Is Money The Root Of All Evil?
In the past few weeks I’ve had a few interactions with people who “hate money”, consider it “evil”, think it “creates greed, poverty, hunger”. They see the cronyism and banking/political corruption and blame this on money. There is indeed plenty of corruption in the world and many systems that are more destructive than beneficial. But money itself simply is not one.
“Lack of money is the root of all evil” – George Bernard Shaw
The common thread among people who think money evil is they do not know what money actually is, on top of that many wish they had more, don’t we all, but that’s a separate issue. Hating money because you have none is like hating women because you can’t get a girlfriend. Women ain’t the problem, and there are steps you can take to improve your chances.
Money obviously does not cause wars, or famine and is not evil, money is an object, paper, or metal, or numbers on a screen these days, it is not conscious, and has no power over people. Of course people may lust after it and may rob or go to war in search of it, but that is the action of humans, not of money.
Money is simply a unit of exchange, it means I can exchange my labour after a days work for some paper, or these numbers on a screen, or Bitcoin in my wallet, which I can then exchange for food, rent, or whatever items my money can afford. I recently bought a fancy pipe lighter. I have no materials or skills to manufacture a pipe lighter, if I did, it would take me years to do so, so my life is much easier that I can merely exchange my labour for money, and then exchange my money for the pipe lighter. Money replaced barter so rather than me acquiring items that people selling the lighter might want in exchange, I could just send them money, its a means of exchange we both agree on. Click here for more in depth information on The Origin of Money or click here for The Essence of Money.
Tom Woods Interviews Chris Rossini about “Set Money Free”
These days Central Banks and governments decide what money we are allowed to use. The banking system destroys the value of our money by constant printing, the more money there is the lower the value, so if you have any savings in the bank, over time it will buy you less and less. So when we see people working all the hours they can to pay their bills, or heavily in debt, this is not the fault of money, there may be a number of factors involved, but what will play a role is inflation: prices rise when our wages do not, this is the greatest scam of central banking, and yet most people are totally unaware. What we need is a free market in money, a level playing field, not one set up to insulate elite bankers.
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So what’s wrong with the money supply?
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So the problem is not money, the problem is who is controlling the money supply. A lot of people are angry that banks such as the Federal Reserve or Bank of England are privately owned. That they are privately owned is not an issue, everything else around us is privately owned, why not money? That the government forces us to use that private money with no competing currency to choose from is entirely the problem. If the government did not protect this monopoly money, we could have multiple competing currencies from many private banks, we could simply choose to use the ones that are most secure, reliable, that hold their value, perhaps backed by gold or Bitcoin for example. When there is competition in any product us consumers benefit, the more mobile phones we can choose from means we can find something in our personal budget and that suits our needs. The same goes for money, people could choose to use what they prefer, and this of course would leave any private banks competing for our business. Look at the crypto currency market, there are tens if not hundreds of crypto coins, some will survive, many will die off, but the ones that do survive are the ones that most people see as being secure and easiest to use. When there is choice, the consumer decides, not the government.
Bitcoin: 1DsAHkGWtEWJef679Gcc6rKPj6igxmfebK
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Very good. I agree with your views, the problem is not money. I clearly see the point of a free market in money. I wonder why some governments and bankers are so eager to dismiss cryptocurrencies. Also, not many days ago the real identity of Bitcoin’s founders was such an important matter in the mainstream media. I wonder why … Thanks!
Some researchers into the history of money question the view that barter preceded money. According to them monetary currency has been here as long as civilisation.
Money is a currency, i.e a current of energy. Problem is, in our era of financial capitalism, money itself has become the focus of attention and financial capitalism does not care about real wealth, i.e. goods and services, but only the dollar value of various forms of financial products which have no objective value in the real world, only a monetary one.
I agree that competing or even complementary currencies are very helpful for the enforced centralised monetary system is a way to enslave and control – money is created as a debt which is paid off by the labour of others. If you read the manual for control Silent Weapons for Quiet Wars you will see that the monetary system as currently practiced is one to keep people on the hamster wheel and utterly dependent on the psychopathic elite.
Then there are spiritual currencies such as paying attention and spending time which are freely given.
I think you underplay the subtle psychological mind control involved in the monetary system. For many it is not just a tool for ease of exchange, it is a valuable in itself (the whole of financial capitalism is based on money as a value in itself). Love of money suggests that money is like a nurturing entity, like a mother that loves you for who you are. It goes to people’s heads. I’m anti-money. I think the only true currencies in Natural Law are spending time and paying attention. I agree that competing and non centralised monetary systems are a great solution but you can’t eat money, you can’t use to protect yourself against the elements, you can’t use it as a weapon of self-defence. Money is a social technology and like all technology, depending on how it’s used, can enslave or liberate. In our system I would argue that it largely enslaves, at least the majority who are forced to do jobs they hate to keep in money’s reach.
Thanks for your comments Thomas. Your second comment overlooks the title of the post and the point of it. Any mind control, any need to be nurtured by money etc are surely separate conversations. If a person is intelligent and well balanced, they will understand money is a thing without consciousness. It cannot control anyones mind, nor nurture etc. How money is used can be beneficial or not, just as guns, or cars, or fast food. So I disagree, money does not “enslave”, society can, people can, our addictions or consumerist needs can. I wonder with respect, when you returned to comment the second time, if you reread the article because the second comment almost entirely misses the point of the article.
Your suspicions are correct. I thought I remembered it well enough to comment again but I must have been wrong. Feel free to delete it if you like.
To come back to the money issue and in light of our recent discussions I think our difference with regarding the money issue (correct me if I’m wrong) is as follows:
– You appear to think that money is an objective thing which has no consciousness therefore no necessary rule over men’s minds but has beneficial effects in terms of the good it can bring to humanity’s material welfare via free markets and free trade whence your subscribing to anarcho-capitalist ideology.
– After consideration, I tend to see money not as an objective thing which we give value to but as existing only in consciousness which is why I harp on about the mind control aspect of money. The only value ‘money’ has is the one we ascribe to it in our own consciousness, remember when the English isles used to trade in tally sticks? What possible objective value lies in tally sticks? For me true money is mon-eye, the one eye that is spiritual vision and wealth situated in the so-called third eye chakra where the pineal gland is located. And the true meaning of accounts, as in bank accounts, is what we are accountable for in terms of our thoughts, emotions and actions.
I’d be curious to hear you thoughts on this.
Basically what I’m awkwardly trying to say is that there is danger in allowing proxy currency, even as mere unit of exchange, to determine the value of the fruit of our labour and nature’s resources. Money, to my knowledge, has always been centrally controlled and diverted the energy of people away from themselves to suit whatever elite agenda of the day. Surely you must see something wrong in valuing, say, the monetary value of the entirety of England’s forests, as recent Conservative ministers have done in the UK, when trees and forests are worth way more than money ever could?
As someone said “money doesn’t grow out of trees, but neither do trees grow out of money.”
In other words money, whether centrally controlled or not, results in the totalitarian quantification of everything under the sun, including natural amenities that are not quantifiable monetarily for any one who has an open heart and is respectful of Nature’s dominion.
Call me naive or idealist but money has for only value the care and attention we give to it collectively, and this applies to centralised as well as non-centralised money. Question: if care and attention is what it takes to produce goods and services why the need for a unit of exchange when these fruits can be based on mutual aid and a critical mass insight into the benefits of collective cooperation without coercive control?