The Centralized Tree: This Is What We Are Up Against
What is the biggest enemy to humanity? Put another way, what is the group that exerts the most control over people?
Many will point to governments. Certainly, they have a hand in it. However, we need to be mindful there is an entire power structure that is out of the view of most people. It is by understanding who is wielding the power that we can begin to start to formulate a way to get around what they are doing.
Before going any further, I will state this is a done deal. The battle is already won because decentralization will be the norm in a decade or so. However, before we reach that point, there will be a lot taking place, some of it downright nasty. The establishment is not going away easy.
So let us look at the different facets of the power tree.
Bankers
This is the top of the pyramid (those in the know understand why I chose this term). These are the ones who run the show. Old man Rothchild spelled it all out for us long ago when he said that if he controlled the currency, he didn't care who made the laws.
It amazes me that people still do not understand these are the ones who run everything. The Wall Street versus Mainstreet gained a great deal of attention over the years yet few paid notice. In fact, it is getting worse. The Central Banks, which are private entities, control the money supply. Through this system, they give it out to their friends, i.e. other bankers, before it is spread to the general population as DEBT. Each dollar you have carries interest upon it paid to the same bankers.
They rule the next two categories because both are under the control of the money system.
Corporations (especially mega tech)
We now live in a corporatocracy.
These entities, which are "persons" by the way, monopolize all our commerce. They take the lion's share of what is generated without limit. They are free to destroy the environment, engage in illegal activities, and pay slave wages. If someone does try to force them to pay more, they simply outsource those jobs (now they automate them).
Of course, these entities are owned by the bankers. Look up the institutional investors in 50-100 of the top corporations. You will see names like Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and State Street Bank.
These entities are becoming even more dangerous since they are now surveillance arms for both the bankers and the government. We all heard of the data breaches which can carry a huge penalty per violation. Naturally, nothing is ever done about it. This is where centralization is really harming humanity. Because of this, the new media still allows them to control the message.
In addition to big tech, the military industrial complex is also the big driver here.
Government
We finally get what people think is the problem. Notice how it is number 3 on the list. The government is nothing more than a bunch of stooges.
This is the force and coercion arm for the bankers. Here is where we see the violence of the world take place. The bankers fund it, the corporations build it, and the government implements it. Try to resist, at any level, and you will see the violent tendencies of government. They will not be kind to you.
Again, centralization helps them a great deal. Since they have the ability to tap into all the communication and data systems, they can monitor everything that is taking place.
Media
This is another stooge as it is the propaganda arm for the powerful. While big tech is controlling a lot of the message, including censorship, the media still operates under the illusion of "independent". Of course, we see they are owned by 6 or 7 mega corporations so how independent are they? It is simply baffling that people disagree with the idea that the entire media spectrum is tarnished. No matter what channel is being watched, it is propaganda. The elites have a message to deliver and that is what they are doing.
Our path is to move towards decentralization. It is up to us to do everything in our power to help push the platform along. It matters none whether it is STEEM, EOS, or Bitcoin. People need to realize who the enemy is. Those who insist upon fighting with others in this space might as well be treated as enemies. They are doing us no favors. The elite use divide and conquer to maintain control. And we enter the world of crypto-economics and people have the need to create conflict among themselves. If this continues, I dont care how many billions you make in cryptocurrency, it will be taken from you. The government already has proven they can get into ethereum wallets without a key.
The Chinese have a system that does not reflect what I just wrote here. This is basically for the west. In China, the government is at the top of the food chain. Then comes the corporations which is basically a front for the government in many instances. After that, you have the media arm which is fully controlled by the central committee. Finally, I guess you could say come the bankers although they do not wield as much power as in the West.
There is a reason I bring this up. For all of China's faults, they might have found a way to break through the banking system. In fact, that is exactly what is happening in that country. Mobile payments are, overwhelmingly, being conducted outside the banking system. Mega tech like Alibaba created platforms which are much less expensive to use. This is a big thing for all of us to pay attention to.
https://www.globalresearch.ca/how-chinas-mobile-payment-ecosystems-are-making-banks-obsolete/5651648
The challenge with these platforms is they are still centralized. This article points out the threat that could be posed if one of the the mega-tech companies decided to create a similar platform. It well could be the case although, to me, it would have to be a startup since mega tech is owned by, guess who?
Nevertheless, it does provide an opportunity. Decentralized money payment systems is crucial. Fortunately, that is exactly what is at the core of crypto-economics. Cryptocurrency allows people to make money transfers outside the banking system. This hits the banks square in the face when it takes place. It is also something the banks are well aware of yet are powerless to stop. Hence why we see FUD, FUD, and more FUD (remember they control the propaganda arm).
Believe it or not, we are presented with all the solutions to take each of these layers down. The question is will people embrace it or remain asleep.
We have cryptocurrency to eliminate the banking system. With this mode of money creation, distribution, and transfer, we do not need the banks for the most part.
DAOs will end up replace the crooked Wall Street companies that cause harm in so many different ways. These companies exist for one reason: to maximize shareholder value. This is all they care about. It is one of the big reasons we have so many of the problems in the world today.
We are starting to play around with different forms of governance. While there is no clear cut answer, we are going through trails systems that we can build upon. Give a decade to work this out and I feel the need for government will be severely reduced, if not eliminated.
With a decentralized web, the media will not be able to control the message. As we are seeing, platforms like STEEM allow any viewpoint to be posted on the blockchain. This will change the rhetoric over time as people move away from the MSM.
As I mentioned, the elite will not go easily. One of the main weapons in this tug-o-war is technology. Many write about the perils of technology like it is a threat. Technology is no threat. The people who control the technology are the ones who determine whether it is a threat or not.
Everything we can think of technologically has a great benefit to humanity. Or it can be very destructive. It is all how it is used. Once again, this is why decentralized and open source are crucial. We cannot have AI, as an example, in the hands of these mega-corporations. Nor can we have them controlling the IOT, autonomous cars, or even our cell phones. We need systems that put these technologies in the hands of the masses.
The Age of Abundance is coming. These entities and individuals who are enslaving humanity are on the clock. It is ticking on them. We see a clear path to eliminate them from our lives. The issue is that this is not going to happen in the next 24 months. It will most likely take at least a decade before we see the masses embrace it. Sadly, at least in the West, I think there will have to be grave hardship before most get the wake up call. They simply are too comfortable.
Take the entire cryptocurrency space. Who do you think is likely to embrace it right now: the population of the US or Venezuela? I think the answer is clear.
I write this to drive home the point of how important all this is. We are not just on a social media site earning a few tokens. This is much bigger than that. We have people creating a ton of open source applications which will serve as the basis for other creations down the road. People are forking blockchains because they believe they can take what was done before and improve upon it. That is the advantage of open source.
We who are not technically inclined are the voice for what these people are creating. Each time we do something on here, that is another feather in the decentralized cap. As the STEEM blockchain gets bigger, it becomes more of a force. These things end up taking on a life of their own. We never know who will see what is permanently posted on this blockchain.
So, amass you tokens, have fun on here, and meet some wonderful people. However, do not lose site of the fact that there is a massive shift taking place and some are not happy about it. For this reason, we each play a part in making sure we see this through to the end.
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the blockchain is not the answer to everything, however,. After all, there are still plenty of uses for the fedeverse; , and while that is a decentralized technology, doesn't make it blockchain technology. AAlso, in certain scenarios, technology like Active Directory in the enterprise stil remains valid. There are open source alternatives to Microsoft's Active Directory, even, if folks wwant to use those. I definitely see where you are coming from in this entire article, but it's a good place for folks of various technical bacgrounds to play devil's advocate, and that's exactly what I did here.
Blockchain is the answer to everything if you've determined that the root of all problems is the love of money. If crypto can incentivize the masses to stop being greedy then all the world's problems melt away.
That is true and my writings always state that blockchain is just one piece of the cryptoeconomic puzzle. There are going to be other data structures that are decentralized/distributed that will not be blockchain.
This might be only an intermediary step in the technological evolution.
Indeed.
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LOL they are such pathetically ignorant shills.
Great article again! Upvotes and resteemed! I even sent this to a couple friends and relatives!
I was not aware that this was possible. Could you elaborate or point me to a link?
Same-I can't find any info on that...
Very good post about centralization, I do believe though that centralization is important in some aspects of our lives while a lot of things should become more decentralized
While I think that DAO's may have a chance at changing things, we need only look at Steem to see that the hierarchy of power is still firmly in place. In fact, with a GINI coefficient near 1, the inequality of money (and thus power, especially on Steem) is much worse than, say, in the U.S., where the Gini coefficient is around .415.
For instance, HF20 was announced as coming out soon. How much of a vote did the vast majority of us have over HF20? How much discussion and open debate was there? Shouldn't Witnesses be giving us their arguments for why they will or will not vote for it?
To take another perspective, Herb Simon (one of the founders of AI and Cognitive Science and a Nobel laureate in economics) wrote about the importance of stable subassemblies--essentially hierarchies. Decomposition of tasks (and mechanical things) into hierarchies seems to be a fundamental property of making tasks tractable (and physical things stable). However, that might not mean that the economy needs to be set up that way (or become that way through winner-take-all rules). We have plenty of examples of self-organizing systems made of individual units with no, or little, hierarchy, but I believe that those tend to be systems that value the hive over the individual--not something our species seems to be evolved to do on a consistent basis.
So crypto is an interested experiment, along with Steem, but thus far crypto systems seem to be magnifying the problems instead of solving them.
Proud member of #steemitbloggers @steemitbloggers
What you are talking about is that life is competition. Wealth distribution has never been more fair than in 2018. Wealth spread is happening at a faster rate all the time. It's just the relative wealth that is exploding also in value. But that doesn't matter when everyone is constantly getting richer.
It would be nice if the rising tide of corporate profits was raising all boats, but the data, at least in the US, doesn't support this. Wages are largely flat recently and have lagged behind inflation--more so depending on how far back you go in years. In most states the minimum wage is far below the living wage (see the MIT living wage calculator) and the minimum living wage is barely squeaking by and assumes full time employment with healthcare--something many Americans don't have. The middle class is hollowing out here with most of the wealth being sucked to the top 1%. I could include links to any number of articles and reports on this, but credible reports and analyses are so easy to find that there is little point. So, no, everyone is not getting richer--a very small number are getting richer at the expense of most others. The reason for this has a lot to do with legislative capture, rent seeking, monopsony power, weakening of labor laws (more legislative capture), and shared business practices that further harm labor and consumers (such as arbitration and do-not-compete contracts). The market is skewed against most of us. Unless we change the rules, income and, subsequently, wealth distribution will just get worse, especially as more and more automation replaces jobs. At least until the masses revolt. The start of that revolution is already happening with Trump being elected and Brexit being approved. The masses just haven't yet figured out what the real cause of their troubles are.
Proud member of #steemitbloggers @steemitbloggers
BTW, you downvoting my post exactly supports my claim that there IS a hierarchy of power here; however, unlike, say facebook, where censorship is discussed openly at times and can be a big deal, on Steem, anyone with enough power can arbitrarily hurt others for whatever reason they like. This is one of the reasons why I think we need one account = one human and no bots. The reason for tying power to vests on Steem has some to do with economic stake, but is also designed to prevent someone from creating a bunch of small accounts to gain a lot of votes. Since one human can have multiple accounts, equally powered votes could be gamed. The big question is whether Steem can be designed to balance this all out in a way that actually improves quality. It is not working that way in its present state.
I am just a stakeholder that doesn't think what you say is aligned with reality. World of abundance is coming. I think you spread fear and uncertainty and the world doesn't need any more of that to be honest. People should be focused on thriving instead.
I agree that people should be focused on thriving, since that is what we can best control (ourselves, that is); however, we live in a society of laws and regulations, or, in the case of Steem, on a blockchain of rules. The problems come when those rules make it difficult to thrive unless you are already thriving. Or when they largely ensure that those with the most continue to win no matter what. At that point, we need to push for change. Yes, a world of abundance is coming, especially with automation increasing, but unless things change dramatically that abundance will go to a few and leave more and more people behind. And yes, we should be afraid of this. WRT Steem, I'd like to see it succeed, but unless the rules become more fair and it becomes easier for new users to see benefit, I doubt that will happen. I even bought steem with fiat so I could reward posts that I like with something more than dust. So yes, unreasonable fear and uncertainty is a bad thing and there is too much of it today. But reasonable fear and uncertainty is healthy, since it spurs action. The economic data on inequality is very clear, at least here in the US. The recent corporate tax cuts are projected to make this even worse. I'd love to see crypto-type decentralized approaches overturn this (which is why I'm on Steem), but there are clearly problems that are preventing steem from meeting its originally stated goals. SMTs may help if we can experiment with a number of SMT-based communities with different rule sets. But right now, to think that decentralized approaches get rid of a hierarchy, at least on Steem, is simply not true. The important question is whether it is possible to remove the hierarchy on Steem without adverse side-effects. Recently lukestokes posted that rulers are bad, but (good) rules are good. Someone has to make those rules and I just don't know if its possible to do it without some kind of rulers, thus my mention of Herb Simon's work on hierarchical organization. In any case, we need to be having more of these discussions, including in-depth analysis of steem rules and rule changes.