I don't know what it's like in other countries, but here in Romania, we really don't get that many books on cryptocurrency, blockchain or anything related to this world we on Steem inhabit. I suppose it makes sense because most people don't really bother to look too much into things. The occasional mention of Bitcoin by the MSM (accompanied by several frowns) seems enough for most. What would they want with crypto anyway? They're not drug dealers or pedophiles.
So most don't really care, but why risk it? Why run the chance of selling a book favorable to anything Bitcoin-related? Some poor sap might but it and God forbid actually take an interest in this. They might even buy Bitcoin.
And who wants that? More people understanding they don't need banks and filthy, lying bankers to take care of their money....can you imagine how dangerous that would be?
I was browsing at a local bookstore and my eyes chanced upon this little gem.
Originally, it's called 'American Kingpin: The Epic Hunt for the Criminal Mastermind Behind the Silk Road by some journalist named Nick Bilton. I have no idea what the content is actually like, as it was wrapped up. But it doesn't matter. Because the average browser won't actually bother to buy the book or even skip through it because people are happy being ignorant. They don't care what's actually happening, they're content knowing the little they do.
'The world's largest drug empire'
'criminal mastermind'
Now, those are heavy words and they already paint a picture. And certainly not a good one. The average bookstore browser doesn't know who Ross Ulbricht was and frankly, doesn't much care. He hasn't time to read the classics in that bookstores, let alone some book about some internet dude...must be for techy guys. Or criminals. Because naturally, the darknet is only for criminals.
Ulbricht was dangerous because he showed a lot of people they could run things, that they didn't need “the systematic use of force” as he put it. So, it figures that the people who use that force would want us to think of him as some evil drug lord. But he wasn't.
They don't want you to look at Dread Pirate Roberts (as he was nicknamed) and think it absurd that he's serving a life sentence plus 40 years without the possibility of parole. While pedophiles and actual drug lords go scot-free. Really, doesn't that seem a tad weird? Okay, even in their preferred narrative that Ulbricht was some evil fucking psycho, I think a life sentence and forty additional years is a bit much. Especially since their laws are quite lax for other offenders.
But they don't want you thinking that way, they don't want you to hear of the Silk Road and know what it was or what it really meant. And if you do, by accident, hear about it, they want to control what you hear. They want to manipulate the information that gets into your head. And now for the average browser, the little he does know is that it was a drug empire full of evil, sick men.
Right.
See, here on Steem, we rejoice whenever the normies seem to hear of Bitcoin in a positive light, we hope we're breaking through to the masses, but the effort to manipulate and control the way they think about this is very much still there.
This young man is spending his life in prison basically because he tried to go against the establishment. That should worry people. Not just us. Everyone.
