LEIGH: How Bitcoin Is Used To Promote Human Rights, Feat. Stories from Activists and Refugees
CoinDesk Podcast Network
CoinDesk
4.8 • 689 Ratings
🗓️ 17 February 2020
⏱️ 39 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
CoinDesk reporter Leigh Cuen is joined by the Human Rights Foundation’s Alex Gladstein and Syrian entrepreneur Moe Ghashim to discuss how cultural context shapes the way people view bitcoin, including stories from the Middle East.
Many bitcoiners see cryptocurrency as a cypherpunk tool that enhances personal freedoms, with cypherpunk meaning “using privacy tech to promote social change.” There are diverse users around the world gaining this type of value from bitcoin, but they rarely give interviews or are seen on stage at conferences.
Later we’ll explore the risks of governments impacting the bitcoin ecosystem, through regulatory enforcement, censorship and market manipulation. Then we’ll dive into what everyone can do to enhance bitcoin’s usability through education.
Want more? Leigh has several articles exploring such use cases, everything from why protesters in Lebanon are turning to bitcoin to the possibility that dictators may also participate in the crypto ecosystem
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | It's more dangerous to connect Bitcoin to human rights than to terror in the Middle East. |
| 0:06.1 | Once you connect it to human rights, people will get extremely scared. |
| 0:11.4 | This is the difference between like a dictatorship and a democracy. |
| 0:14.2 | Exactly. |
| 0:15.0 | In a democracy, what the government banks will try to do is say that Bitcoin is too close to terror. |
| 0:21.0 | But in dictatorships, they'll say, oh, it's too close to being used for human rights and, |
| 0:24.7 | you know, democracy work, because that's the equivalent of terrorism in your country, right? |
| 0:30.1 | Exactly. Exactly. |
| 0:34.1 | Hello, everybody. I'm Coin desk reporter Lee Quinn, joined today by Alex Gladstein of the Human Rights |
| 0:39.2 | Foundation and Syrian entrepreneur Mo Gashem, who teaches refugees about Bitcoin along the Syrian-Turkish border. |
| 0:46.1 | Today we're going to talk about some of the ethical nuance surrounding censorship resistance. |
| 0:50.7 | Thanks for joining me today, guys. Thank you. Our pleasure. Mo, can you start us off by sharing a little bit about how you've used Bitcoin and what your |
| 0:58.3 | students find useful about this technology? |
| 1:01.1 | Yeah, sure. |
| 1:01.7 | I initially started to learn about Bitcoin when I was trying to solve payment issues |
| 1:07.1 | in the Middle East, North Africa. |
| 1:09.1 | That's where I had my startup in the e-commerce space, and I thought it isn't working in |
| 1:14.0 | the region. |
| 1:15.0 | And that's where I came across Bitcoin, and then I decided to stop everything I'm doing |
| 1:20.1 | and learn about it because I was shocked how much I don't know about what's going on. |
| 1:24.7 | As I started to learn more about it and really love the whole concept, I thought, |
| 1:29.5 | we need to learn about it at Syrians, not only about the price. And I did a few workshops in |
... |
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