Privacy

Normal life. As much as people want to deny it, it’s actually really important.

I think it's easier for us, as adults, to dismiss those things, but they bring kids joy and an opportunity to learn about the value of money and saving.

I was scratching my head with that one too. HOAs are doing a better job at killing the garage sale.

This is some boomer facebook shit.

I have a Paypal credit card reader I keep with me because I do commissioned work on the side, it's the size of a stick of gum, I can take a payment anywhere, I've paid friends for dinner or other things with a quick tap and use it at garage sales.

Not saying I WANT a cashless society, nor do I think anyone is seriously pushing this issue because if you did away with cash people will come up with something to use as cash the very same day. But I do think this weird image/article is extremely 1-dimensional and likely published in some Christian magazine to reinforce the right-wing fear that anything will ever change at all.

"Crypto will fix that!"

By having a publicly visible ledger of all transactions ever recorded???

Monero would be the exception

For people who think that Crypto will solve these issues, it won't. In a mass-adoption scenario, a few coins will be accepted as currency while the rest remain mostly useless for commerce.

That argument is entirely dependent on what the "few coins" hypothetically turn out to be. For example, regarding privacy, Monero is private by design.

Those orgs behind those coins and their exchange platforms will then become just like the banks of old. Any attempt at democratizing Crypto is illusory, it's a fantasy.

Are you arguing that it is inevitable that exchanges, or some other entity, will inevitably gain majority control of the networks of decentralized currencies?

trace anyone's movements

There's literally a GPS enabled mind control device in almost everyone's pocket.

Take off the tinfoil hat, NYC is not planning to get rid of metrocards. The credit card payment ability is just a convenience feature to get more people riding transit.

They don't receive suitcases of money. Their wives law firms get steady business from a network of donors. Their kids get past the fancy school acceptance filters despite being block heads. They're invited to speak at an overseas conference where they do one event and then 30 days of vacation. Their fake biographies of overcoming hardship get sold out and given out for free by their political party. They can trade stock with insider knowledge.

Let me try to respond back:

1. Depending on your situation, your identity, your society, you cannot always rely on the police helping you. There are lots of documented cases of discrimination (e.g. racism) at police institutions in all kinds of regions across the globe. The companies probably don't want to delete the data any time soon, so there is a chance that this data persists for decades. What if your country chances and starts discriminating or harassing whatever group you belong to? Can you guarantee that your government/society won't flip the switch on any group of society within their lifetime? Can you guarantee that nobody ever wants to visit a country which their group will be discriminated or persecuted?
2. If the homeless person does not own a smartphone, how do they receive money on their Swish account, yet create a swish account? How does a person without documents create a swish account?
3. In your case, Swish seems to be a digital gatekeeper. What prevents them from going rogue, increasing prices or discriminating people? I recommended reading Jaron Lanier's Gadget for understanding the power of digital monopolies.

If the first point does not convince you, here are 2 examples:

• gay dating apps: It repeatedly happened that information from gay dating apps were leaked, sold or extorted to bad governments. Those governments discriminated or persecuted, in some cases killed people just for being homosexual. Chances are high that a gay person has some digital traces to that, e.g. in Swish. Cashless puts them even more at risk in countries like Egypt. https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2017/apr/03/jailed-for-using-grindr-homosexuality-in-egypt
• In the 1930s, a lot of Jews in Europe were identified through state documents which (unnecessarily) mentioned their religion. In some locations, brave people protected them by destroying, hiding or faking state documents.

In other words: If your society changes, any data that exists may be turned against you, even costing your life and the lives of your closest people. Avoiding to have this data saves lives and protects minorities.

Speaking from going through it myself; in the USA, Police often don't help you if you're dealing with domestic violence/rape in a marriage. My ex's military commander refused to help me too...

huh? anyone can dislike going cashless, since when do conservatives care about domestic abuse victims for example? conservatives generally perpetrate domestic abuse!

It might be theoretically possible where there is cell service, but keep in mind that a lot of homeless people do not have and are unable to get bank accounts. De-banking can be and is used as a tool to control people generally. Being cashless might be benign if you are in a situation where the banks, financial apps, and governments can be trusted not to weaponize their absolute control over everyone's money, but in many places they cannot.

On the other other hand, in the U.S. if you are pulled over by the police with cash, they can choose to seize that cash just because carrying cash looks suspicious. They don't need to charge you with a crime. If the cash was in a bank, they'd need to go through a lot more process to seize it -- the cops typically can't just walk into the bank and demand it.