Quote from: ElectricMucus on August 20, 2012, 05:40:33 PM

No it's not it's arrogant, and economical harmful.

Why do you think the term "legal tender" refers to government issued turds which you are forced to accept? You might argue that this is something different as you don't have the means to use violence to enforce your agenda, you just refuse to do business with em. But ultimately it is the same because you can only pay taxes in legal tender.
If this attitude becomes the norm it will split the economy apart and in the end starving it of participants. It's about choice, you must choose to take part of it or else you aren't a real participant. People who are forced into a system will ultimately create their own one. (Guess what we are here Shocked

)

We just don't need that here.

No, refusing to use government issued legal tender fiat is neither economically harmful nor morally questionable because it is peaceful and voluntary.

There is even an argument for moral people, who desire peace and prosperity, to do whatever they can to limit or eliminate their use of legal tender fiat. States are always aggressively violent and always results in lower standards of living because of the inability to solve the calculation problem.

Legally you are not 'forced to accept' legal tender for a transaction. You can refuse service unless people pay via bitcoins, seashells or whatever else you want.

When you are forced to accept legal tender is in payment of debt. Likewise if you sue and obtain a judgment it will become a debt and is usually denominated in legal tender. Legal tender laws are price controls, enforced by violence, for the legal tender instrument. As such, legal tender laws are economically harmful.

The least harmful is to make the legal tender instrument one which the market would otherwise choose as the monetary instrument because then the value the market places on the monetary instrument would generally be higher than the set price. The introduction of the price control, enforced by violence, leads to misallocations of capital because of the non-mutually advantageous economic relationships. The early American colonists understood this because of the depredations visited upon holders of capital by legal tender laws.

Hence Shakespeare's advice in Hamlet:

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LORD POLONIUS:
Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.

John Witherspoon, a signer of the Declaration of Independence said For two or three years we constantly saw and were informed of creditors running away from their debtors and the debtors pursuing them in triumph, paying them without mercy. Virginia law went so far as to declare debts cancelled if the creditor refused to accept the notes.

Quote from: ElectricMucus on August 20, 2012, 05:40:33 PM

But ultimately it is the same because you can only pay taxes in legal tender.

No, it is not the same because it is the local aggressively violent costumed criminal gang requiring payment of slave tribute in a particular form of a particular instrument. The tax liability may accure and the other party may choose to pay it, instead of being beaten or murdered by the aggressive criminal gang, and will need legal tender instruments to do so. They will simply have to acquire those instruments from a third transaction, either with you or some third party, and the savings or cost will be reflected in the price the two of you agree upon.

Quote from: ElectricMucus on August 20, 2012, 05:40:33 PM

If this attitude becomes the norm it will split the economy apart and in the end starving it of participants. It's about choice, you must choose to take part of it or else you aren't a real participant. People who are forced into a system will ultimately create their own one. (Guess what we are here Shocked

)

Yes, I agree that Bitcoin has the potential to make extreme divisions in the economy because it so profoundly changes the economics of violence because no amount of violence will solve a math problem. It is a great force multiplier for protection from extortion. However, the starved participants will be those that require on aggression and violence for their sustenance. On the other hand, the producers will keep what they produce because the ROI from stealing it from them will be negative.

BLOGDAIL makes a compelling case:

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The facts in this matter do not concern the people who are gloating over this event. There are a group of people who are violent in nature, and who despise Bitcoin because they understand exactly what it represents; a direct threat to their sick and violent society which is based on coercion, the absence of freedom and the application of force.

Imagine a world where everyone had access to personal force fields via an artificially created gland that was made to grow into their abdomen by a nano machine / virus. These force fields could be activated either by the fear response or by the direction of your will, in the same way that you use your will to direct your arm to throw a ball.

Everyone would be able to protect themselves from any sort of physical attack, and all would be able to use similar technology to protect their houses.

It would then immediately become impossible for the State to send their agents to your house to rob you with bailiffs. They would no longer be able to force you to pay anything that you did not want to pay, and you would be able to protect yourself and your property from the other criminals and predators that are not sent out by the State.

In such a world, all flows of money would be voluntary by default. There could be no coercion of any kind, since violence against the person and her property would have been abolished by the advent of force fields.

The entire world would switch from one based on violence to one based on voluntary exchange.

This is exactly what Bitcoin is doing.

It is going to make it impossible for the state to stop people transacting at a distance, in any amount that they choose. It is going to remove the State from the equation as the unwanted third party in all transactions.

Quote from: ElectricMucus on August 20, 2012, 05:40:33 PM

We just don't need that here.

If you are a member of the aggressive criminal gang then having the productive cows refuse to produce or disappear is a real problem. However, if you are a productive cow then it only makes sense to disappear to Atlantis.