Cashless society, forced banking, and the War on Cash

Keeping $1k in a bank for 1 year is equal to the CO₂ emissions of flying New York to Seattle. Because banks invest in fossil fuels.

The source of this article is in a walled garden that disrespects our privacy so I will not cite it. But here’s the text, posted here in the free world for all people to access:

The menace of “the War on Cash” is making steady headway across the board.

And that’s whether it concerns big-time international policy-makers pushing for total digitization of financial assets – or individual examples that showcase just how serious this threat is.

Here’s one such case: Elizabeth Dasburg and two others were denied the right to use cash to pay entry fee to the Fort Pulaski National Monument in Georgia, managed by the National Park Service.

It’s turned into, “parks, but no recreation” – because the victims of this violation of US law regulating the use of domestic currency have now opted for litigation.

Plain and simple, Dasburg and the two others believe it is still illegal in the US to refuse to accept the country’s legal tender. Or is it? That’s the question the US District Court for the District of Columbia will have to spell out.

Judging by the filing, the Fort Pulaski employees were equally indoctrinated against accepting cash, as they were trying to be helpful. The visitors were first told in no uncertain terms that only cards are accepted.

We obtained a copy of the complaint for you here.

And then, if – say they had no cards (that they might not want to use them doesn’t seem to have been a consideration) – they were instructed to go to a grocery chain like Walmart and buy a gift card.

However bizarrely and unnecessarily complicated this might sound – all the more ironic, because it appears the “explanation” for this policy is that cards are more “convenient” – that’s what Fort Pulaski wanted.

Cards. Of any sort. Things that can be tracked and tied to a person, in other words.

“By forcing people to use credit cards or digital wallets, under the guise of convenience, the National Park Service becomes a player in the surveillance state, undermining park visitors’ privacy right,” Children’s Health Defense (CHD) General Counsel Mack Rosenberg commented on the case – and the state of affairs.

CDH has decided to put its money where its mouth is and support the defendants’ case financially.

The National Park Service is said to have been working on cashless-only payment options for some years, the scheme now in effect in to close to 30 national parks, historic sites and monuments.

While those behind such things are always happy to present themselves as champions of “equality and diversity,” the reality looks quite different.

“Only half of low-income households have access to a credit card, according to a March 2022 Federal Reserve Bank of New York report,” CHD President Laura Bono said in a letter to the Park and Service CEO.

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/7614616

1. The right to be unplugged includes the right to be free from banks as banks increasingly force customers online. There is also a #WarOnCash underway. So even if you make the ethically absent minded decision to pay for your food electronically, the least you can do is pay the tip in cash. (the war on cash is war on privacy)
2. Electronic tips are also subject to siphoning off by banks. When you tip by card, you also tip Visa, Mastercard, or whatever scumbag credit network is in play because their fee is a percentage of the whole transaction. The electronic transaction may be free to you but it’s not free to the business. I don’t know if the restaurant pays the whole fee and transfers 100% of the tip to the server, or if the server shares the hit. But if this is not McDonalds but some small local business, it’s better to give the full amount to the business anyway.
3. Data protection: when you tip electronically, that creates a record not just attached to you but to the server. If you respect /their/ privacy by way of data minimization, you tip in cash.
4. Environmental protection: banks are lousy for the environment. (ref: Banking on Climate Chaos, bank blacklist and Wired article)
5. Terminal tipping is a swindle (esp. in Europe). Tipping is not only optional in the most pure meaning of the word (not expected), but tipping amounts are lower in Europe meant purely to indicate service quality. Even a tip of €1 is a complement. But terminals suggest American proportions (e.g. 20%). It’s a scam. I think I’ve only seen this in tourist traps. The ownership is happy to make their staff happy by pushing a tip request in a way that deceives the public into thinking it’s out of their hands.. that the technology is asking for the tip. This fucked up scam is training restaurant patrons to overtip w.r.t. the culture (a culture that the locals don’t want to drift into Americanism). In the US it’s not exactly a swindle, but you have less control over the amount nonetheless. Sure most people like the math-free convenience but IMO that does not justify it. And certainly the ~15—25% amounts are excessive when there was no table service.
6. Sometimes servers pool their tips to then tip a portion to the kitchen staff who did well enough to make the servers look good. Cash tips make that go smoothly. I was once in a rare situation where I needed to pay by card and I also wanted cash back. The server explained to me they do not give cash back because of that tip pooling that they do, saying that sometimes they do not get enough cash tips to properly treat the kitchen staff.