Hacktivists Show Us the Future of Decentralized Regulation

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J.G. Vibes

One of the most frustrating paradoxes in the mainstream political discourse is the idea of “regulation”. We are often told that the problems in our economy, and in our society as a whole are the result of “not enough regulation”, but many people fail to actually process the reality and peripheral consequences of said “regulations”. 

Now before I begin I want to make it clear that I am not saying that all kinds of regulation or oversight for important services is a bad thing, but what I am saying is that government regulation is bad. More specifically, the actions that have come to be associated with this word regulation in terms of government policy are extremely harmful to society.

When a government regulates anything, be it the economy, the drug market, the food market, you name it, they are not doing so with the benevolent intention of helping people, as their public relations scheme suggests. Furthermore, they are not using peaceful means to achieve their goals, they always use force and threats to get what they want. It’s important to remember that these politicians are not impartial referees on the sidelines who have no personal interest in the decisions that they are making. 

Many politicians own large businesses or are involved in high ranking institutions that directly benefit from the decisions that they make while they are in office. With that being said the idea that these people can regulate the marketplace is totally insane, because it ensures that they will use this power to create an unfair advantage for corporations and institutions who already dominate society.
This has become one of the issues that I have actively been seeking solutions for, and over the past few months I am constantly witnessing decentralized groups of internet activists actually regulating the government and the market without any swat teams or tax forms, and requiring no illegitimate authority or sacrifice of freedom anywhere.

This concept of online volunteer regulation first caught my eye after the passing of the NDAA. The government was passing a massive measure to take away people's freedoms and the media was totally silent, as were the so called watchdog groups that are apparently around to blow the whistle on such things. However, as I pointed out in an article at the time, the internet was not silent, and a group of people under the “anonymous” umbrella took action releasing personal information of the legislators putting the bill forward. As I admitted then, more creative action is needed to truly bring about change, but this is all in its beginning stages, and if we look at this in the right context we can get a glimpse into the future of regulation.

Months later I came across a story where a group of internet “hactivists” hunted down an online thief who stole money from a children’s charity. Now again, with the most recent case of anonymous exposing a massive FBI spy operation, we are seeing how average people volunteering their time and energy can offer us a more effective and moral way of ensuring that everyone is on the up and up.

So “who watches the watchers”? Well the truth is that we don’t really need to designate “watchers” at all. In other words, there is no need for some massive government bureaucracy to regulate anything, when there are hundreds of thousands of people online who are willing to do it for free, and these guys won't pull any punches or sweep anything under the rug as government bureaucracies have been known to do when bribed or threatened.

If you have any questions or disagreements feel free to email me at jgvibes@aotmr.com

J.G. Vibes is an author, and artist with an established record label and event promotion company that hosts politically charged electronic dance music events. You can keep up with him and his new 87 chapter book Alchemy of the Modern Renaissance, as well as his show Voluntary Hippie Radio at www.aotmr.com

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