In reference to Stephen Livera's Bitcoin Won't Let You Transcend Politics. I also want to cite to other excellent discussions on SN, such as Bitcoin is Political and Bitcoin is a political tool.

I believe that the idea that we can transcend politics to be naive, if not outright deceptive. To say that we bitcoiners should keep our distance from politics misunderstands both the nature of Bitcoin and the nature of politics itself. Politics, in its essence, is not merely the province of governments and voting booths; it is the synthesis of everything uniquely human: rationality, aggression, diplomacy, calculation, violence, intelligence, duplicity, language, and everything else that drives human interaction.

While many bitcoiners see politics through a lord/serf lens, that is just one expression of it (admittedly one which has been dominant for most civilizations throughout history). Politics is not a machine that we can avoid; it is the language we speak, the strategy we wield, and the consequences we live. The concept of escape it is a comforting myth, held by those who fail to recognize its pervasive influence or, more troublingly, by those who hope to wield it uncontested against those who claim exemption.

And furthermore, Bitcoin itself is not just embedded within the landscape of political expressions; I believe it is a crystallization of it. Every feature of Bitcoin -- its protocol, its cryptographic fortifications, its consensus mechanisms -- reflects a calculated assertion of power and autonomy. Bitcoin’s cryptographic robustness is rationality made tangible; its proof-of-work is a bold display of aggression against the unchecked excesses of the fiat empire; its consensus protocol is diplomacy enacted through decentralized consensus.

Even the pseudonymity of Satoshi Nakamoto is a political act, harkening back to The Federalist Papers and revealing again how anonymity can protect revolutionary ideas. Each aspect of Bitcoin represents defiance toward centralized systems, a rallying cry for autonomy, and a meticulously calculated plan for reshaping power.

Yet, Bitcoin’s political essence goes deeper. Its very presence on the world stage is a strategic move to alter the rules of engagement, forcing a recalibration of political powers on a global scale. Bitcoin challenges and refines political expression by limiting certain forms of control -- censorship, seizure, or inflation manipulation -- while expanding others, like financial self-sovereignty, borderless transactions, and uncensorable asset ownership. In this way, Bitcoin isn't some outside force which tolerates or coexists alongside the political sphere; it reshapes it from within.

As long as humans desire autonomy, stability, and freedom, Bitcoin will remain relevant because it speaks to those desires through actions, not words. Bitcoin isn’t an escape from politics but a tool for reshaping it. Every transaction is an assertion of self-sovereignty, every mined block a testament to decentralization’s resilience. It reveals that political power does not always need a centralized authority; sometimes, it resides within a protocol, a network, a language, and a community willing to hold the line.

Bitcoin has built a political structure of its own, one in which rules are enforced not by force but by consensus, not by coercion but by code. Far from being passive bystanders, Bitcoin and bitcoiners are active participants in the political sphere, and carry with them a message that is as bold and relentless as its protocol: the future of power belongs to those who claim it, secure it, and hold it in trust for the individuals it empowers -- and it is now our turn to take the lead.

Livera references the statement "you may not be interested in politics, but politics is interested in you." Clausewitz famously commented that “war is not merely a political act but a real political instrument, a continuation of political intercourse, a carrying out of the same by other means.” Bitcoiners like to point out that "Bitcoin doesn't care what you think." These statements all describe aspects of a unitary process which emerges from human nature.

Bitcoiners must engage with the traditional political machine. Both to protect and extend Bitcoin itself, and to ensure the most positive synthesis of the two systems. Because Bitcoin is itself just politics by another means.