When I read articles like this from our government, I worry about my future. I'm also against all of the illicit activities described in that article. I'm against pollution, money laundering, crime, etc. I think all of these things will have to be politically managed - as is the case for any financial system. The reality is that I'm also a professional making money from this type of tech, so the fact that some powerful bureaucrats can publish these articles scares me. I'm not a criminal, and I have worked my ass off to grow this industry, and it is not these people's place to intentionally misunderstand what we're doing and to demonize us in front of the law.
I agree with you and I am surprised to see that governments and powers-that-be are still pushing these narratives. They are ignoring the powerful network effects that Bitcoin and other tokens have in the way they unite a global web3 movement of digital natives. They are ignoring how Bitcoin is digital gold for a whole generation that would never buy physical gold as an investment. And what about movements like generative art, ordinals, meme culture, gaming, defi and so on. Focusing on the darknet and criminal activity made sense in 2012 but we are way past that being a plausible argument to dismiss blockchains. I can only conclude that The Next Big Thing Starts Out Looking Like A Toy.