First, one government uses power to regulate who and how receives money. Than another government uses power to regulate who and how accepts money. Why nobody questions why governments are regulating money flow at all?
If nobody was after WikiLeaks, Visa and MasterCard would be happy to provide them with payments. Or, on the other hand, if Visa does not want to provide a service for any reason, why anyone should force them to?
> if Visa does not want to provide a service for any reason, why anyone should force them to?
Since Visa (and MasterCard) are such a big part of the flow of payments that leaving that decision to them is almost like letting organized crime charge protection money.
I guess you missed this part:
> banks in Sweden were caught in the act of arbitrarily
> discriminating against fully legal business owners that the
> banks claimed sold (according to the banks) “questionable
> products” like horror movies, movies with nudity, or sex toys;
> meanwhile, these same banks happily channeled stock in
> corporations under investigation of genocide. When pressed on
> the matter, the banks referred to vague rules from Visa and
> MasterCard
Imagine being a startup that competes with (say) Amazon in some fringe market (say porn, of which Amazon has plenty). You get shutdown (by Visa/MC proxied by your bank) for selling "questionable products" while Amazon happily can continue selling the same products, since they bring so much more profit to Visa/MasterCard. Is that fair?
Visa and MC are, as mentioned, an effective duopoly over card payments in the EU.
This means that Visa and MC are in a position to govern the flow of money. Since they have started acting as a governing body by unilaterally cutting off access for political reasons, they have exposed themselves to political control over their behavior, also for political reasons.
Only the government gets to be the government. That's why it works.
If nobody was after WikiLeaks, Visa and MasterCard would be happy to provide them with payments. Or, on the other hand, if Visa does not want to provide a service for any reason, why anyone should force them to?