You can send me money across the globe without a middleman or anyone being able to block that transfer.
That's it.
If you don't want that, you don't want that. Some of us do.
That's it.
If you don't want that, you don't want that. Some of us do.
Similarly, any government which wants to can block the network entirely or require everyone exchanging into real currency to avoid transactions involving people who’ve violated local laws. Since Bitcoin by design helpfully gives them a full list of your past activities anyone considering ignoring those demands has to consider the risk of consequences for their participation at any point in the future.
Yes, I buy things with bitcoin, and no, you can't find it on the blockchain.
(Or do I? :))
Similarly, maybe you haven’t hit a transaction yet which a government made an effort to block but … are you certain that nobody will ever try to do so or be interested in your past history? If you’re trying to obscure your identity, consider how that would look under existing money laundering if any party led to your real identity being associated with those transactions. If you aren’t confident that no government with jurisdiction will ever care, that’s a factor to weigh on every transaction since you’re leaving an immutable public record.
They wouldn't be able to unless they had over 51% of the mining power, and it would be easily noticed.
Since the blockchain is public all of that can be retroactive, too, so any transaction has the risk that the other party will leak your identity, which similarly disincentivizes other people from taking them.
By that logic anyone in the world can "block" whatever they want by threatening consequences.
At the moment someone with a gun might stop me from going to have a cup of tea with my mother.
I learned long ago to ignore such things in order to maintain my sanity.
We're all criminals now. Such are the '20s.
With the trajectory our political system is on, a few more months of this and the outcome where the guy with the gun pulls the trigger may well be preferable.
The main escape valve at the moment is that the regulations aren't being enforced.