I'm not entirely sure what you mean by Monero attempting to be something more than money akhi. In being anonymous, it seeks to fulfill the biggest requirement that any true cash-replacement needs to meet: fungibility. BTC struggles with this, and available tech to combat it has its own issues that you are no doubt aware of.

There's other ways in which I believe Monero to be better than Bitcoin, but let's focus on fungibility here. Is there any way that Bitcoin tackles this issue without major drawbacks? And even if there is, is optional privacy really what you want from a cash replacement? Fungibility should never be opt-in, it should be the default