Recently, there've been more threads of founders voicing their anger at the entitlement some crypto "users" have.
After sitting one day at a booth, trying to have sensible conversations, I feel similar.
But instead of writing a rage thread, I figured my thoughts would go on here.
Any project with a token knows that people will always feel that they're not getting enough of it for their "honest work" of spamming the Discord server with GMs. And fair enough, in a sense, we invite this behavior with the structures we create.
However, I'd have thought that at least in face-to-face settings, there'd be some pretense at keeping up the social contract of manners.
Apparently, predatory behavior can spread to the real world, and it takes the form of taking stuff from someone's booth, asking for "gifts," and repeatedly coming back with different groups of friends to order the people at the booth to give them more stuff.
Is it a larger issue that we develop an attitude that we take being offered things for granted but do not give back or want to put in the work (in this case, a small and friendly ask and thank you would have been enough)?
I recall a conversation my mum had with another teacher where both of them were criticizing the service expectations their pupils and parents would have. It'd take the form of expecting teachers to do everything while there was little willingness on the other side to contribute anything.
I can't help but feel it's related to how much convenience we're gaining and at the loss of a bigger overarching figure in life. Maybe if we get too used to ordering everything, we apply a similar attitude to real people. Maybe if our most important goals in life become about materials, we care less about the humans.
Very fittingly, at the booth opposite, a project was using Nietzsche to display the expressions they'd trained their AI models to display.
His declaration that God is dead rang very true in my ears today.
And it's not as if Nietzsche was happily declaring this. Without God, what guidance do we have? Where do we still find meaning in life?
When people behave unkindly and disrespectfully, we tend to say, "They need to find God."
I reckon it doesn't have to be a specific God, either. It's just some sort of larger-than-life purpose and something they'd respect.
The one system spanning the world, then, is capitalism. Unfortunately, though, it's not great as a replacement for meaning-creation.
Zizek writes that "it deprives the large majority of people of any meaningful cognitive mapping."
The Mexican poet Octavio Paz believes the real evil of liberal capitalists to be a "passive indifference to values."
"Without a higher unity we only tolerate difference because we are equally indifferent to everything and everyone."
Is this what's happening here?
Are humans indeed wolves to each other?
I have no answers.
It makes me mad and sad because I do not know how to get through to people who feel that way, who see others as mere service providers there to meet their needs. People who do have no respect for anything, isn't that a tough life?
Maybe reading some Nietzsche would help.
If he knew crypto existed, he might even change his famous quote to include:
"The most potent narcotics in life are alcohol, airdrops and Christianity"
Some things I consumed that are reflected in this:
