# SBF vs. Voorhees

By [jer979](https://paragraph.com/@jer979-2) · 2022-10-31

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Personally, I knew [it](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ytaa_5liwMA&list=WL&index=14&t=2197s) was over before it even began.

Erik is a trained debater and extremely articulate. Plus, he’s been studying the issue of crypto regulation for years, so the actual [YouTube discussion](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ytaa_5liwMA&list=WL&index=14&t=2197s) between them, while illuminating, is probably a big one-sided.

[![]({{DOMAIN}}/editor/youtube/play.png)](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ytaa_5liwMA)

But in the midst of the hullaballoo around the debate, [I think it’s worth reading Erik’s post in response to SBF’s original post.](https://www.moneyandstate.com/blog/response-to-sbf)

This is one of the key points:

> But it would be so much easier if the blockchains themselves would block illicit funds, wouldn’t it? 
> 
> That, my friends, is the road to ruin. That is the road to tyranny, ubiquitous surveillance, and the worst dystopian, Orwellian financial system that could be dreamed up. **That is the road that every CBDC will take**. Crypto—true crypto— _must_ be different, or it has no reason to exist. Immutability at the base layer is the raison d’être.  

In all of the discussion about regulation, what people don’t seem to get is that, the very rails that connect people with each other must, at their core, be free.

Otherwise, who watches the watchers?

At the end of the day, and what gives me motivation, excitement and purpose is where Erik ends up:

> Defi is the shining city on the hill. 
> 
> It is the frontier of finance. Everything good and beautiful about crypto has been a step in this direction: an open, borderless, immutable economic foundation for the world.
> 
> If defi does not swell your heart with joy, hope and inspiration, you are missing something. 

This is what crypto is all about.

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*Originally published on [jer979](https://paragraph.com/@jer979-2/sbf-vs-voorhees)*