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Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

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Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#231

Post by [deleted] »

adamiscool8 wrote: post #200
throw0101b wrote: post #168

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You seem to be trying to conflate blocking a road and honking your horn with violence... In order to defend fucking with non-violent protesters bank accounts directly (and very illegally). Do you want your movement to succeed? If yes, then don't piss off the non-members / the general public, and try to get them on your side. That is what MLK understood and did. That is what Nelson Mandela did not understand when he…

>“We do not need allies more devoted to order than to justice,” Martin Luther King, Jr.

[deleted]

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#232

Post by s1artibartfast »

rexfarwell wrote: post #207
janice1999 wrote: post #6

Governments really need to break the Visa and Mastercard Duopoly. Not mentioned in this article, but certainly related, was the Canadian governments unprecedented step to freeze hundreds of bank accounts of protestors during COVID protests using their Emergencies Act. While I couldn't be more politically removed from the protestors, using a legislative power envisioned for war like conditions to personally ruin prote…

The MOU of the protestors was to overthrow the government. Seems like an appropriate response. https://archive.org/details/convoymou2022/page/3/mode/2up

The MOU was no more an overthrow than people proposing any policy.

IF protesters request the government set up a community oversight board for the police or build a playground, that wouldn't not be overthrow either.

I have seen the MOU linked several times, but nobody has ever made a coherent argument how it constitutes treason, overthrow, or anything else of that nature.

It is a simple list of demands from protesters, primarily that the government drop vaccine mandates and vaccine passports.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#233

Post by throw0101b »

adamiscool8 wrote: post #90
nick_ wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They were blowing freight truck horns at all hours of the day and night. Tens of thousands of people's lives and sleep were disrupted for weeks on end. 90% of the stuff they were protesting literally wasn't real. Obviously there is a fine line between legitimate, legal protest and it should be taken very seriously. IMO that particular protest pushed that line too hard.

The stuff they were protesting was very real, and those measures specifically caused disruption to hundreds of thousands of people's lives and sleep for months on end. The government turning to wartime measures so that privileged Ottawans living in some of the most affluent areas around the nation's capital can withstand a few honks for a few weeks is absolutely preposterous.

> The government turning to wartime measures […]

The Emergencies Act has nothing to do with war:

* §3 For the purposes of this Act, a* national emergency is an urgent and critical situation of a temporary nature that (a) seriously endangers the lives, health or safety of Canadians and is of such proportions or nature as to exceed the capacity or authority of a province to deal with it, or, (b) seriously threatens the ability of the Government of Canada to preserve the sovereignty, security and territorial integrity of Canada, and that cannot be effectively dealt with under any other law of Canada.

* https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/acts/e-4.5/page-1.html

Was the "health or safety of Canadians" at risk? Did it "exceed the capacity or authority of a province" (Ontario under Ford)?

The Act mandates an inquiry be called after any invocation, and the inquiry in question found that the use of the Act was justified:

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Public_Order_Emergency_Commiss...

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#234

Post by [deleted] »

1over137 wrote: post #215
nick_ wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can tell when people have absolutely no idea what they're talking about when they think downtown cores are where rich people live.

Outside the USA, including Canada, downtown cores are where (many, but not all) rich people live.

[deleted]

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#235

Post by standardUser »

BJones12 wrote: post #206
standardUser wrote: post #203

I used to be vehemently opposed to going cashless (as a society) because then how would I buy illegal drugs? But crypto seems plenty mature to handle that problem now and I'm running out of arguments for why physical currency is essential.

Because, through intention or error, a government or bank can lock out your accounts, leaving you penniless to pay bills or buy food.

That presumes a household already has a large physical cash reserve, which I imagine few do. Besides, if you do want to store value, there are plenty of options like gold and silver and... crypto.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#236

Post by throw0101b »

derektank wrote: post #209
djhn wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why oppose? Privacy. Freedom. Democracy. Equality.

Adding regulatory burdens to voluntary transactions doesn't really seem to be in the spirit of expanding freedom to me. There's certainly an argument to be made that the privacy benefits or the inclusionary benefits are worth the hit to people's economic freedom, but don't pretend there isn't a tradeoff here

> Adding regulatory burdens to voluntary transactions doesn't really seem to be in the spirit of expanding freedom to me.

Lots of folks are unbanked and cannot get credit (cards):

* https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unbanked

It would given them more freedom to participate in the economy.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#237

Post by null0pointer »

stavros wrote: post #16

I really hate paying by credit card (I don't like asking the bank for permission to spend my own money), but it's so convenient that I can't bring myself to carry cash any more. I have a really nice small wallet that I can store a few notes in, but I need a compartment for That's literally the entire reason I pay by card nowadays, I just don't like carrying coins.

It’s also annoying to use a password manager. It would be much easier to just use the same password on every account.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#238

Post by felixg3 »

miki123211 wrote: post #227
nazcan wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That does not include the cost of staff processing it.

And the cost of staff pocketing some of it, and the cost times risk of it being stolen, and the psychological impact to employees of the store being worth robbing...

You forgot cash pickup and delivery costs for big stores or sending two employees to the bank with the day’s revenue (that’s the cost a lot of cash-only merchants in Germany usually don’t calculate for). Also don’t forget the counting of the day’s cash, two employees 30 minutes each.

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#239

Post by [deleted] »

sofixa wrote: post #208
elforce002 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What happened in Canada strongly indicates that a cashless society is as bad as it sounds. China did it and, well, we don't have to guess what happened next. Canada, a Western country with lots of "freedoms", did what it did because those truckers, etc... were a "threat" to "democracy". I advocate for every form of payment to be conducted without restrictions: cash, deposits, debit, credit, crypto, etc... That's true…

> Canada, a Western country with lots of "freedoms", did what it did because those truckers, etc... were a "threat" to "democracy". Can you stop exaggerating for dramatic effect? You can agree with them all you want, but occupying public places for weeks in a highly disruptive normal is a threat, yes. Anywhere on the planet, try pulling the shit those people did (half of what they were protesting about didn't exist,…

[deleted]

Re: Canada 'sleepwalking' into cashless society, consumer advocates warn

#240

Post by CamperBob2 »

gruez wrote: post #225
CamperBob2 wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Translation: "I don't live anywhere near the affected area, so I didn't experience it. If I had, I could have just left town for a while and waited for the whole thing to blow over. I don't see the problem."

It's possible to be against the protesters and/or think that they're unacceptably annoying, without trying to compare your plight to innocent civilians who were killed/raped by enemy soldiers.

Exactly. There's a force continuum at play.

Truckers take over the city and make life a living hell for thousands of innocent residents? Lock their bank accounts and starve them out, and (ideally) prosecute the perpetrators alongside anyone who donated to them.

Soldiers raping and killing civilians? Blow them to kingdom come if possible (it's a war, after all). Otherwise, identify them, convene a tribunal after the war, and hang those found guilty.

FA, FO.

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