More on KYC-walling the internet
I understand the issue of wanting to protect kids online. When I was a kid, I saw a lot of gnarly shit I never should’ve seen on the internet. Most of my generation and every one after it probably has. There were also a lot of other terrible things I witnessed and experienced at a young age, and most of it had nothing to do with the internet.
I can’t help but thinking about this like the responsible gun owners vs careless gun owners debate, but I hate that analogy because I hate guns.
But that’s kinda what it is, right? Isn’t it the parent’s responsibility, as a gun owner, to lock it up somewhere their kid will never be able to get their hands on it?
Didn’t Eminem even make similar arguments over his music back in the 90’s? You shoulda been watching them, apparently you ain’t parents.
If you want to ban everything that could potentially pose some kind of risk to your child, couldn’t the real problem be your parenting? Like can you just not be bothered to pay attention to anything your kid is doing on a day to day basis?
They have computers at school, sure. But there’s usually a pretty hardcore firewall on those so they can’t even play games in the browser, let alone fire up Pornhub in the middle of class.
Every nine year old in America has a smartphone now too, but there are plenty of security measures you can take to make sure they don’t have access to things they shouldn’t see.
KYC-walling the entire internet is like restricting access to the nation’s water supply because some kid in Florida drank stagnant water from a 5-gallon bucket in the backyard and got sick.
The authoritarian online safety bills being pushed across the US and UK make no sense. At least if you’re looking at them like they’re actually about protecting kids, anyway.
Further reading:
Porn censorship is going to destroy the entire internet - Mashable
End well, this won’t: UK commissioner suggests govt stops kids from using VPNs - The Register
Ohioans will need to submit their photo ID to watch pornography online starting this fall - 614NOW