Post #1339090

2026-04-18 12:53 UTC

@Karcsesz@equestria.socialhaving this system as an option is an improvement over current private sector solutionsThis isn't about replacing private age verification implementations. It's an attempt to force age verification everywhere. The main reason people object to age verification is that it's privacy invasive. With this solution they can divide those people and counter one of the main arguments against age verification. This comes at a time when there are initiatives to ban access to social media entirely for children. This is an attack on freedom of expression. People ignore that children also have human rights. And just think about the implications for the Fediverse.And to be fair, they do identify a valid symptom of curious kids with overworked (or absent) parents getting in harm's way.If parents are so absent that they can't do their job as parents, then that's something the child welfare agency should deal with. Parental neglect is the main catalyst that's extremely harmful here. Many psychological disorders are caused by parental neglect.

Replies (2)

@C_Chell@equestria.social 2026-04-18 18:27

@interru@hooves.social @Karcsesz@equestria.social "This comes at a time when there are initiatives to ban access to social media entirely for children." Yes, but (for me) they missed the problem. They want to ban children and teens to access social platforms because the content shared is made to influence them and the feeds make them stuck on those platforms. Instead of requiring the social platforms to be less addictive (algorithmic feeds, endless scrolling, target ads, ...) and with better moderation, they prefer just to ban children to access them.

Open ##1339089
@Karcsesz@equestria.social 2026-04-19 11:15

@interru Sorry about the late response, had a busy day yesterday and wanted to give this reply some proper thought. I think we're both mostly in agreement here. I also object to mandating verification, to social media bans, etc etc, it's why I keep stressing how I only think this system is a good idea as an option for platform owners to elect to make use of. But you're arguing against it based on what it *might* enable (that we can and should fight against) while not considering what it actually does. It's like that systemd patch that added a date of birth field. The patch didn't mandate any sort of age verification, it didn't even add any mandatory data sharing, it just implemented something that others might need in a place that made sense. Yet a mob made the dev's life miserable because they saw "might be used for mandatory age verification" and stopped thinking beyond that. Gonna need some more space for the parenting bit so 🧵

Open ##1548779