Bitcoin is Plato's Cave

A group of prisoners have been confined in a cavern since birth, with no knowledge of the outside world. They are chained facing a wall, unable to turn their heads.

A fire is lit behind them, giving off a faint light. People, animals, and objects pass at the rear of the cave, but all the prisoners can see are shadows on the wall. The prisoners classify and name these illusionary shadows, believing they are perceiving actual entities.

Suddenly, one prisoner is freed and brought outside of the cave for the first time. The sunlight hurts his eyes and he finds the new environment disorienting.

When told that the things around him are real, while the shadows are mere reflections, he cannot believe it. The shadows appear much more obviously real to him, but gradually, his eyes adjust, until he can look at objects directly, and finally, at the sun, whose light is the ultimate source of everything he is seeing. He is struck by the beauty surrounding him. He cannot believe he was trapped in the cave for so long.

The prisoner returns to the cave to share his discovery, but he is no longer used to the darkness, and has a hard time seeing the shadows on the wall. The other prisoners think the journey has made the freed man stupid and blind, and violently resist any attempts to free them. The prisoners remain imprisoned, failing to ever know the beauty that lies outside of their cavernous wall.

99% of the world has been confined in a cavern since birth, the cavern of fiat.

Fiat is government money, money declared to be money by governmental decree and law, money manipulated and whimsically printed by central banks. The U.S. Dollar is one example of a fiat currency.

Watch this.

In 2023, let’s say you worked 40 hours a week and made $100,000 for the year.

You saved all $100,000 and kept it in the U.S. Dollar.

At 2% annual inflation (the mandated rate by the United States central bank, aka the Federal Reserve), your money becomes worth $98,000 next year.

After 35 years, that original $100,000 is now worth $50,000.

Inflation and the USD just said that you only worked 20 hours a week in 2023 and only earned $50,000.

But you didn’t. You worked 40 hours a week and earned $100,000.

Nope. Inflation says you only worked 20 hours.

The U.S. Dollar stole 1,040 hours of your time.

The U.S. Dollar stole 43 days of your work.

The U.S. Dollar stole $50,000 of your work’s value.

You did nothing to deserve this other than existing in a monetary system where this is a reality.

The U.S. Dollar steals from its earners and holders *every* year. And it’s not just the Dollar, it’s every single fiat currency in existence.

Some people are aware of this and they place their earned USD’s elsewhere, such as real estate, so they can better store their wealth. This inflates the price of a home, making life increasingly more unaffordable.

Not only is your time, work, and wealth being stolen from you, life as a whole is becoming costlier each year. This is what inflation does. This is what fiat does.

So many today are shackled by the evil of fiat. Born into fiat, many of them aren’t even aware another world exists, just like the prisoners in Plato’s cave. Some of them kick and scream when they are told there in fact is a much more beautiful world to be seen outside of the dark walls of fiat.

Anybody that has studied Bitcoin long enough has taken the journey of the freed prisoner. They walk outside of their dark cave and are immediately perplexed by the vastness of wonder and light. They continue exploring, and eventually, their eyes adjust, at which point they discover a whole new world of grace, beauty, and truth.

They can’t help but desire to come back to the cave, to tell all of their friends and family about their discovery, to plead with them to break free and finally bask in the sun’s light and truth.

It’s the tale many Bitcoiners know all too well. Their friends and family are well aware that they are a Bitcoiner, that they are preachers of a different, new world that will finally free them from central banking and the perils of fiat. 

When you become a Bitcoiner, when you escape the cave, you can’t help but wear the light on your sleeve. Once you see the light, it overtakes your entire being. You're left with no choice but to show others the light that is Bitcoin because its beautiful brilliance pervades every inch of your soul and mind in the best way possible.

You come back to the cave and tell the chained prisoners about Bitcoin, that there is a way out. But now, you don’t see the world they see, or at least, you know the cavernous world of fiat is full of lies and darkness. Some prisoners may cast you off as delusional, some may cast you off as stupid, some may cast you off as a conspiracy theorist, some may ignore your pleas, some may fight back against you.

Why? Because they would rather stick with comfortable and familiar illusions, just like Plato’s prisoners. 

Imagine waking up to the fact that everything you’d seen, believed, and been told was a lie. For Plato’s prisoners, this is the case. For fiat’s prisoners, it isn’t as absolute, but their worldview is at best distorted.

Why do I talk about Bitcoin?

Because I have seen the light and I promise you it is more beautiful and magnificent than anything you have ever laid your eyes on. You might respond, “That’s ridiculous… yeah right, okay Mr. Charlatan… keep believing that, buddy…”

Don’t you see my point? What if you are the prisoner? What if I have titled this writing for a reason?

I might be able to unshackle you and I might be able to hold your hand and guide you for a while, or perhaps someone else can, but at some point, you’re going to have to explore and free yourself.

For now, ask yourself if you might be chained up facing a wall where the only thing you can see is illusionary shadows. What if inflation wasn’t necessary? That’s the foundational belief of fiat. What if there wasn’t a select group of humans that could create an infinite amount of money whenever they wanted? What if your time, work, and money didn’t have to be stolen from you? What if life didn’t get more expensive every year?

Maybe there is another world out there.