That's a good idea. There could be two headers, the existing RTA header that adult sites use today [1] and another static header that explicitly states there shall be no adult content.
What is adult content? I know parents who have no problem with their kids seeing porn. I know parents who give their kids a beer. I know parents who take their kids to violent movies. I used to know parents who will give their kids cigarettes. Most parents I know will disagree with their kids doing one of the above. I know songs that were played on the radio in 1960 that would not be allowed today, even though today we allow some swearing on the radio.
That's between parents and their local governments. Yes when I was a kid my mom let me watch whatever and go wherever. The parent in my example ultimately decides what a kid may or may not do which is in alignment with existing laws. If the parent is endangering their kid that is up to them and their government to sort out.
Point being, put the controls entirely into the hands of the device owner. Options can be to default to:
- Block everything by default unless header states otherwise.
- Block only sites that state they are adult.
- Do nothing. Obey the operator. (Controls disabled on child accounts or make them an adult or otherwise unrestricted account on the device).
I think the options are just limited to our imagination.
This is the problem. What is an "adult" web site? Websites that show porn? Websites that show gore? Websites that show violence? Websites that show non-porn naked people? Websites that have curse words? Websites that promote cults and alternate religions?
Why is it the site's responsibility to "state" that they are adult, given whatever parameters they dream up? Why is it the government's responsibility to say "This is adult content, but that isn't adult content?" Shouldn't the parent get to decide which categories of content count as "adult"?
Let’s not pretend like this is a brand new problem. Even pre-Internet, there have always (well, let’s just say definitely the whole lifetime of anyone GenX or younger) been tons of first-amendment-protected content falling under all 3 of these categories: “obviously fine for children” (e.g. Sesame Street, Paw Patrol), “obviously not appropriate for children” (Hustler magazine, Pornhub), and “Controversial / maybe ok for teens / still probably not okay for 6-year-olds” (e.g. sex ed, depictions of rape, graphic violence). This last category is obviously one where Opinions May Vary, but the way we have handled it in the past has been laws. Nearly every state has statutes prohibiting sale, display, rental, or distribution to minors of material deemed “harmful to minors” - the distinction between the second and third categories is determined by a court if it really has to be. This has worked fine in the offline sphere, and it’s why I couldn’t walk into a video store when I was 8 and rent a stack of porn tapes.
At minimum, it would be a reasonable legislation topic to at minimum mandate that websites publishing obviously “Harmful to minors” content tag it as such[1]. And also it would be ideal to create some kind of campaign to tag the first category as safe (honestly Apple and Google ought to be working together on that one). If you in good faith operate a site in the controversial category, that would be no different than selling books on sex ed in a Barnes & Noble - protected.
Parents could then choose, with simple device controls:
- Allow only “tagged safe” pages (parents with very young kids, or who have a hard time monitoring use)
- Allow safe + no-tag (open-minded parents who choose to err on the side of allow, and monitor the controversial stuff themselves)
- Allow all (parents who want to be solely responsible to regulate it)
I find it frustrating that people are talking like we have to either have a completely “no rules” Internet where obviously any kindergartener is going to stumble upon super disgusting stuff, or this gross surveillance state Internet, where people have to show ID to use any site. Neither of those are how things were before the Internet and it doesn’t have to be how things are now.
[1] you might ask, what do we do when say, a Russian porn site doesn’t want to comply with this tagging. In my opinion, it seems reasonable that someone could put obviously bad faith sites like that into a block list database. In a place like the UK I would expect that to be a government regulator, but there’s no reason why that couldn’t just be something private companies do in the US. As a parent, I would pay two bucks a month to subscribe to a service like that if it were integrated into the operating systems my kids use.
Then those parents can turn off their browser/client’s age protections. I think that’s actually a decent argument for the solution posed by this thread.
> I know parents who have no problem with their kids seeing porn.
I don't agree with showing actual children porn, but I also totally expect teenagers to find some way to get access to it in the age of the Internet.
Part of the challenge with this is cultural. Different places in the world think about sex, sexuality, and even the concept of what is a child differently. In the US, showing a woman's bare breasts to a person under 18 is generally considered wrong, and in many cases is illegal. In most of Europe it wouldn't even raise an eyebrow, because bare breasts are on television, sometimes in commercials even.
Set aside for a moment the question of age verification and age limits, we cannot even agree in any sort of universal sense what even qualifies as porn or adult content, and at what age someone should be able to see it. There's a difference between a 7 year old and a 17 year old seeing the same type of content, and there's also a difference between a photographic nude and a video of people engaged in coitus.
The story is basically the same for everything else you listed.
These age verification laws in many ways are trying to use the most heavy-handed mechanism possible to enforce American cultural norms on the entire planet. That's clearly wrong to do. What the GP suggested using RTA headers though puts the control into the parent's hands, which is as it should be.
We don't need to care what France or China thinks when we make our laws that are about our own citizens. They do the same over there.
> These age verification laws in many ways are trying to use the most heavy-handed mechanism possible to enforce American cultural norms on the entire planet. That's clearly wrong to do.
Yes there's a chance our rules spill over there naturally, and I don't consider that wrong either.
I considered many of the same points you mentioned.
Though, one area I am still struggling to grasp is the harm that governments are trying to mitigate. If a child were to see inappropriate material, then what harm can truly arise? Also, why do governments need to enact such laws when the onus of protecting children should be on their parents?
I am not trying to start any kind of flame war, but I really cannot see any other basis for all this prohibition that is not somehow traceable back to Western religious beliefs and the societies born and molded from such beliefs.
It seems like you might be a big believer in cultural relativism and that nothing can be right or wrong, so this may be unsuccessful, but many of us do believe that it’s harmful to the normal development of children to be exposed to certain types of content. It is mostly about maturity. A five-year-old who sees explicit sexual acts performed on a screen is going to be curious about it and be interested in trying it. He or she will likely have no sense of what would be problematic (e.g. trying to initiate such an act with a peer or an adult. Consider how they probably don’t understand ideas of consent). It’s why it’s generally considered grooming for people to exhibit that type of thing to children. Children who have been groomed frequently abuse other children (including by force), and can be taken advantage of by pedophile adults.
I think it’s important, as tough as it can be to identify where exactly the line is, distinguish the concept of a 16-year-old cranking his hog to some Internet porn (which yes, probably pretty harmless and inevitable), with little kids being exposed to explicit types of content. And little kids are curious, so just the fact that they make an attempt to find the content doesn’t mean they’re ready for it.
I appreciate your well thought out response, and I apologize for the length of my response:
As to whether I believe in cultural relativism depends on the level of abstraction we are discussing. I believe there is no way to logically prove that something is morally right or wrong in a similar manner to how a mathematical concept can be proven from pure logic alone. But this fact does not often influence my beliefs in terms of morality in the context of social contracts, diplomacy, legal frameworks, etc.. To draw a parallel, I do not believe in complete free will, but I live my life as though it does exist (I believe in more of a 'sandbox' like an RPG video game with clear constraints and limitations).
> many of us believe that it’s harmful to the normal development of children to be exposed to certain types of content.
Are these beliefs supported by evidence or are they merely conjecture? Do not get me wrong, I am not saying I completely disagree. A child exposed to various types of abuse and neglect can have detrimental effects to his or her development, and there is plenty of evidence to support a statistical relationship.
> A five-year-old who sees explicit sexual acts performed on a screen is going to be curious about it and be interested in trying it.
I believe that is quite presumptuous. By that logic, if a child is exposed to comedic content, will that child become funnier? Such conclusions remind me of the debate as to whether violent video games and other media increase aggression and acts of violence in children. The data clearly does not support this conclusion. Now, I would not say there never has been/will be a case of a child trying to replicate a sexual act due to exposure -- much like violent content -- but outliers do not define the norm.
> He or she will likely have no sense of what would be problematic (e.g. trying to initiate such an act with a peer or an adult. Consider how they probably don’t understand ideas of consent).
Understanding consent is irrelevant. Children legally and morally (as determined by my culture) cannot consent to any sexual activity under any circumstances. Consent is de facto impossible. This is a social contract that I also strongly agree with.
> It’s why it’s generally considered grooming for people to exhibit that type of thing to children.
I was under the impression the intention behind the action was more important than the action itself. There is a difference in intentions between a child stumbling upon an adult getting undressed compared to an adult undressing and exposing themselves in front of a child. One action is happenstance and the other is predatory and abusive. It's why family pictures that might have a naked baby in a bathtub is not often considered CSAM.
> Children who have been groomed frequently abuse other children (including by force), and can be taken advantage of by pedophile adults.
I believe this myth is perpetuated too often. The vast majority adults that of sexually abuse children have no history of childhood sexual abuse. Certainly, some do perpetuate the abuse, but it's not as common as some might think. It is just another attempt for abusers to garner sympathy and decrease their punishment. It's very similar to the myth that public urination can result in a registered sex offender. To my knowledge, there are no instances of this type of case in the United States. However, it is a clever little lie to tell comfort folks into living next to a registered sex offender convict of a more heinous crime.
As for children-on-children abuse, I am not certain your claim holds up, but I admit I am less knowledgeable in this area.
Fundamentally, the laws around requiring ID to view adult content do not really prevent any of the harm we are discussing. Sure, I child might not accidentally stumble upon explicit content on Pornhub. However, the laws do not stop Chester Child Molester from sending their dick pics to a kid on Discord or Roblox or whatever.
Why is it the if a child stumbles upon a parent's firearm and hurts themselves or another, the parent can be held liable in both civil and criminal court. However, if a child stumbles upon sexually explicit content via a parent's computer, the onus is placed upon everyone but the parent(s)? If the harm of exposure of sexual material to youth is so damaging, then should parents not also be held to such civil and criminal punishments?
> if a child is exposed to comedic content, will that child become funnier?
Yes, of course they will. But you do make a good point that 'playing CoD leading to kids wanting to shoot people with real guns' isn't proven, but most parents I know still do not want their kindergarteners playing realistic violent games. As a parent, we are mainly looking for the ability to choose to introduce more adult themes like violence only when we can tell that the child's maturity level is sufficient to understand the morality involved. Shooting Nazis in a video game is fun, but they should first understand why we can't shoot that asshole who makes fun of them at school, or that hardass math teacher, or their annoying little brother.
> Understanding consent is irrelevant. Children legally and morally (as determined by my culture) cannot consent to any sexual activity
We agree there, but set aside this legal definition to understand my point better. If two 12-year-olds fool around with each other, willingly, I'm not that shocked and I don't think it's likely going to cause any real harm in most cases. On the other hand, if a kid (whether 5 or 8 or 12 or 14) forces another child into an act, that's worse. And the less mature, the less likely they understand the severity of that act and its impact on the victim. An immature brain might think that forcing themselves on a cousin or something is no more severe of an offense than borrowing their pokemon cards without asking.
> If the harm of exposure of sexual material to youth is so damaging, then should parents not also be held to such civil and criminal punishments?
As far as I know, in my country, if a kid says at school "My daddy showed me this cool website called PornHub" that school is 100% calling 'Child Protective Services' and the parents will 100% be investigated on suspicion of grooming and abuse because like I said, it's illegal to show such materials to children in most or all states.
The US. If they want to serve users in other countries, or if certain states make their own rules, it's business as usual whether to serve different content there or serve a different header or take the legal risk.
It's the exact same problem that age verification faces. There are different laws in different jurisdictions and operators have to figure out how to comply with the ones that matter to them.
Think of the (current) header as meaning "we would have blocked you if we saw you were under 18" or whatever equivalent and it should make sense.
> I know parents who have no problem with their kids seeing porn.
Surely you mean at least teenagers, and not literally children, right? Consider the prevalence of violence, racial stereotyping, and escalation of fetishism into degeneracy that clearly exists within this medium; what's the line that these parents draw? Are they making sure it's only something vanilla? Or is there no line whatsoever?
That was our struggle with implementing "blocking" tech at a school I worked at. Is a kid looking up how to do a breast self exam porn? What about a self testicular exam.. What about actual Sex Ed kinds of sites?
i can make arguments as to potential merits of kids having a beer/cigarette, listening to swear words, or witnessing casual violence. i cant make an argument for letting kids see hardcore pornography in any capacity.
Swear words and violence don't cause addiction, alcohol can but it's way less likely and also easier to restrict... idk why a kid should have cigs even once though
there may be valid use cases in certain demographics eg the disabled. to me it is evidently advantageous teaching a teenager how to have a smoke or have a drink properly , so that they don't go overboard with self directed learning for a valid activity (loosening social inhibition). we could totally teach teenagers the generation and consumption of dispassionate violent relationship simulacra. may I ask what would be advantageous about this ?
it is literally always the same thing - who gets to make these decisions? if you come from a family of alcholics (there are many) you will view alcohol for what it is, one of the most dangerous drugs that someone decide should be "legal." if you come from family that lost loved ones to smoking - same thing with smokes. hardcode porn, eh, they will eventually start putting this into practice ("hard" part is personal preference) so while probably not the greatest thing to have kids exposed to who makes these decisions? Personally, if you gave me a choice between smokes and porn and I had to choose one for my kid - I would choose hardcode porn. the core issue as always - who is making decisions on what kids should or shouldn't be exposed to?! and what do you do when whenever someone else gets that power then decides that reading or math or fishing or camping or ... is not allowed?
why 90%? and who decide is it 90%? or 87%? or 94%? are we going to have a referendum to decide on this? we need 100% people to vote on this referendum or small fraction will work? ...?
Practically it's hard to ban something new across the entire country without overwhelming support like that. There are enough people who strongly think kids shouldn't be able to buy alcohol or cigarettes that it ended up getting banned in every form, in all US states (even before federal law). Wouldn't be possible with a slight majority opinion, even if an individual proposition only needs 50% of votes.
this is 1,000,000% not accurate. there are things that vast majority of people support that are never going to happen (e.g. universal background check for gun purchases) and there are things that ruling party easily gets through that are wildly unpopular.
I said it's hard to ban something without support, not that it's easy to ban with support. Not to mention, gun background checks are more controversial than you're making them out to be, in fact this is an example I would use. Even if more than 50% like the idea of a background check, not so many will trust the implementation, and not everyone will vote.
Just for completeness sake and just for fun about 40 or so states allow private sales of firearms without a background check. Of course it is on the seller to know they are not selling to a felon and they may be on the hook if the buyer does something bad though I am straying a bit off topic from age/ID verification and tracking.
you should look this up, the percentage of support is closer to 100% than 50% (84-90%) - about as great of a support as it is humanly possible and yet………
Yes, the RTA header was primarily a solution specific to porn sites. The broader problem is that parental controls don't have reliable standardized signals to filter on which has led to the current nonfunctional mess.
So ideally you want a standardized header that can be used to self classify content into any number of arbitrary and potentially overlapping categories. The presence of that header should then be legally mandated with specific categories required to be marked as either present or absent.
So for example HN might be "user generated T, social media T, porn F" or similar with operators being free to include arbitrary additional categories (but we know from experience that most of them won't).
While this would be required by law, I imagine browser vendors might also drop support to load sites that don't send the header in order to coerce global compliance.
Just an opinion which I know is not super valuable but categories won't help with most sites. Anything that permits user contributed content can become any rating at any minute unless all content would require approval by a moderator before anyone could see it. A few forums support that concept but it requires a proportionate number of moderators or I suppose a very accurate and reliable AI moderator if that is even a thing. I think it's easier and probably legally safer to just tag anything that is not guaranteed to be 100% child safe at all times as adult and let parents decide if they with to approve-list the site in parental controls.
Yeah, and this is a good one. Blacklist is less likely to be ignored by parents. Both have risks of corps doing CYA strats, but less so with the blacklist. Whitelist has the advantage of being more feasible without an actual law, and also better matching how parenting works. Generally kids are given whitelists irl.
That's a good idea. There could be two headers, the existing RTA header that adult sites use today [1] and another static header that explicitly states there shall be no adult content.
[1] - https://www.shodan.io/search?query=RTA-5042-1996-1400-1577-R... [THESE ARE ADULT SITES, NSFW]
What is adult content? I know parents who have no problem with their kids seeing porn. I know parents who give their kids a beer. I know parents who take their kids to violent movies. I used to know parents who will give their kids cigarettes. Most parents I know will disagree with their kids doing one of the above. I know songs that were played on the radio in 1960 that would not be allowed today, even though today we allow some swearing on the radio.
That's between parents and their local governments. Yes when I was a kid my mom let me watch whatever and go wherever. The parent in my example ultimately decides what a kid may or may not do which is in alignment with existing laws. If the parent is endangering their kid that is up to them and their government to sort out.
Point being, put the controls entirely into the hands of the device owner. Options can be to default to:
- Block everything by default unless header states otherwise.
- Block only sites that state they are adult.
- Do nothing. Obey the operator. (Controls disabled on child accounts or make them an adult or otherwise unrestricted account on the device).
I think the options are just limited to our imagination.
> - Block only sites that state they are adult.
This is the problem. What is an "adult" web site? Websites that show porn? Websites that show gore? Websites that show violence? Websites that show non-porn naked people? Websites that have curse words? Websites that promote cults and alternate religions?
Why is it the site's responsibility to "state" that they are adult, given whatever parameters they dream up? Why is it the government's responsibility to say "This is adult content, but that isn't adult content?" Shouldn't the parent get to decide which categories of content count as "adult"?
Let’s not pretend like this is a brand new problem. Even pre-Internet, there have always (well, let’s just say definitely the whole lifetime of anyone GenX or younger) been tons of first-amendment-protected content falling under all 3 of these categories: “obviously fine for children” (e.g. Sesame Street, Paw Patrol), “obviously not appropriate for children” (Hustler magazine, Pornhub), and “Controversial / maybe ok for teens / still probably not okay for 6-year-olds” (e.g. sex ed, depictions of rape, graphic violence). This last category is obviously one where Opinions May Vary, but the way we have handled it in the past has been laws. Nearly every state has statutes prohibiting sale, display, rental, or distribution to minors of material deemed “harmful to minors” - the distinction between the second and third categories is determined by a court if it really has to be. This has worked fine in the offline sphere, and it’s why I couldn’t walk into a video store when I was 8 and rent a stack of porn tapes.
At minimum, it would be a reasonable legislation topic to at minimum mandate that websites publishing obviously “Harmful to minors” content tag it as such[1]. And also it would be ideal to create some kind of campaign to tag the first category as safe (honestly Apple and Google ought to be working together on that one). If you in good faith operate a site in the controversial category, that would be no different than selling books on sex ed in a Barnes & Noble - protected.
Parents could then choose, with simple device controls:
- Allow only “tagged safe” pages (parents with very young kids, or who have a hard time monitoring use)
- Allow safe + no-tag (open-minded parents who choose to err on the side of allow, and monitor the controversial stuff themselves)
- Allow all (parents who want to be solely responsible to regulate it)
I find it frustrating that people are talking like we have to either have a completely “no rules” Internet where obviously any kindergartener is going to stumble upon super disgusting stuff, or this gross surveillance state Internet, where people have to show ID to use any site. Neither of those are how things were before the Internet and it doesn’t have to be how things are now.
[1] you might ask, what do we do when say, a Russian porn site doesn’t want to comply with this tagging. In my opinion, it seems reasonable that someone could put obviously bad faith sites like that into a block list database. In a place like the UK I would expect that to be a government regulator, but there’s no reason why that couldn’t just be something private companies do in the US. As a parent, I would pay two bucks a month to subscribe to a service like that if it were integrated into the operating systems my kids use.
> Websites that promote cults and alternate religions?
Websites that promote any religions. No way should under-18s be exposed to that.
Then those parents can turn off their browser/client’s age protections. I think that’s actually a decent argument for the solution posed by this thread.
There is such a thing as making the "kid ok" header so rare or "18+" so eager that nobody takes it seriously, so that'd need to be kept in mind.
> I know parents who have no problem with their kids seeing porn.
I don't agree with showing actual children porn, but I also totally expect teenagers to find some way to get access to it in the age of the Internet.
Part of the challenge with this is cultural. Different places in the world think about sex, sexuality, and even the concept of what is a child differently. In the US, showing a woman's bare breasts to a person under 18 is generally considered wrong, and in many cases is illegal. In most of Europe it wouldn't even raise an eyebrow, because bare breasts are on television, sometimes in commercials even.
Set aside for a moment the question of age verification and age limits, we cannot even agree in any sort of universal sense what even qualifies as porn or adult content, and at what age someone should be able to see it. There's a difference between a 7 year old and a 17 year old seeing the same type of content, and there's also a difference between a photographic nude and a video of people engaged in coitus.
The story is basically the same for everything else you listed.
These age verification laws in many ways are trying to use the most heavy-handed mechanism possible to enforce American cultural norms on the entire planet. That's clearly wrong to do. What the GP suggested using RTA headers though puts the control into the parent's hands, which is as it should be.
We don't need to care what France or China thinks when we make our laws that are about our own citizens. They do the same over there.
> These age verification laws in many ways are trying to use the most heavy-handed mechanism possible to enforce American cultural norms on the entire planet. That's clearly wrong to do.
Yes there's a chance our rules spill over there naturally, and I don't consider that wrong either.
I considered many of the same points you mentioned.
Though, one area I am still struggling to grasp is the harm that governments are trying to mitigate. If a child were to see inappropriate material, then what harm can truly arise? Also, why do governments need to enact such laws when the onus of protecting children should be on their parents?
I am not trying to start any kind of flame war, but I really cannot see any other basis for all this prohibition that is not somehow traceable back to Western religious beliefs and the societies born and molded from such beliefs.
It seems like you might be a big believer in cultural relativism and that nothing can be right or wrong, so this may be unsuccessful, but many of us do believe that it’s harmful to the normal development of children to be exposed to certain types of content. It is mostly about maturity. A five-year-old who sees explicit sexual acts performed on a screen is going to be curious about it and be interested in trying it. He or she will likely have no sense of what would be problematic (e.g. trying to initiate such an act with a peer or an adult. Consider how they probably don’t understand ideas of consent). It’s why it’s generally considered grooming for people to exhibit that type of thing to children. Children who have been groomed frequently abuse other children (including by force), and can be taken advantage of by pedophile adults.
I think it’s important, as tough as it can be to identify where exactly the line is, distinguish the concept of a 16-year-old cranking his hog to some Internet porn (which yes, probably pretty harmless and inevitable), with little kids being exposed to explicit types of content. And little kids are curious, so just the fact that they make an attempt to find the content doesn’t mean they’re ready for it.
I appreciate your well thought out response, and I apologize for the length of my response:
As to whether I believe in cultural relativism depends on the level of abstraction we are discussing. I believe there is no way to logically prove that something is morally right or wrong in a similar manner to how a mathematical concept can be proven from pure logic alone. But this fact does not often influence my beliefs in terms of morality in the context of social contracts, diplomacy, legal frameworks, etc.. To draw a parallel, I do not believe in complete free will, but I live my life as though it does exist (I believe in more of a 'sandbox' like an RPG video game with clear constraints and limitations).
> many of us believe that it’s harmful to the normal development of children to be exposed to certain types of content.
Are these beliefs supported by evidence or are they merely conjecture? Do not get me wrong, I am not saying I completely disagree. A child exposed to various types of abuse and neglect can have detrimental effects to his or her development, and there is plenty of evidence to support a statistical relationship.
> A five-year-old who sees explicit sexual acts performed on a screen is going to be curious about it and be interested in trying it.
I believe that is quite presumptuous. By that logic, if a child is exposed to comedic content, will that child become funnier? Such conclusions remind me of the debate as to whether violent video games and other media increase aggression and acts of violence in children. The data clearly does not support this conclusion. Now, I would not say there never has been/will be a case of a child trying to replicate a sexual act due to exposure -- much like violent content -- but outliers do not define the norm.
> He or she will likely have no sense of what would be problematic (e.g. trying to initiate such an act with a peer or an adult. Consider how they probably don’t understand ideas of consent).
Understanding consent is irrelevant. Children legally and morally (as determined by my culture) cannot consent to any sexual activity under any circumstances. Consent is de facto impossible. This is a social contract that I also strongly agree with.
> It’s why it’s generally considered grooming for people to exhibit that type of thing to children.
I was under the impression the intention behind the action was more important than the action itself. There is a difference in intentions between a child stumbling upon an adult getting undressed compared to an adult undressing and exposing themselves in front of a child. One action is happenstance and the other is predatory and abusive. It's why family pictures that might have a naked baby in a bathtub is not often considered CSAM.
> Children who have been groomed frequently abuse other children (including by force), and can be taken advantage of by pedophile adults.
I believe this myth is perpetuated too often. The vast majority adults that of sexually abuse children have no history of childhood sexual abuse. Certainly, some do perpetuate the abuse, but it's not as common as some might think. It is just another attempt for abusers to garner sympathy and decrease their punishment. It's very similar to the myth that public urination can result in a registered sex offender. To my knowledge, there are no instances of this type of case in the United States. However, it is a clever little lie to tell comfort folks into living next to a registered sex offender convict of a more heinous crime.
As for children-on-children abuse, I am not certain your claim holds up, but I admit I am less knowledgeable in this area.
Fundamentally, the laws around requiring ID to view adult content do not really prevent any of the harm we are discussing. Sure, I child might not accidentally stumble upon explicit content on Pornhub. However, the laws do not stop Chester Child Molester from sending their dick pics to a kid on Discord or Roblox or whatever.
Why is it the if a child stumbles upon a parent's firearm and hurts themselves or another, the parent can be held liable in both civil and criminal court. However, if a child stumbles upon sexually explicit content via a parent's computer, the onus is placed upon everyone but the parent(s)? If the harm of exposure of sexual material to youth is so damaging, then should parents not also be held to such civil and criminal punishments?
> if a child is exposed to comedic content, will that child become funnier?
Yes, of course they will. But you do make a good point that 'playing CoD leading to kids wanting to shoot people with real guns' isn't proven, but most parents I know still do not want their kindergarteners playing realistic violent games. As a parent, we are mainly looking for the ability to choose to introduce more adult themes like violence only when we can tell that the child's maturity level is sufficient to understand the morality involved. Shooting Nazis in a video game is fun, but they should first understand why we can't shoot that asshole who makes fun of them at school, or that hardass math teacher, or their annoying little brother.
> Understanding consent is irrelevant. Children legally and morally (as determined by my culture) cannot consent to any sexual activity
We agree there, but set aside this legal definition to understand my point better. If two 12-year-olds fool around with each other, willingly, I'm not that shocked and I don't think it's likely going to cause any real harm in most cases. On the other hand, if a kid (whether 5 or 8 or 12 or 14) forces another child into an act, that's worse. And the less mature, the less likely they understand the severity of that act and its impact on the victim. An immature brain might think that forcing themselves on a cousin or something is no more severe of an offense than borrowing their pokemon cards without asking.
> If the harm of exposure of sexual material to youth is so damaging, then should parents not also be held to such civil and criminal punishments?
As far as I know, in my country, if a kid says at school "My daddy showed me this cool website called PornHub" that school is 100% calling 'Child Protective Services' and the parents will 100% be investigated on suspicion of grooming and abuse because like I said, it's illegal to show such materials to children in most or all states.
There are already laws defining this. Had to draw the line somewhere, and they did.
In which legal jurisdiction and culture? Many or most website are have users from many locations.
Is the header a json encoded map from country code to age rating?
The US. If they want to serve users in other countries, or if certain states make their own rules, it's business as usual whether to serve different content there or serve a different header or take the legal risk.
That seems unworkable and a practical matter
They already do this, like there's Victoria's Secret's US website vs Qatar.
It's the exact same problem that age verification faces. There are different laws in different jurisdictions and operators have to figure out how to comply with the ones that matter to them.
Think of the (current) header as meaning "we would have blocked you if we saw you were under 18" or whatever equivalent and it should make sense.
> I know parents who have no problem with their kids seeing porn.
Surely you mean at least teenagers, and not literally children, right? Consider the prevalence of violence, racial stereotyping, and escalation of fetishism into degeneracy that clearly exists within this medium; what's the line that these parents draw? Are they making sure it's only something vanilla? Or is there no line whatsoever?
They don't care. The kids won't think to ask until they are teens, and they are not showing it until then, but it is technically available.
That was our struggle with implementing "blocking" tech at a school I worked at. Is a kid looking up how to do a breast self exam porn? What about a self testicular exam.. What about actual Sex Ed kinds of sites?
i can make arguments as to potential merits of kids having a beer/cigarette, listening to swear words, or witnessing casual violence. i cant make an argument for letting kids see hardcore pornography in any capacity.
I have hard time imagining what is that argument, that apply to the thing you mention but that doesn't apply to hardcore pornography.
Or do you also think we should forbid hardcore pornography also for adults?
Swear words and violence don't cause addiction, alcohol can but it's way less likely and also easier to restrict... idk why a kid should have cigs even once though
there may be valid use cases in certain demographics eg the disabled. to me it is evidently advantageous teaching a teenager how to have a smoke or have a drink properly , so that they don't go overboard with self directed learning for a valid activity (loosening social inhibition). we could totally teach teenagers the generation and consumption of dispassionate violent relationship simulacra. may I ask what would be advantageous about this ?
it is literally always the same thing - who gets to make these decisions? if you come from a family of alcholics (there are many) you will view alcohol for what it is, one of the most dangerous drugs that someone decide should be "legal." if you come from family that lost loved ones to smoking - same thing with smokes. hardcode porn, eh, they will eventually start putting this into practice ("hard" part is personal preference) so while probably not the greatest thing to have kids exposed to who makes these decisions? Personally, if you gave me a choice between smokes and porn and I had to choose one for my kid - I would choose hardcode porn. the core issue as always - who is making decisions on what kids should or shouldn't be exposed to?! and what do you do when whenever someone else gets that power then decides that reading or math or fishing or camping or ... is not allowed?
There are things where like 90% of people will find common ground
why 90%? and who decide is it 90%? or 87%? or 94%? are we going to have a referendum to decide on this? we need 100% people to vote on this referendum or small fraction will work? ...?
Practically it's hard to ban something new across the entire country without overwhelming support like that. There are enough people who strongly think kids shouldn't be able to buy alcohol or cigarettes that it ended up getting banned in every form, in all US states (even before federal law). Wouldn't be possible with a slight majority opinion, even if an individual proposition only needs 50% of votes.
> without overwhelming support like that.
this is 1,000,000% not accurate. there are things that vast majority of people support that are never going to happen (e.g. universal background check for gun purchases) and there are things that ruling party easily gets through that are wildly unpopular.
I said it's hard to ban something without support, not that it's easy to ban with support. Not to mention, gun background checks are more controversial than you're making them out to be, in fact this is an example I would use. Even if more than 50% like the idea of a background check, not so many will trust the implementation, and not everyone will vote.
Just for completeness sake and just for fun about 40 or so states allow private sales of firearms without a background check. Of course it is on the seller to know they are not selling to a felon and they may be on the hook if the buyer does something bad though I am straying a bit off topic from age/ID verification and tracking.
you should look this up, the percentage of support is closer to 100% than 50% (84-90%) - about as great of a support as it is humanly possible and yet………
Yes, the RTA header was primarily a solution specific to porn sites. The broader problem is that parental controls don't have reliable standardized signals to filter on which has led to the current nonfunctional mess.
So ideally you want a standardized header that can be used to self classify content into any number of arbitrary and potentially overlapping categories. The presence of that header should then be legally mandated with specific categories required to be marked as either present or absent.
So for example HN might be "user generated T, social media T, porn F" or similar with operators being free to include arbitrary additional categories (but we know from experience that most of them won't).
While this would be required by law, I imagine browser vendors might also drop support to load sites that don't send the header in order to coerce global compliance.
Just an opinion which I know is not super valuable but categories won't help with most sites. Anything that permits user contributed content can become any rating at any minute unless all content would require approval by a moderator before anyone could see it. A few forums support that concept but it requires a proportionate number of moderators or I suppose a very accurate and reliable AI moderator if that is even a thing. I think it's easier and probably legally safer to just tag anything that is not guaranteed to be 100% child safe at all times as adult and let parents decide if they with to approve-list the site in parental controls.
I always love seeing pros and cons of whitelist vs blacklist sorts of strategies in different scenarios.
Yeah, and this is a good one. Blacklist is less likely to be ignored by parents. Both have risks of corps doing CYA strats, but less so with the blacklist. Whitelist has the advantage of being more feasible without an actual law, and also better matching how parenting works. Generally kids are given whitelists irl.