Over 70% of teenagers <18 today have watched porn [1]. We all know (many from experience) that kids easily get around whatever restrictions adults put on their computers. We all know the memes about "click here if you're 18" being far less effective than "click here if you're not a robot."

Yes, there were other ways of trying to solve the problem. Governments could've mandated explicit websites (which includes a lot of mainstream social media these days) include the RTA rating tag instead of it being a voluntary thing, which social media companies still would've fought; and governments could've also mandated all devices come with parental control software to actually enforce that tag, which still would've been decried as overreach and possibly would've been easily circumventable for anyone who knows what they're doing (including kids).

But at the end of the day, there was a legitimate problem, and governments are trying to solve the problem, ulterior motives aside. It's not legal for people to have sex on the street in broad daylight (and even that would arguably be healthier for society than growing up on staged porn is). This argument is much more about whether it's healthy for generations to be raised on porn than many detractors want to admit.

[1] https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/raising-kind-kids/20...

In real life, we think age verification is a good thing. Kids shouldn't buy porn. Teenagers shouldn't get into bars. etc... There has to be room somewhere for reasonable discussion about making sure children do not have access to things they shouldn't. I think it's important to note, that complete dismissal of this idea only turns away your allies and hurts our cause in the long run.

For the folks in the back row:

Age Verification isn't about Kids or Censorship, It's about Surveillance

Age Verification isn't about Kids or Censorship, It's about Surveillance

Age Verification isn't about Kids or Censorship, It's about Surveillance

Without even reaching for my tinfoil hat, the strategy at work here is clear [0 1 2]. If we have to know that you're not a minor, then we also have to know who you are so we can make any techniques to obfuscate that illegal. By turning this from "keep an eye on your kids" to "prove you're not a kid" they've created the conditions to make privacy itself illegal.

VPNs are next. Then PGP. Then anything else that makes it hard for them to know who you are, what you say, and who you say it to.

Please, please don't fall into the trap and start discussing whether or not this is going to be effective to protect kids. It isn't, and that isn't the point.

0 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2025/11/lawmakers-want-ban-vpn...

1 https://www.techradar.com/vpn/vpn-privacy-security/vpn-usage...

2 https://hansard.parliament.uk/Lords/2025-09-15/debates/57714...

If we’re gonna apply your definitionally racist argument then whites (ie Europeans) (or Asians or Africans) shouldn’t be in the country.

Also, apparently you’re ok with America’s population doubling with immigration as long as those immigrants are white Europeans?

The share of immigrants as a percentage of population is about where it was between the mid 1800s and early 1900s, but you’re fine with that because it was primarily Europeans? (Although, ironically, a lot of those Europeans were also not considered white contemporaneously and it’s only now that their descendants consider themselves white and rail about all the non white immigeants).

If we’re gonna apply your definitionally racist argument then whites (ie Europeans) (or Asians or Africans) shouldn’t be in the country.

Also, apparently you’re ok with America’s population doubling with immigration as long as those immigrants are white Europeans?

The share of immigrants as a percentage of population is about where it was between the mid 1800s and early 1900s, but you’re fine with that because it was primarily Europeans? (Although, ironically, a lot of those Europeans were also not considered white contemporaneously and it’s only now that their descendants consider themselves white and rail about all the non white immigeants).

On a personal moral/philosophical level, I think lines on a map which we call "nations" are a foolish way to decide who is allowed to go where and do what.

So from first principles, I don't accept the framing. I don't think "national" right to self-determination is a meaningful or valid term. It exists in practice but it is not valuable except in terms of pragmatism/realpolitik.

Therefore, I advocate for immigration policies which are much more focused on helping people and bettering society around me than on any nation-based concept of identity. That doesn't mean I want to bring more people who would hurt others into my society. But it does mean I don't care about whether the people who come in are "like me" in some meaningful way.

(That doesn't mean I don't act like nations exist or agree that they do, just that my ideal world probably would not include them in that way. Nor does it mean I don't think national lines ever echo the lines of societies or that I'm an anarchist who doesn't believe in governments. I just don't accept the idea that "this person lives on this side of the border" is a meaningful way to decide if they get to live in a place or not.)

Also, it sounds like what you consider "national" framing is actually racial framing. Given that you spend a lot of time talking about white people in a nation that has never been just white people, is that not correct?