Ragnar Lifthrasir Should You Spend Bitcoin Now?

Hi, you're listening to the Stephan Livera podcast, a show about Bitcoin and Austrian economics. Today for episode one hundred and eighty-nine, my guest is Ragnar, and we're talking about this question of whether you should spend Bitcoin now, the Bitcoin circular economy, and what actions are required to build Bitcoin's censorship resistance, especially in this time when so many people are getting cancelled. This show brought to you by Swan Bitcoin. If you're in the US, you should absolutely get your auto-stacking on with Swan. It's so simple even a no-coiner could do it. Step one, auto fund USD from your bank account. Two, auto-stack your Bitcoin. Three, auto-withdraw your Bitcoin to your cold storage. Swan doesn't charge withdrawal fees, they want you to follow Bitcoin best practices. Swan crushes Coinbase's fees for recurring buys by up to eighty percent and Cash App's fees by up to fifty-seven percent. Set and forget, enjoy your life, just Swan and chill Go to swanbitcoin dot com slash livera to start auto-stacking with Swan today and get ten dollars of Bitcoin dropped in your account when you start. Next up is Unchained Capital, Bitcoin financial services, empowering customers with multi-signature. If you need a way to upgrade your security from single signature to multi-signature, check out Unchained Vaults. They've got a two of three setup, so you have two hardware wallets and Unchained would hold the third key in that scenario. If you have any questions, the Unchained website offers some consults as well if you need a hand website there for assistance on that. Unchained also offer loans, so you can put up Bitcoin and get US dollar without selling your Bitcoin, and all Bitcoin is stored on chain and never rehypothecated. Go and check them out, Unchained Capital have awesome content and open source tools as well. Their website is unchained dash capital dot com. Next is CipherSafe. So we all hold our own keys, right? And if you're using a hardware wallet, are you just using that piece of paper? Well, what would you do if there was a fire at your house or it got Metal backup seed and CipherSafe offering this CipherWheel product. It comes in a wheel shape and it also masks the words of your seed and it's got a padlock tamper evident seal so you know if it's been opened. So make sure you or your loved ones have access to your bitcoins if an accident happens to you. Go to CipherSafe dot io and use the code Livera for ten percent off. Just gonna bring in my guest now. Ragnar is the founder of Guns N' Bitcoin. He is a long time Bitcoiner and, he's obviously got some views to share around the- Censorship resistance, and, you know, spending versus holding of Bitcoin. So welcome, Ragnar. Thanks, Stephan. Thanks for having me here. Of course. Look, I guess let's just start a little bit with- You're, you're vocal about this concept of hodl monomania, right? So for you, what is hodl monomania, and in your view, how prevalent is that in the Bitcoin community?

Sure. So I created the phrase hodl monomania to distinguish it from just hodling, and hodling is a very, rational, strategy to, investing, whereas the monomania part comes in when that gets out of balance, where you forget the other aspect effects of Bitcoin, not just spending and earning, but just the general goals, so where hodl monomania becomes bankerism.

I see. Yeah, and I guess fro- I guess the other part of that question is how prevalent do you believe that is? Do you believe that there's really a big portion of the Bitcoin community who actually believe in that? Or, I guess one challenge I might offer you there is that maybe that's really not that many people who are literally only hodl, and, you know, it's kind of i-i-in, in the minds of people- People on Bitcoin Twitter, it can, it can be exaggerated, right? It's like a small, it's like a loud minority.

Yeah, obviously Twitter, Bitcoin isn't Bitcoin, but, what I see is it is by far the dominant narrative and the dominant thinking process, and that's what's, I think, kind of dangerous is it's, it's okay for people to think that, but I think the dangerous part is where you get attacked for questioning that, and attacked for thinking differently. I mean, just when I- When I say, you know, when I say spending, people think, "Why? Why do you hate hodling?" It's like, "Well, we could talk about hodling, but we're talking about spending right now." So there's just this knee-jerk reaction. And for me, especially now in the last, call it month, it's become a hundred times more important that we get back to the cypherpunk roots of Bitcoin, which is using it as a way to get around the state and get around threats. which to me, the last- Last month is, has been, I think, a watershed for me, and I think we're now facing the most dangerous time in the West since World War One for Europe, and the United States, I would say the most dangerous time since the Civil War. I see. So,

yeah, tell us a little bit about this idea of what you view as the, if you will, the cyberpunk background of Bitcoin, and has Bitcoin's community lost its way?

Yeah. So Seiferpunk, you know, their goal was untraceable-- excuse me, their goal was untraceable digital cash, and the whole point of that, of course, is so that the state can't stop you from doing certain things and don't even know you're doing them. And why is that important? It's because commerce, commerce moves the world, money moves the world, circulating money moves the world. and this is best shown by the Silk Road. I think if you ask anyone what was- Was the one event in Bitcoin that really put it on the map or that really, was a strike against the state? And I think nine times out of ten, they'll say Silk Road, Silk Road changed everything, and I think Silk Road is the biggest example of just how powerful it is, considering how long it took them to shut it down, especially all the mistakes that, the admins of Silk Road made, they still took them that long. So that's what that ethos is, and I think now with this more- Marxism revolution that we're just at the beginning of, it's gonna become much more important because, you know, with Silk Road, it was about the state, and the cypherpunks only thought about the state, but now we've got something much worse, which is all aspects of society, you know, we have education, we have corporations, we have tech, we have even churches, we have every side of it. The media now is becoming the state or gaining up with the state. So in terms of the censorship resistance and privacy, it's, it's much bigger than the Much, much worse and more dangerous.

Right. And so look, I, I can agree with many parts of what you're saying. I think there are parts where I might disagree, right? So I think obviously we should focus on, te-- people, you know, get-- encouraging people to learn how to use Bitcoin privately. We can encourage them to use it in these censor-resistant ways. But I, I think the part where I might disagree, and per-- perhaps I'm in the Vijay Bohra party camp on this issue, is that The, coming back to the definition of cash and what the cypherpunks were talking about, it could also be that they, they meant it closer to bearer asset than, let's say, day-to-day transactional commerce. And so I think this is where some of the, again, not to rehash the whole twenty seventeen be casher debates and so on, but the, I think that's where some of the tension comes up between the supposed hodling camp and the supposed, you know, you should also spend camp, because I think it comes to To, is it realistic, for two reasons. One is around how much transaction on chain can everyone do, right? It won't be, how feasible will that be? And then the other part is just economically, i-is it about really about people building up enough of a savings pool that there's enough other people who also want Bitcoin? What would you, say to that?

Yeah, I mean, those are some interesting points. And with semantics like cash, right? I mean, you could give five different definitions of cash, and they're all correct. So is it, is it a bearer instrument? Is it a savings? Is it gold? Is it transactions? But I think we get in the swamp of semantics with that. And same with savings versus investing. To me, I think of what is wartime Bitcoin? You know, I think we've been in peacetime Bitcoin, since its inception, but now we're in wartime Bitcoin, and by that I mean cancel Culture. I mean, we're, we're having people's lives ruined because people can cancel people's PayPal and their Kickstarter and get them off of credit cards, like Andrew Torba, he can't even have a Visa for the rest of his life, him and his wife, him personally hasn't even committed any crimes. So to me, there is war for now, and they're using money as the, machine of destruction. So instead of thinking about, you know, philosophy and what were the words of the meaning, it's like, well, what, what's our situation? What's our counter that threat, I'm all for wh- whatever we wanna call it, bear instruments, investment, hodling. To me, that's the approach to take is say, okay, what is the issue and how do we, practically defend ourselves from that? And that's more my focus, rather than like the semantics, which I can get caught up in quite easily, I

guess. Yeah. an interesting point actually in the chat, NVK is, chatting, he's saying none of that is new. So what would you say to that? So this idea that, I mean, they shut down Liberty Reserve, that it was eGold, PayPal famously became more, arguably became more captured by government regulation. I guess what would you say to that? It, not-- like, that's, that's nothing new.

Well, it's nothing new in the sense that the state has always been an issue, but that, again, was peacetime Bitcoin. We're in wartime Bitcoin, which means now we have cancel culture. Again, going back to this, it's Marxism. We're on the beginning of a Marxist revolution in the West, and this is, this is meaning people's lives are ending with the financial weapons. And so it's actually new in the sense that the private sector has never had the power of the state. Previously, it was just the state, but now it's the private sector and the- State working together, and we're just at the very beginning of this. Whereas before, as long as you kind of s- kept out of the state's hair, you know, you, you kind of obeyed the laws and paid your taxes, they generally left you alone. But now, if you say all lives matter, you get fired from your job, you can't find another one, and even when you get fired, you think, okay, I'll just work for myself. And people will say, "Well, Bitcoin fixes this, right?" So you'll see someone not be able to

True, mostly because people aren't using Bitcoin, and I know this from personal experience, because I'm involved in the 3D gun printing community, and those guys often try to do, you know, raise some money, crowdfunding, to, you know, finance themselves, and immediately, well, they have to use Bitcoin, so we already know that. That's an example of needing it. But the problem is, even though Bitcoin can do that, it doesn't quite do it because no one is using Bitcoin. People don't even know what Bitcoin is. You'd be surprised that these guys when People will say, "Well, how do we even get Bitcoin?" When they do, it's like, "Well, I'm hodling it." And so this censorship resistance requires this, you know, actual Bitcoin in circulation. And when I see everyone say Bitcoin fixes this, well, on crowdfunding platforms, in theory it does, but if no one's using Bitcoin to pay, if these guys can run their business, these guys who've been canceled, you know, whether it's their YouTube channel being demonetized, whether it's being kicked off of Twitter, whether it's Patreon, yes, Bitcoin would

Money and no one's using it, and so is it nothing new? Well, you always need it, but now it's a hundred X, and it's only going to get, I think, much worse.

I see. So look, I think you make a good point that it's difficult to get a, to run a Bitcoin donation campaign, and I think there's a few things there. So I think, first of all, I think it's this question of is merely holding using Bitcoin, or in your view, is it that you actually have to spend, right? And so I think Also comes to, perhaps that also comes to, what's your view of Bitcoin and what, is it the right tool? Is it the right tool for the job? Because in, in some people's minds, it may well be that they use it as their savings technology, they're not necessarily looking to spend it, and that, perhaps, that would be why they don't donate. but I think historically, it would also be fair to say, when there's been bull runs, then people have been a bit more willing and a bit more free with the cash, right? So I guess my question

You must spend to be using Bitcoin or can holding be, you know, is only holding a use of Bitcoin?

Yeah, holding is absolutely a use of Bitcoin, and it is one of the best. I mean, holding is powerful in the sense that it can give you financial sovereignty and it can give you fu money. Right? I mean, if you have enough, it doesn't matter what the mob says, it would take a lot for them to be able to deplatform you and cancel you because they can't. You have enough money. So in one sense, hodling is a tool of cypherpunks. Because you can't be canceled, it's f u money. So hodling is absolutely a use of Bitcoin. And is there a right way to use Bitcoin? I don't think we can say that. I mean, Bitcoin is just software, it's a tool. But at the same time, I don't think we can be nihilistic about it, where we can't say nothing matters, right? Like there's no effects of how we use Bitcoin and what we advocate for. So people often confuse me for advocating a certain use of Bitcoin or emphasizing it as saying, "This is the only valid use case Not. And the reason why I have to do this is I feel like we've gone so far to the hodling side, to a monomania, that it's just gone too far. And so, so the fact I even have to kind of talk about the other side, I think demonstrates it itself. And then I think you were talking about hodling like can Can it really help, you know, either defund the state or how effective is hawking for these things?

Right. And so, so I think that's a good question as well because, I've seen you discuss this on, on, online as well around things like capital gains tax and, you know, obviously we know the, you know, there are risks around KYC. Absolutely, there are some risks there. Do you believe that, I guess, I, I, I see a potential tension there that some people believe that merely holding in some way helps defund the state longer term. I, I, I would, I would believe that view, but I think you might disagree with that view. Is that right? Or what's your position there? What's your thinking there?

Well, I think I would ask the question, how much hodling would do that, like a dollar amount, and if so, for how long, and exactly how does that defund the state? And I've never received an answer for that. I think when you make a claim, you've gotta give numbers or, you know, something to give it credulity. And if we look at the market cap of Bitcoin, let's just say today, let's say everyone hodles, no one spends, and let's even say that no one even pays their taxes on it, well, the market cap of Bitcoin is about the net worth of Jeff Bezos. So that's not even a drop in the bucket for like a US federal budget, which is in the trillions of dollars Dollars. So even if we all huddled, like every person owns Bitcoin, not just like the hardcore huddlers, but every single person, everyone who has a dollar of Bitcoin, that's just not even-- the dollars aren't even there. They're not a drop in the bucket of a federal budget. And that's the best case scenario. More realistic is you might have ten percent of people hodling and not, you know, paying taxes.

I see. Yeah. So I guess the way I'm thinking of that is it's kind of like There, there comes a tipping point, right? And we can't say when that tipping point would be, right? And so the way I see it is more like, as more people hold Bitcoin and save outside of the state, then it eventually gets to that point where- Governments can't so easily fund themselves by using cheap debt funding, and so part of that is around, like thinking back to, you know, historical examples when the government wanted to print money, and at the start, they could probably get away with it, right? They could print a bit of money, and it didn't really matter because it comes to inflation expectations, right? It becomes to what is the community thinking on what the government is doing with the money? And At the start, it's fine, but then eventually, right, at the-- towards the end, it becomes like monetary hot potatoes, and we see this in say, Brazil, Argentina, Zimbabwe, et cetera. We see it in these countries where they- Eventually, people don't want to hold the government fiat anymore, and I think that is kind of the tipping point of when it would become, in that direction of defunding the state. And that's why I can't give you like a number. I can't say, "Oh, the Bitcoin price needs to be a million dollars," right? I, I can't give a price. I think it's, it's a mental thing in people's minds, it's their inflation expectation. So what, what do you believe on that? Well,

I, I think it's an extraordinary claim

to I want a stronger argument. Like, is it one percent of people holding Bitcoin, what price of Bitcoin? Like, does it have to be a million or is a hundred thousand close enough? Like, just some ballpark. But let's just say that, that is true, that hodling Bitcoin could defund the state, you know, for whatever reason, just kind of granting that. I think if that were to ever get close, the government would effectively shut down, or clamp down on Bitcoin enough to where it could never happen. Like, let's say we start to approach that in the United States us would immediately close all of the exch-exchanges. They would require you to turn over all your Bitcoin, just like they did with gold. That's exactly what they would do. So if, if Bitcoin ever got that close, it would be closed down effectively before that could ever even happen. It would be like a push of the button.

Right, and I think so this comes back into the typical arguments that, you know, we-- Bitcoiners have with other, you know, people about the likelihood of the government being able to shut down Bitcoin and also the incentive, right? Because again, it comes to- Individual people inside the government may, in some sense, get captured by Bitcoin, right? And you know, I mean, you mentioned the Silk Road case, even, that, as a Carl Mark the fourth or something, that guy, yeah, one of the guys actually went and, you know, once he got in, in, became an investigator in the case and went and got Bitcoin for himself, right? So I think that's a similar case where we're gonna see that happen ac-across all spheres of society, whether that's in the government or in the private sector or wherever, I think

Bitcoin and want some for themselves. And, you know, I think that also, it also brings up this idea as well of competition jurisdictionally, right? Like going elsewhere. I think not everyone can do it, but I think it's-- that is a viable option. Another option is just this kind of, maybe it's not a perfect example, but the Uber strategy, right? When Uber came out, technically, they were illegal in many cities that they were operating in, but they, they kind of-- they got enough customers on board, they had enough dr- Uber drivers The work, and it just, it just became politically infeasible to stop Uber in many countries around the world. Would you believe a similar strategy could be employed with Bitcoin?

I don't think so because it's money, you know, Uber, I know, you know, it's, it's obviously not the best example, so, but I, I get your, your point, like you said, it's not the best, but, I think the difference is because it's money, it's so much more dangerous, and at least in the US, we've seen the US, I mean, we go to war in the US just to defend the dollar, that's why we're in the Middle East, that's probably why Gaddafi got killed because he was

Export, we're going to defend it, and as will any other country, they're gonna defend, their monetary system. So that's the first thing. And then going back to your original point about, jurisdictions and arbitraging based on taxes and stuff, I mean, I think that could be an effective strategy for, you know, individuals, of course, but, going back to the scale question, how much money is that that the government isn't getting out of them for those taxes, number one, and how much is it pulling out? And I think if you Even if, again, if you did all of Bitcoin, the entire market cap of Bitcoin, it doesn't even come close. And so for me right now, I'm more focused on what's happening, you know, right now with cancel culture, with this beginning Marxism that we're starting to see, and I think it's, it really is, I mean, this is our World War II, our World War One of our generation, and those guys went off to war, you know, what, what they did, the communists and the nazis, they, their weapons were obviously rifles and tanks, Is money, it's all about money. Like if you look at the, the Black Lives Matter, it's kind of extortion, you know? They go to these corporations and they say, "What are you doing to support the cause?" And now you have across the board, every corporation expressing support, donating money to a certain cause, and even if you don't say anything, then you're also, in trouble. So it's all about money. This, this cart, this, Marxist revolution is really about money, and so money is gonna be their weapon, and like Bitcoin For that, not for defunding it, because you can't defund corporations, right? Maybe the state, the taxes, people will say, but you can't defund the corporations, and so you have to focus on the privacy of the transactions, that nature.

Yeah, and I think so, again, it's a similar thing where I agree with some of what you're saying, and I disagree with some of it. Like, and I, I, I broadly agree with you, right? I think we're coming from a similar perspective, right? We're both libertarians, we want I think the, the difference, I guess, for me is more just like the, we don't, I guess we sort of see it like the way Bitcoin evolves might be a little bit different, right? I might see it more, a, a little bit more, like I'm not one hundred percent hodl, alright? I think, yeah, occasionally you wanna, you know, I think, I think also you can sort of have one foot in both camps, right? Like if you were to have a KYC stash that you're hodling, and then you've got like a non That, but I think the broader question is more just about building up enough of a savings pool, right? Enough people in the Bitcoin world that it makes sense for you to have all these different trading partners, because right now it's just difficult to, do that. And I'm not saying it's impossible, right? Obviously, in small scale, you can trade back and forth with people, but I think the broader point I would make is more just that we need to build an overall network of Bitcoin holders, and that's the Help, that's helping this transition over into a Bitcoin world. What's your view there?

Well, if, if by that you mean a network of people who can trade Bitcoin with each other rather than through a third party, that's a hundred percent accurate. I mean, if we can do that, that does go a long way because obviously these third parties is the Achilles' heel of Bitcoin, the third party services and exchanges, that's where the state puts its thumb, that's where they can seize the Bitcoin, that's how they- They influence Bitcoin, you know, taxation and KYCAML, so that is, a good thing. And I think a lot of that also comes down to supporting Bitcoiners and how you build those relationships is at a small level, like you said, we can kind of do it at a small level now, but we, we build from it. Like I know some guys, some just for a short time, some for a very long time, that, if I wanna buy some bitcoins sometimes or, or sell occasionally, I can go to them. So that's a good way to

build it not by hoarding also, but also by, you know, earning it, spending it. And this isn't, I think this is another misunderstanding that people have when we talk about the economy, the Bitcoin economy, where they think we're talking about at the level of a nation state, right? The US dollar or even like a small one like Switzerland or Barbados is gonna switch over to Bitcoin. No, that's not what it means. What it means is a very tiny scale, you know, it can be like a hundred people. A hundred people that, you know, I'm buying your t-shirts and you're paying me for your web development, and then when we go to a Bitcoin meetup, I, you know, I'm paying, you know, for the meals and stuff. I think that's the scale we need to, to build at, is let's just start from there. Let's just start at fifty dollars worth of Bitcoin. Let's start at spending fifty dollars worth of Bitcoin with Bitcoiners, and then that's really the community, 'cause really, It just takes this actual small number, I think you kind of alluded to that before, it just takes a small number to kind of turn the tide, and if we can get that, then we can build both through like, pools, I think you said, and just through commerce.

Right, right. Yeah, I think, I think it makes sense in like, in certain scenarios, absolutely. Like it's a Bitcoin conference or in a small town, like you probably-- I don't know if you've seen, Marty Bent recently interviewed this guy, I forgot his name, I think his name is Mike, he's doing this thing called Bitcoin Beach down in El Salvador, right? And it's, and it's like a whole town where they're all paying Lightning with each other. And so, I mean, that's, that's cool. I like that. I

Kind of, you know, just trading back and forward, and earning online, obviously I'm all about that, I love that idea, I just, I just see it like, w-we have to also, you know, and I think you recognize this also, is the importance of holding because in my view, that reservation demand, all those people holding are what enable the people trading to actually do what they're doing, because they're, in some sense, they're acting like a If you will, a price floor or like a, they're kind of backing up the, they're keeping the price up because they're holding, they're not spending, right? And so, and it's not kind of going out into the fiat world, right? And so the more we can kind of- encourage people to kind of send value out, out of the US dollar and into the bi-bitcoin, so to speak, then it helps that process of, changing the world's money over, would you say?

I don't think I would completely agree with that. I think people will just hold money naturally if they don't have anything to spend it on or don't want to spend anything on. And so I think we don't need to actively advocate for that other than saying, "Is, you know, realistically, it's a speculative asset. So if you can handle the volatility over medium to more like short term, you should do it just as an economic, you know, goal and to give yourself some sovereignty and going back to, hey, if you have enough Bitcoin, you're hard to cancel," which Its own power, but, you know, taking it back to make it really acute, like, let's say that you on Twitter said something four years ago that someone found offensive, and then they get the mob after you, and then your sponsors, you know, they're, they're out to make money, and they say, "You know, Stephanie, you're a great podcaster, but we just, we can't be your sponsor anymore, they're gonna come after us." And then you keep going with your podcast, and you say, "Okay, now I have this,

All these hoddlers saying, you know, sorry Stephan, but I'm hodling and I can't help you, and then it becomes difficult for you to do what you do. And so it could happen to you, it can happen to me, it probably will eventually, and to anyone. So again, it goes back to like wartime Bitcoin. What is wartime Bitcoin? It's looking at individuals with real names, with real businesses, and saying, hey, how does Bitcoin help them? How is it not helping them? And why isn't it helping them? Rather than trying to get too sort of philosophical Or abstract or, hypothetical, and 'cause I'm a very like practical person, and so that's kind of the, the approach that I, I think about it.

Yeah. Okay. I think you made some good points there, Ragnar. one point I would make though is let's consider it could be that people just don't wanna give up their Bitcoin for whatever that product is that you're selling, like so for, in that example, let's say, okay, let's say I get cancelled and my sponsors don't wanna, you know, whatever, and let's- Say I don't get enough donations, from the Bitcoin world to keep the podcast going. Well, then maybe I would just say, "Look, that's maybe that just means people don't value the podcast enough that they would donate for it." And so, you know, I, I think that, that should also be seriously considered, right? It's not that, it's not necessarily that people don't wanna spend at all, it just means they don't perceive enough value for them to spend. What would you say to that?

Well, you, you put it well, and I would call that more of a, a bankerist mentality in the sense that you come at Bitcoin purely from an economic perspective, and the economic perspective isn't bad. I come at it from that perspective as well. I want my Bitcoin to go up, I absolutely do, but I think it goes back to a big picture of, you know, what is the purpose of your life? How are you trying to change the world? What are your core beliefs? And a lot of the guys that I interact with, the 3D gun printing guys, they are out to arm the world and to provide access to guns for everyone to be able to make themselves. And so their use of Bitcoin is very different, and their whole attitude is different, the words they use is different. It's a completely different approach, and for them, it's a matter of necessity. It is really a subversive tool, and so they don't say, "Well, you know, what's my ROI on They, they want their Bitcoin to go up as well, but it's, comes down to a fundamental life approach.

Yeah. Yeah, so I think ultimately it comes down to what do you value most, and obviously people value different things, and I think, I, I absolutely want to see, because I think Bitcoin is a very important tool in terms of us, our liberties, right? It's not the only tool, obviously. I think 3D gun printing is, is a great, is a big thing as well, and I think, you know, people should try to support where they can, and I, I, I'm, I'm, I guess I'm just making the point more, the more kind of narrow stepped back point of sometimes people just don't wanna spend their Bitcoin because they don't see the value in it, and I think in that case, it's not about, you know, Bitcoin spending, because maybe they wouldn't spend US dollars either, right? So it's just, it's just about what, what do they see value in, what are they willing to spend into? And, but absolutely, I take the point that

Guns and we want, defense, drone defense, whatever, we want these technologies because they enable this asymmetric defensive technology against, you know, people who are trying to take your stuff or take your money, right?

Yeah, and so I think it's, it's good to have that balanced approach. And I think, you know, my other thing with hodl monomania, I know it upsets people, but I, I kind of do it on purpose because I think we know about hodling, I think there's enough information and enough financial incentives to hodl So to me, that's why I don't really talk about it anymore, 'cause I think we know that, and so it's kinda like, where do we need to be, you know, in the balance? And so I think, I think it would be good if we have more conversations about this, Marxist revolution that we're facing. I think it'd be better if we talk more about that, how can you earn Bitcoin? And I think that's starting to happen, you know, with the samurai wallet guys, I know you've had them on, on the show, you know

And so I think, you know, we are having that conversation as well. So I think what I want is just more of a well-rounded conversation for people to really face, I think, some dark times ahead and, and put themselves in that position they might think they won't get canceled, but they might, and if not them, their spouse or their family.

Yeah, right. and I think, y-y-you're right that we are seeing more ca-- a lot more canceling happen now, and we are starting to see when someone gets canceled, sometimes their spouse is also getting canceled or their aunt or their, their relative is also getting canceled. So that is absolutely something there. I guess one point I would just make though is perhaps from a historical perspective, right? And I know you've been around Bitcoin for a while yourself. I think in the earlier days, there was a lot of discussion About, oh no, hoarding is bad, or oh no, deflation is bad, and I think that was also part of why a lot of people were trying to study economics and counter some of those ideas and say, "Well, no, hold on, hoarding itself isn't necessarily bad, it's actually kind of like a pejorative, and this is why we hold cash, and it's, it's because of uncertainty." And these are things, obviously, you know, I've discussed on the show, and I think people, people get that, but I can also see,

Our, censorship resistance and looking for ways to try and be more private. So, because again, people have different risk assessments as well, right? So they might say You know, for example, if we're thinking more in terms of like KYC and not KYC, they might have different risk assessment, right? They might be saying, "Well, I'm willing to leave the country, or I'm willing to, try and lobby and try and, improve the tax laws where I am." You know, so I think that, that, that's also that perspective as well. And I, and I understand, obviously, again, my, some of my sponsors have KYC, so obviously disclosure, I, that's, I might have an incentive

I, I think there can be a role. Obviously, I don't like KYC, but I see it more like it's, it's something that if we, if we have to do KYC, to, for people to be able to feel comfortable buying Bitcoin, they don't wanna risk getting, you know, taken up in a sting or whatever if they're being called a money licensing, un- unlicensed money transmitter, blah, blah, blah. That, that's a risk for them as well. so I think that's why I feel like, obviously, I Sometimes the internal community, like fighting against, you know, KYC can also, maybe that's counterproductive in some ways. What do you think?

Yeah, I think, you know, I agree with you in the sense that we're kind of stuck with third parties, the on ramps and off ramps, just because we are such in the fiat world. And so I think of it as like training wheels, right? You, you kind of need it, especially, you know, to get going, but eventually you do wanna take off the training wheels, and if you always keep the training wheels on KYCAML, you're just not going to get, you know, the benefit of what Bitcoin can really do, and you're hobbling yourself. And, you know, KYCAML is, it's not something you wanna brag about. It's something that, you know, okay, we're stuck with it, and I don't think very, very few people would say, "Oh, we can completely do away with it." I, I don't think that's realistic. I don't think anyone's really saying that, but that, that tension is good for people to have the conversation

Forces people to defend a more extreme, position. But, you know, it's interesting about your point with, with KYC/AML is partly why we have it is because we don't have an economy where we can earn it, and we don't have this network where we can buy and sell from each other. I think, imagine if we were a hundred percent, you know, you-- let's say you spent even ten percent of your Bitcoin in the Bitcoin community, well, that's, quote unquote, ten percent that doesn't need to be bought on an exchange. So I think we kind of are creating our own problem by not having an economy, because if we don't have this economy to earn it and trade it, and even donate it, we're always gonna have third party exchanges to the extent that we do that.

Right, yeah. And look, I think another point that adds to what you're saying there is this ongoing war on cash, right? And arguably COVID has accelerated some of that war on cash. We're seeing some stores out there who literally are, "No, we don't take cash now, it's card only." Right? It's

actually dirty fiat.

Yeah, literally. So, look, I think that is another, I guess there's a silver lining to that, because as more people, obviously it's bad that, you know, cash is going away, but it may end up incentivizing more of this censorship-resistant Bitcoin use, as you're talking about.

Yeah, Alex Gladstein posted this video, I'm sure you saw it, where it's, he said it's like a two-minute video on- Why Bitcoin is, you know, for human rights, something like that, is excellent video, and he puts it that way, like you said, we're, we have this war on cash, and we're gonna have a cashless society. If you don't even have cash that you could use, wow, they, they really got us, if they can just put the finger, you know, on the computer and stop us. And it will be an incentive, and it's kind of sad that it has to be by necessity, and I think we should kind of try to get ahead of that 'cause

Five percent, ten percent of your Bitcoin, you know, spend it, try to start a side gig earning Bitcoin if you don't. And there's, I think, more people now doing that, especially BTC Pay Server has accelerated that. I mean, it's such an incredible tool, I can't speak enough about BTC Pay Server. So I think if we just say, okay, let's shift the conversation a little bit, why don't we just try to do five percent or ten percent of our transactions, let's try to earn it, spend it, or let's try to mix those, I think we'll really move the needle, and taking it back to what you said earlier about, you know, this, this turning point, I think it just takes some percentage and then that, that kind of flips things.

Yeah, right. And I think, I can agree with that. I'm a big fan of BTC pay saver, and I absolutely want to encourage people to earn Bitcoin where they can. So, look, Ragnar, I've really enjoyed chatting with you. Where can, if you've got any last kind of closing thoughts for the listeners, and where

Well, thanks for having me. I really appreciate that you can talk with a wide variety of people and hear both sides. You stay really rational and calm, and I appreciate that. I'm not the best at that. so for contacting me, just Guns and Bitcoin. I'm also on Keybase at Ragnar Lifthrasir of Guns N' Bitcoin. Should, Spend.

Fantastic. Well, thank you for joining me, Ragnar. And listeners, you can find me online at stephanilivera.com. Make sure you share this show with people if you enjoyed the discussion. And thanks, guys