Ever since Bitcoin launched back in 2009, the rise of centralized exchanges has been inevitable. A few years later, and now the whole crypto market is dominated by centralized exchanges. While there have been many alternatives to the solution (such as decentralized exchanges), people are still performing trades at centralized entities.

Now the real question is why this is happening, since after all, Satoshi intended Bitcoin to be free from middleman or third parties? Depending on an exchange or custodian, greatly defeats the purpose of true decentralization. Knowing how oppressive some governments are, it'll be easier for them to stop usage of crypto whenever they want to by just targeting centralized exchanges.

Nonetheless, what are your thoughts about this?