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So what is the problem? I don’t want my kids sharing real names online. I wouldn’t want them verifying their age with Bluesky either. But that’s fine because I

by dpark 1y ago

So what is the problem? I don’t want my kids sharing real names online. I wouldn’t want them verifying their age with Bluesky either. But that’s fine because I also don’t want them getting porn or DMs on bluesky. This is win win for kids. It’s not a win for adults who now have to expose their identity.

gjsman-1000 1y ago
[flagged]
- immibis 1y ago
  I think people just don't want the government to surveil everything they do.
  - gjsman-1000 1y ago
    https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45430811 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45430811
- Aloisius 1y ago
  Em. Thomas Paine, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Benjamin Franklin, John Marshall, John Locke, Immanuel Kant, David Hume, Baruch Spinoza, René Descartes and many, many more wrote anonymously. Some wrote anonymously because they wanted the words to speak for themselves, such as Madison, Hamilton and Jay writing the Federalist Papers. Some did it because they thought their name might detract from the message - such as Franklin's writings when he was a teenager. And some others did it to avoid consequences for their opinion - such as when Thomas Paine penned the case for American independence - literally treason. Even Paine's publisher, Benjamin Rush, remained anonymous! The idea that free speech without responsibility wasn't a consideration seems contradicted by how utterly pervasive it was by classical liberal philosophers and founding fathers and how influential those writings were to the founding of the country and the creation and passage of the first amendment.
Ajedi32 1y ago
> So what is the problem? [...] It’s not a win for adults But isn't that exactly the problem? What are you confused about? You think there's no issue with violating the privacy of all adults as long as children are unaffected?
- gjsman-1000 1y ago
  Being an adult is the ability to be responsible for your actions. Arguing for the ability to disclaim any responsibility or risk of responsibility, at the expense of children's safety, is peak child behavior. This view also makes a mockery of free speech, which was originally intended to allow mature adults to take responsibility and ownership of their actions and beliefs, not run away from them. The idea of running away from your actions and beliefs, in the name of freedom, inverts the entire philosophical foundation.
  - Ajedi32 1y ago
    I have no problem with personal responsibility, I do have a problem with mass government surveillance. (Or depending on implementation, merely government control of private communications. Either way it's not a good thing.) "You must give the government more control of your life or you hate children." is a bad argument.
    - gjsman-1000 1y ago
      You're conflating identification with surveillance; which are completely separate issues. Every bar that cards you isn't surveilling you. Every bank that KYCs you isn't obligated to track every purchase; if they do, the reaction is not to ban KYC, but ban the surveillance. Every library card you use to check out, is not obligated to sell your data; if they do, the reaction is to ban data sales, not library cards. The cypherpunk ideology has convinced you that any form of identity verification equals totalitarian control, which is precisely the absolutist thinking that prevents reasonable child safety measures, and got us here. There's a massive middle ground between 'anonymous free-for-all' and 'government surveillance state' that you're pretending doesn't exist. You might say that's a slippery slope. However, government at all is a slippery slope, a senator can literally propose anything at any time, and a Supreme Court ruling can practically do whatever it wants. And yet, every attempt at living without a government, has always been worse. The internet right now is like living in an anarchic society with moderators and tech companies as warlords. The warlords don't see a problem with this, but the majority of people underneath know full well there's a government already. The cypherpunk ideology doesn't keep government out of tech. It just creates worse governments with less accountability and more power.
maybewhenthesun 1y ago
Imo it's not a win for kids either. Lot's of kid-related websites that want age verification and I'd much prefer my kids to be anonymous online, especially in the context of large software companies. These schemes are one implementation error away from exposing/tracking peoples identities (even more than they are already tracked). IMHO kids watching porn is firmly in the domain of parenting, and not a governmental task.
- dpark 1y ago
  > IMHO kids watching porn is firmly in the domain of parenting, and not a governmental task. Do you actually believe this? The logical implication of this stance is that stores should be able to legally sell pornography to children. Fact is that most people are generally very happy to have the government play the part of protector for children. The government in the US stops children from buying tobacco products, marijuana, alcohol, pornography, and many other things deemed dangerous to kids and for the most part people have no problem with that. When it gets to the internet people suddenly have a problem because age verification is generally synonymous with tracking. And I agree tracking is a huge concern. But let’s not pretend that the government stepping in to protect children is actually an unreasonable thing.

by dpark 1y ago

gjsman-1000 1y ago

[flagged]

immibis 1y ago
I think people just don't want the government to surveil everything they do.
- gjsman-1000 1y ago
  https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45430811 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45430811
Aloisius 1y ago
Em. Thomas Paine, James Madison, Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, Benjamin Franklin, John Marshall, John Locke, Immanuel Kant, David Hume, Baruch Spinoza, René Descartes and many, many more wrote anonymously. Some wrote anonymously because they wanted the words to speak for themselves, such as Madison, Hamilton and Jay writing the Federalist Papers. Some did it because they thought their name might detract from the message - such as Franklin's writings when he was a teenager. And some others did it to avoid consequences for their opinion - such as when Thomas Paine penned the case for American independence - literally treason. Even Paine's publisher, Benjamin Rush, remained anonymous! The idea that free speech without responsibility wasn't a consideration seems contradicted by how utterly pervasive it was by classical liberal philosophers and founding fathers and how influential those writings were to the founding of the country and the creation and passage of the first amendment.

Ajedi32 1y ago

> So what is the problem? [...] It’s not a win for adults But isn't that exactly the problem? What are you confused about? You think there's no issue with violating the privacy of all adults as long as children are unaffected?

gjsman-1000 1y ago
Being an adult is the ability to be responsible for your actions. Arguing for the ability to disclaim any responsibility or risk of responsibility, at the expense of children's safety, is peak child behavior. This view also makes a mockery of free speech, which was originally intended to allow mature adults to take responsibility and ownership of their actions and beliefs, not run away from them. The idea of running away from your actions and beliefs, in the name of freedom, inverts the entire philosophical foundation.
- Ajedi32 1y ago
  I have no problem with personal responsibility, I do have a problem with mass government surveillance. (Or depending on implementation, merely government control of private communications. Either way it's not a good thing.) "You must give the government more control of your life or you hate children." is a bad argument.
  - gjsman-1000 1y ago
    You're conflating identification with surveillance; which are completely separate issues. Every bar that cards you isn't surveilling you. Every bank that KYCs you isn't obligated to track every purchase; if they do, the reaction is not to ban KYC, but ban the surveillance. Every library card you use to check out, is not obligated to sell your data; if they do, the reaction is to ban data sales, not library cards. The cypherpunk ideology has convinced you that any form of identity verification equals totalitarian control, which is precisely the absolutist thinking that prevents reasonable child safety measures, and got us here. There's a massive middle ground between 'anonymous free-for-all' and 'government surveillance state' that you're pretending doesn't exist. You might say that's a slippery slope. However, government at all is a slippery slope, a senator can literally propose anything at any time, and a Supreme Court ruling can practically do whatever it wants. And yet, every attempt at living without a government, has always been worse. The internet right now is like living in an anarchic society with moderators and tech companies as warlords. The warlords don't see a problem with this, but the majority of people underneath know full well there's a government already. The cypherpunk ideology doesn't keep government out of tech. It just creates worse governments with less accountability and more power.

maybewhenthesun 1y ago

Imo it's not a win for kids either. Lot's of kid-related websites that want age verification and I'd much prefer my kids to be anonymous online, especially in the context of large software companies. These schemes are one implementation error away from exposing/tracking peoples identities (even more than they are already tracked). IMHO kids watching porn is firmly in the domain of parenting, and not a governmental task.

dpark 1y ago
> IMHO kids watching porn is firmly in the domain of parenting, and not a governmental task. Do you actually believe this? The logical implication of this stance is that stores should be able to legally sell pornography to children. Fact is that most people are generally very happy to have the government play the part of protector for children. The government in the US stops children from buying tobacco products, marijuana, alcohol, pornography, and many other things deemed dangerous to kids and for the most part people have no problem with that. When it gets to the internet people suddenly have a problem because age verification is generally synonymous with tracking. And I agree tracking is a huge concern. But let’s not pretend that the government stepping in to protect children is actually an unreasonable thing.