The Specter of Economic Death: Algorithmic Ostracism and the Dissolution of Financial Personhood in Late-Stage Surveillance Capitalism
Posted by freedomforall 2 days, 19 hours ago to Business
Excerpt:
"I used to think the whole “debanking” panic was overblown. I really did. I’d roll my eyes at the Twitter threads and the think-pieces about how we’re all living in some dystopian soft-censorship nightmare. I’m a reasonable person, you know? I vote, I pay my taxes, I have a 401k that I check maybe twice a year when I’m feeling particularly masochistic. I thought the people screaming about being deplatformed or debanked were probably extremists, probably saying genuinely horrible stuff that any reasonable company would want to distance themselves from.
I was wrong about all of it, and I learned that lesson the hard way on a Tuesday morning that started like any other.
...
I tried to log into my Chase account to check if a client had paid an overdue invoice and got an error message. Weird, but not unheard of. I tried the app. Nothing. I called the number, waited through forty minutes of hold music that sounded like it was composed by an AI having an existential crisis, and finally got through to a human being who told me my accounts had been “restricted” and that I’d need to come into a branch with two forms of ID.
So I drove to the branch during my lunch break, still thinking this was some kind of mistake, probably related to that time my card got skimmed at a gas station in 2019. I brought my passport, my driver”s license, a utility bill, my Social Security card, basically every piece of identification I’ve accumulated in my thirty-four years of existence. I sat down with a nice woman named Patricia who had the kind of patient smile that people develop after years of telling customers things they don’t want to hear. She typed for a while, her face slowly changing from professional neutrality to something more complicated, something that looked almost like embarrassment. Then she told me she couldn’t discuss the matter further and that I’d receive a letter explaining everything within ten business days.
Ten business days. I had maybe three hundred dollars in cash in my apartment, a mortgage payment due in five days, and a family that likes to eat food on a regular basis. I asked her what I was supposed to do until then, how I was supposed to pay for groceries or gas or the medication my wife takes for her migraines, and she just gave me that smile again and said she was sorry but there was nothing she could do."
--------------------------------------------
There it is.
Who controls YOUR life?
"I used to think the whole “debanking” panic was overblown. I really did. I’d roll my eyes at the Twitter threads and the think-pieces about how we’re all living in some dystopian soft-censorship nightmare. I’m a reasonable person, you know? I vote, I pay my taxes, I have a 401k that I check maybe twice a year when I’m feeling particularly masochistic. I thought the people screaming about being deplatformed or debanked were probably extremists, probably saying genuinely horrible stuff that any reasonable company would want to distance themselves from.
I was wrong about all of it, and I learned that lesson the hard way on a Tuesday morning that started like any other.
...
I tried to log into my Chase account to check if a client had paid an overdue invoice and got an error message. Weird, but not unheard of. I tried the app. Nothing. I called the number, waited through forty minutes of hold music that sounded like it was composed by an AI having an existential crisis, and finally got through to a human being who told me my accounts had been “restricted” and that I’d need to come into a branch with two forms of ID.
So I drove to the branch during my lunch break, still thinking this was some kind of mistake, probably related to that time my card got skimmed at a gas station in 2019. I brought my passport, my driver”s license, a utility bill, my Social Security card, basically every piece of identification I’ve accumulated in my thirty-four years of existence. I sat down with a nice woman named Patricia who had the kind of patient smile that people develop after years of telling customers things they don’t want to hear. She typed for a while, her face slowly changing from professional neutrality to something more complicated, something that looked almost like embarrassment. Then she told me she couldn’t discuss the matter further and that I’d receive a letter explaining everything within ten business days.
Ten business days. I had maybe three hundred dollars in cash in my apartment, a mortgage payment due in five days, and a family that likes to eat food on a regular basis. I asked her what I was supposed to do until then, how I was supposed to pay for groceries or gas or the medication my wife takes for her migraines, and she just gave me that smile again and said she was sorry but there was nothing she could do."
--------------------------------------------
There it is.
Who controls YOUR life?
You (as I have) been vocal on this forum.
Consider the possibility you got too close and hit a nerve.
When you get your finances back under control, and you still need financial services, find a Credit Union that has been in your community for a good while.
I only use a C.U.
That said, You might want to read Dr. John Colman's "The Committee Of 300" (now in it's forth ed.)
I cannot promise you that You'll feel any better, in fact, you may be even more disparaged once you truly grasp what is really going on.
Every cycle of boom/bust, inflation/deflation, war/peace, easy credit/no credit is carefully orchestrated to benefit an extraordinarily small group of well-connected families.
Whether the masses starve or prosper, live in peace or die in war, matters not-at-all to these Satan Worshipping bassturds.
Everyone on this forum owes it to themselves to educate themselves basic mechanisms of financial and societal control a very small group of families have exerted on the world over the last 300-400 years.
I've been much happier and have felt more secure ever since. Instead of absolute perfection, there's been a couple of glitches during that just over a quarter of a century of service but that credit union has been over the top helpful for promptly smoothing things out.
interesting and enlightening.
I agree that it's no accident that these things happen.
All bankers are, at the very least, compromised.
They left their principles behind when they became banksters.
Ditto for "public servants."
I have two bank (credit union) accounts along with safes and sundry cash piles. I also travel with a bit of extra cash... lesson from last summer when I was on a long road trip and my only credit card was compromised, so I had to put a freeze on the card.
I expect that this sort of thing will occur with greater frequency, longer delays to get a resolution and fewer opportunities for remedial actions. It's as if we are all being corralled onto the digital rails of programmable currencies.
It's the cost of doing business. Also, in FL we keep 2-3 months of CASH on hand we call "Hurricane Funds". because we've lived through those times when CC's are not working.
Everyone should do this.
And keep your cash separated. Never all in one place.
over regularly while the 'local' small bank accounts stay.
This year it's a JPMC $900 bonus for opening checking and
savings and keeping them open for about 4 months.
That's much better than the best 'high interest' savings rate at present.
I have no loyalty to any bank.
(Hopefully they won't bail-in my account in the next few months.)
They steal from all of us and I try to get a little back when possible.
(I also agree that a "cash" reserve is a good idea for emergency
or when a deal for immediate cash appears.)
But I keep a lower profile now. UNFORTUNATELY. As I plan for retirement, I will lose the secondary bank account "direct deposit" that saves me fees. Hopefully I can have them waived with a balance minimum... (And bank fees SHOULD BE 100% tax deductible. They sure tax you on the INT income!)
If they get 10,000 new accounts opened and 50 are closed in a few months, they have probably
created over 100 million in new money from nothing (loans) charging 15% to 35% interest.
It's effectively a cash cow that cost them next to nothing.
BTW, credit card companies are doing it, too, to get new accounts.
The banks report the bonus on a 1099-int so the IRS is able to get its pound of fiat.
Do a web search for bank bonuses and you'll see dozens of sites listing the latest offers.
What is needed is some kind of common carrier legislation on banks whereby the bank cannot refuse basic services. (To any legal resident). It would work even if voluntary, but compulsory for government provided services.
.. and.. right in the middle of the article is the Table showing actual effectiveness of debanking .. 0.001%.