regard for everyone being discussed. However, if you show up to a conversation to vent your anger, or to seek emotional revenge for your wounds, that conversation will rapidly break down into a yelling match where everyone can walk away claiming to be the victim. Not productive.

You gotta understand how programmable your mind is. Humans are really incredibly variable and if you don’t consciously chose how to mold your own mind it will be done for you by the people you hang out with and the bots who swarm your social media.

It’s not what you are discussing, it’s the way in which you are discussing it. That's the problem. Yesterday we were discussing rape, and consent, and coercion… tough topics. I asked the question, can a man be a rapist and not know it? Now that’s a difficult question, and I could discuss that in two different ways, with understanding, and without. With understanding: We have a culture that teaches young men that they need to be the pursuer and that women will ‘play hard to get’ and they need to be persistent. Without understanding: Men have very little respect for women’s boundaries and constantly push them. Do ya see that difference? Now both are in broad terms generally accurate. But one has some understanding and talks about the people involved with “positive regard” and one with a very negative lens. So go on and talk about the difficult topic, but bro, if it’s not your intention to vent your hatred, do so with some understanding, some positive regard.

Can a man not know that he is a rapist?? I keep seeing pictures of Russell Brand cuz of his rape trial, but, I don’t see a rapist when I look at him. Disclaimer: I don’t know this guy, I wasn’t there, I am not declaring him innocent or guilty. I have no idea. I’m just pondering. I have never been a big fan of his. He was interesting for about 5 mins when he left the Hollywood scene and when he got into Bitcoin. ...and then it quickly became clear how off the rails he is... it seems in anything that he does. Now you don’t get that many women accusing you of assault and willing to go through a massively disruptive process in their life to prove it unless something went very wrong. But despite it being very clear that he is a very unbalanced person, I don’t get any sense of danger when I look at photos or videos of him, and I certainly do when looking at other famous rapists such as Weinstein or Diddy. Now my perception doesn’t necessarily mean anything to anyone, but it fuels a lot of curiosity for me. I think it might be possible for a man to not know that he is a rapist. When you have a culture where women are shamed out of any connection to their own sexual desires and so very limited in their ability to communicate about it. When you have a culture that makes it very difficult to report an assault. When you have a culture that teaches young men that they need to be the pursuer and that women will ‘play hard to get’ and they need to be persistent. When you have a culture that values men for their ability to ‘dominate’. And when you mix that all with the loss of perspective and connection to reality that comes with massive fame… can a man rape women and not realize that’s what’s happening? Can a man see himself as respecting women, see himself as respectful of “no’s” and yet be in a position that allows him to just bull doze his way through a sexual encounter not realizing the metaphorical or literal corner that he has backed someone into and walk away from the experience genuinely believing that everyone had a good time? Do you think that’s possible?

“Let people feel the weight of who you are, and let them deal with it.” - John Eldredge

It’s not about technology, this is about psychology. Why don’t we have more Bitcoin retail payments in the US? Because the American collective unconscious sees Bitcoin as an investment. A ticket to get rich quick. When the average Jane somehow winds up with an app on her phone that shows her a Bitcoin balance, she doesn't think “I guess I’ll walk to the corner store and buy some eggs”, she thinks “Ooo, maybe this will make me rich!” and she holds on to it. For Bitcoin to become something that is commonly used for retail payments it first has to be demonstrated useful as a payments network and that will only happen in situations where it is very much needed. In situations where there is real payments pain. And that has to come first to break the collective unconscious understanding of Bitcoin as an investment.

Technology adoption is not about the tech, it's about the humans. Humans are who decide what tech does or does not get used.

When trying to create more Bitcoin payments, we need to meet people where they are. We need to build for people who are experiencing real payments pain. The American Bitcoin community focuses so much on retail payments in the States, but y’all, people in the US aren’t experiencing payments pain. At least not anywhere near enough to make them adopt a new payments network and unit of account. The US won’t be first in line for this one. At least not for buying a gallon of milk at the corner store. We may have more success with niche things like gaming. And let me bring up Gresham’s Law once again. To avoid a debate on the exact letter of this ‘law’ I’ll claim a variation on Gresham’s Law and call it Hannah’s law😉 I’ve been on about it for years and please don’t dismiss this simple reality; if you are standing in a shop and can chose between spending two different currencies, you are going to spend the one you don’t like and hold the one that you do like. And this is why Bitcoin payments haven’t taken off in the States but Bitcoin as an investment very much has. So are we doomed? Of course not! We just have to go where we are needed. ...and where are we needed? Well what advantages do we have? Decentralization. Bitcoin is so decentralized that it is nearly public infrastructure. And that matters a LOT. Other chains are much less decentralized and so much more risky. Those chains will be adapted to serve influential people in that jurisdiction/organization and not necessarily you or your users use case. Platform risk. Bitcoin has the lowest platform risk. Speed and affordability. We just trounce the credit card networks. But, it’s not noticeable enough of a fee difference to entice the comfortable to take on switching costs. Where this will help us is with the bots. The bots aren’t bothered by changing their habits. They will chose the most efficient option. Also we can scale the way other chains can’t. So sooner or later they will run into scaling trouble and we will be here. Where we run into trouble… Volatility and unit of account. There is a pretty big overlap on the Venn diagram of those experiencing payments pain and those without disposable income. Those who need our tech often can’t weather a drop in the price of Bitcoin. And, us, sitting here in our Bitcoin bubble, have already managed the psychological difficulty of switching units of accounts. But we are not the normies that we are building for. That unit of account can be a massive psychological barrier. So what to do? We need a way to add a stable unit of account onto the Bitcoin payments network. Stablecoins are the obvious choice, but there are other things out there too. So if we know that we need to meet people where they are, where do we go and what do we build? We go to places that currently have currency volatility and/or have payments pain, and we build easy to use applications that include a stable unit of account option. We build applications where users can see a USD denominated payment and push send and know absolutely nothing about channels and liquidity. Cough **Wavelength** cough.

As a young kid I lived among a very ugly version of Christianity. It was a misogynistic, homophobic, dominance hierarchy all about obedience via the threat of torture. Now when I discuss my experiences with Christianity a lot of Christians will get upset and try to explain to me that what I experienced is not really the teachings of Jesus. And well I’m delighted that they don’t want to give me more lectures about how I will burn in hell for all eternity, but, their words are hollow when they keep attending the Churches that preach these ideals. And when they proclaim their allegiance to Christianity but make no distinction between the obedience system that I experienced and the teachings of Jesus. If you want me to believe that you are not like my experiences, then maybe don’t align yourself with people who continue to inflict those experiences on others. If you don’t want me thinking of you and them as the same then please draw a line between you and them. Can we call out the abusive Christians? Can we call them extremists Christians? ...that is what they are, yes?

You can spend too much time considering everything you say, get stuck in analysis paralysis and not say much at all. You can also be an inconsiderate ass who just says whatever is on their mind without a moment to pause and contemplate how you impact others. I’ve spent most of my life making the first error and so now I’m inching closer and closer to being an inconsiderate ass until I feel like I hit the fine line between the two. ...I am not feeling confident in my ability to find that line. And I know this is one of those annoying situations where there isn’t an obvious line, it’s a question of preference. But if we assume that the goal is to be clear, direct, not waste time agonizing, and yet not be an ass… like how do we do that? Send tips!!!

Sometimes my brain just won’t shut the fuck up. It’s just like “Sure you thought about XYZ, but have you considered the possibility of XYZ + 123? How about 123 – XYZ? Did you even pause to consider that? And then there is XYZ/123, or XYZ followed by ABC/123! That would be a plot twist! And have you told so and so of the risk of 123? I bet you haven’t, you really should. And while you’re at it…” 😩 OMG stop it! And then there is some Instagram ad for brain enhancing supplements and I’m like OMG no, how can I slow this bitch down??

You want your dentist to be an expert in dentistry and not an expert in running a Lightning node. One thing I talked about at my TABConf Wavelength workshop that I keep thinking about: Bitcoin builders, please build for your dentist. It’s our job to make Lightning payments easy for people who are not experts in Lightning. It’s our job to build in such a way that your dentist can make Lightning payments with absolutely no idea what channels are or what inbound liquidity is. Not everyone can be, or should be, an expert in Lightning. That’s our job! Thankfully we now have some pretty amazing tools for Lightning payments that don’t require having read an Andreas Antonopoulos book. If your dentist can scan a QR code then they can use an application powered by Wavelength.

We want our no’s to be respected, as they should be! But it really helps a lot if we also learn to say yes clearly. Simple, but sometimes very difficult. I was born in 1983 in a very religious community. I of course absorbed a lot of the misogynistic and puritanical ideas of that time. I did not know that women had sexual desires, really. ...well until I experienced them of course, when I then assumed something was wrong with me. The term “slut shaming” wasn’t widely used until the early 2000’s. Prior to that it was just common knowledge that it was a disgusting abomination for women to express sexuality. As you might have guessed, that can cause a young woman a lot of confusion and shame. I was not capable of clearly communicating desires in my early 20’s. I didn’t even understand my own desires. Just contemplating what I wanted left me flooded with debilitating shame. In that context it can be easier to have a ‘persistent’ partner. That’s not the healthy way to do things, but it can be functional in that environment. When you don’t know how to say “yes”, then someone else’s persistence is the only way you will get there. I did a really great thing for myself in my early 20’s. I realized that this was utter nonsense and set about removing those ideas from my head. It took 8 years. 8 years of consciously correcting myself whenever I felt that brand of shame creep up on me. After 8 years of consistent, conscious effort I was able to clearly express a sexual desire without being hit with a wave of shame or depression. 8 fucking years! That’s how deep this stuff gets into your brain. And it helps to understand this when dealing with these issues. But, we also need to work towards doing this right. All adults *should* be able to clearly articulate what they do and do not want. We should expect this of others and ourselves. We have to expect our partners to clearly communicate and we need to learn to clearly communicate.