> This seems reasonable from first principles: we don’t sanction rubber band manufacturers for making the bands that hold laundered money together, bag manufacturers for making bankers’ bags used by launderers, &c &c.

This is where all the reasoning falls apart. We do sanction these things. We sanction types of paper commonly used for printing different countries currencies. We sanction types of metal alloys that are most useful in fissile material production. We literally sanction guns and bullets.

Tornado Cash is a large chamber, fully automatic, machine gun. We should sanction it and remove it because what it is most usable for is mowing down large amounts of people, not helpfully killing a wolf that's about to eat an Albertan heifer.

To us programmers language and code and free speech sure seem like all the same thing, but as you zoom out it stops being language and it starts being technology. I don't want gangsters and kleptocrats tornadoing cash. I want order and good government and societies built on peace, trust, and reliable justice.