Bitcoin News and Finance American Conservative Pundit Ben Shapiro Endorses Bitcoin Hinting at Libertarian Holy Grail Skip to main content

American Conservative Pundit Ben Shapiro Endorses Bitcoin Hinting at Libertarian Holy Grail

The highly popular right-wing commentator devoted a 15-minute Youtube video to inform his followers of the merits and potential that bitcoin, and cryptocurrencies, in general, as an anti-government monetary system. The grassroots embracement of bitcoin is the first of its kind in the alt-right American universe.

Crypto Adoption is Taking a Surprising Right Turn in the American Political Landscape

On March 7, 2021, Ben Shapiro, a prominent American conservative political pundit, released to his Youtube channel a video titled “Bitcoin: The Future of Finance or Fool’s Gold?”. In three days the video accumulated more than 800,000 views, suppressing Aatonop’s flagship video, “Introduction to Bitcoin: what is bitcoin and why does it matter?” that took four years to get to his current 733,000 views.

This is the first time Shapiro discusses bitcoin, cryptocurrencies, or finance in general.

The 15 minute Shapiro video is vastly different from Andreas Antonopoulos’s. While Antonopoulos speaks to the tech crowd and focuses on the blockchain innovation that enables bitcoin, Shapiro explains the crypto world in the most basic terms, as if he knows that his viewers are encountering the concept of fiat-vs-crypto for the first time.

The fact that Shapiro chose to introduce cryptocurrencies and bitcoin to his 2.87 million subscribers is an eye-widening moment in crypto acceptance and adoption in the U.S. in its most folksy form. Shapiro isn’t perceived like Elon Musk or Mark Cuban, billionaire public figures in the tech arena that are followed by the in-crypto crowd. Shapiro is considered a man of the people, a political pundit that is followed by the alt-right crowd – republican, conservative, middle-of-America working-class people.

For readers of news.Bitcoin.com, it might be hard to imagine a world devoid of crypto. But this world does exist, and it’s far larger than the crypto world. Shapiro’s attempt to break the barrier between these two worlds is indicative of the massive inroads bitcoin has made in 2020 and the first quarter of 2021, on its path to be fully embraced by the mainstream.

The Libertarian Angle

After explaining the monetary concept that fiat currencies are predicated on, Shapiro, as an intro to explaining what actually bitcoin is, says this:

What if you could do transactions with pretty much everyone, and you could do it without having to refer to the dollar? You wouldn’t have to worry about central banks. You wouldn’t have to worry about governments blowing up the value of the currency.

This is a direct reference to Libertarian thinking in the U.S., and it’s not hard to see where Shapiro is heading here. Cryptocurrencies, in essence, are a Libertarian dream come true – a monetary system with zero governmental oversight, which collides perfectly with the Libertarian dogma that the government should “stay out” of people’s lives altogether.

If until now Libertarian talking points revolved around the size of government, taxes, gun ownership, and even cannabis, now the holy grail of libertarianism is becoming a reality – a non-governmental economical system. Shapiro doesn’t utter the word “libertarian” throughout the entire video, but he keeps hammering over and over again the point of people losing faith in the governmental monetary system, the dollar, and turning to bitcoin for rescue.

It would be interesting to see if other prominent libertarian figures in the U.S., like republican senator Rand Paul, or former governor and Libertarian Party 2016 presidential nominee Gary Johnson, 2020 presidential nominee Jo Jorgensen would soon jump on the crypto wagon as well, shilling bitcoin as the ‘People’s Money.’

The Shapiro Verdict

This is how Shapiro concluded his video:

Remember – bitcoin goes up when faith in the system goes down. If you have full faith and credit in the United States, you’re buying bonds. If you don’t have faith that the United States isn’t going to inflate the currency, you’re buying bitcoin.

And then, finally, gives his seal of approval:

My feeling is, that over time, cryptocurrencies, particularly ones that find their place in the market as bitcoin has, I think that those are going to rise. I think as we have less and less faith in centralized governments, and it seems to me that we are right now…

An anecdotal proof that Shapiro isn’t a crypto-head comes at about the five-minute mark when he dives into what bitcoin is. This is what Shapiro says about bitcoin’s creator:

So who created the bitcoin? Supposedly he’s name is Satoshi Nakamoto. Now the reason I say supposedly is because nobody really knows who created bitcoin. It’s supposedly this guy, who is supposed to be 40? And from Japan?

Do you see cryptocurrencies getting “politicized” in the future? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Custodial Lightning Network Service Attack Discovered by LN ‘Newbie’ — Hacker Strikes 6 LN Custodians

On September 18, a Redditor posted to the r/bitcoin forum and explained how he discovered a way to “attack [the] lightning Network’s custodial services.” The Reddit account dubbed “Reckless Satoshi” wanted to figure out if a “discrepancy between real routing fees and service’s transaction fee can be exploited for a profit.” The researcher disclosed that he wanted to see how large the damage could be and said “it is bad.” 6 Lightning Network Custodial Services Attacked, Researcher Discloses Findings to Offenders Prior to Public Disclosure A Redditor called Reckless Satoshi published a disclosure post on r/bitcoin this past Saturday and disclosed how he had found a vulnerability with routing fees and some of the Lightning Network’s custodial services. The research attack was done in good faith and after it was complete he disclosed the bugs to the offending services before publishing his findings. Reckless Satoshi used the Lightning Network (LN) attack on six different services incl...

Axie Infinity Down 40% Since Last Week’s Price High, Protocol Revenue Outshines Competitors

Last week, the game token leveraged within the Axie Infinity gaming universe skyrocketed to all-time highs, while other crypto markets remained extremely lackluster. During the last seven days, Axie Infinity’s platform token has dropped significantly in value shedding more than 12%. Meanwhile, the game platform’s smooth love potion token has slid over 8% over the last 24 hours. Axie Infinity Down More Than 40% Since All-Time High Not too long ago, the axie infinity (AXS) token was a topical conversation because it reached an all-time high on July 15. At the time, AXS managed to capture $28.93 per unit and since then it has shed 12.8% during the last seven days. The axie infinity (AXS) token is used within the blockchain-based game that involves battles between token-based creatures called “Axies.” AXS is used for the game’s governance system as well as other actions within the game. At the time of writing axie infinity (AXS) is exchanging hands for $16.70 per coin. AXS/USD on Ju...

Play-to-Earn Game From Polker (PKR) Exchange Listing – Endorsed by Akon

The Play-to-Earn NFT based Polker.Game ‘s native token $PKR has been officially listed on the popular centralized exchange BitMart. Polker.game has been in the spotlight recently as Akon, the American R&B superstar and record producer gave his official endorsement of polker stating that the “game is revolutionary” and that Polker is “hands down.. the best play to earn, NFT game in the space.”. With the BitMart listing and celebrity endorsement from Akon, Polker is perfectly positioned to become a major player in the Play-to-Earn league. Watch Akon’s Video Here What is Play-to-Earn? Although not a new concept, play-to-earn has become a trending term due to the popularity of the NFT game AXIE infinity. In the past, previous play-to-earn games have also achieved success – however, thanks to the huge amount of development in the blockchain space in recent years the gaming experience is now massively improved. Play-to-Earn games are essentially free to play and open to anyone and...

China to Crack Down on Copyright Infringement Through NFTs

Authorities in China are going after creators of digital collectibles based on other people’s works of art, the use of which was not authorized. The government offensive is part of a campaign to combat online copyright infringement and piracy with the participation of several departments. Regulators in China Move to Strengthen Copyright Supervision of Online Platforms The National Copyright Administration of China (NCAC) has recently launched a campaign against copyright infringement and piracy on the internet, together with the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the Ministry of Public Security, and the State Internet Information Office of the People’s Republic. A major objective of the initiative is to improve copyright supervision of online businesses by investigating cases involving the sale and distribution of infringing products on short video, live broadcast and e-commerce platforms, and promptly dealing with infringing content, the agency announced in a press r...
Blogarama - Blog Directory