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Age verification is highly unpopular amongst heavily online users, but the voting population overall is in favour: https://yougov.com/en-gb/daily-results/202507

Age verification is highly unpopular amongst heavily online users, but the voting population overall is in favour: https://yougov.com/en-gb/daily-results/20250731-91334-2 https://yougov.com/en-gb/daily-results/20250731-91334-2

stingraycharles 6mo ago
Seems like even under young voters more people support it than being against it; 30% of people aged 18-23 are strongly in favor, 57% of people in that age group supports it. I wonder why? Maybe these types of surveys don’t consider the implementation / what you need to give up in order to have age verification?
- SkyeCA 6mo ago
  > I wonder why? Because the internet, for all it's good, has caused society and individuals some pretty serious problems. I don't like the idea of mandatory age verification, but having unrestricted internet access as a kid was objectively bad for me and many of the people I know.
  - righthand 6mo ago
    [flagged]
    - deleted 6mo ago
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    - palmotea 6mo ago
      > That is your parent’s fault that it was bad for you. So don’t punish me or anyone else because you never learned control. I think you're suffering from a lack of empathy. That doesn't mean OS age verification should be implemented or not, but that you're going to be insufferable and pretty ignorant about what's going on. IMHO, the popularity of age-verification is due to the increasing awareness of the harms of much online activity, plus the impracticality of putting the whole burden of mitigating that for children onto the shoulders of parents. If you flippantly and contemptuously ignore those concerns, people will be happy to ignore your concerns. And since you brought it up: honestly, I wouldn't feel bad "punishing" you with this policy, just because of the attitude displayed in your comment. It's needlessly aggressive and making contemptuous assumptions. Your comment actually shoots your position in the foot.
      - righthand 6mo ago
        [dead]
        palmotea 6mo ago
        > I am increasingly in belief that more of the world will be split into the cattle camp and the cattle with agency camp. "Cattle camp"? Seriously? FYI: you're off the rails if you use terms like "sheeple" unironically. I suggest you get help for that. > I am not interested in your “this will be good for society” bs. You also need to work on your reading comprehension. > I don’t have to be empathetic to you or your “well I have an argument to help make the world worse” ideas and beliefs... You're not going to get far acting self-righteous and pissing on other's legitimate concerns because you labeled them "mak[ing] the world worse." > ...you... ignore opposing beliefs and criticisms. Look in the mirror.
        righthand 6mo ago
        You’re in denial if you think the average person isn’t being turned more and more into cattle. Yes seriously, cattle camp. > And since you brought it up: honestly, I wouldn't feel bad "punishing" you with this policy, just because of the attitude displayed in your comment. > You're not going to get far acting self-righteous and pissing on other's legitimate concerns Look in the mirror as well. You started with the “punishing you just because”.
        palmotea 6mo ago
        > Look in the mirror as well. You started with the “punishing you just because”. You actually introduced the "punishment" framing, which I think was unhelpful so mirrored it back to show that. You should also note that I scare-quoted it. And the point I was making was your attitude is harming your own advocacy.
        righthand 6mo ago
        You’ve already rejected the advocacy why would I be trying to convince you of anything?
izacus 6mo ago
Yp, similarly how gambling and smoking restrictions aren't popular among gamblers and smokers.
- deleted 6mo ago
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like_any_other 6mo ago
Perhaps the voting population should first be made acutely aware of the extent of surveillance they are under, and how much age verification would expand that surveillance, and then be asked again. They'll claim they already "know", but watch their opinion change after they get paper mail with a list of recently visited websites, or their words written on public or unencrypted chats, or their movement history thanks to phone spyware.
- gnfargbl 6mo ago
  That's likely, but only if it's possible to materially articulate some specific negative ways in which age verification data is actually being used. You and I can strongly suspect that there's a significant downside to these providers having so much sensitive personal data but, until that is proven, the voting population will only see the upside.
  - like_any_other 6mo ago
    The death of online anonymity isn't negative and specific enough? People understand this intuitively - hire someone to obviously follow them everywhere, record everything they do (or only as much as current surveillance records), and they'll want to put a quick stop to it. Do the same thing, but out of sight, out of mind, and their correctly evolved instincts fail to carry over.
    - deleted 6mo ago
      [deleted]
randusername 6mo ago
I don't think surveys like this are a meaningful indicator of societal attitudes. "age verification" is not unlike "DEI" in that everyone will have different schemas about what it is and how it will be assumed to be implemented. We're not learning anything about the public unless we try to pose the question more directly. https://yougov.com/about/methodology https://yougov.com/about/methodology

stingraycharles 6mo ago

Seems like even under young voters more people support it than being against it; 30% of people aged 18-23 are strongly in favor, 57% of people in that age group supports it. I wonder why? Maybe these types of surveys don’t consider the implementation / what you need to give up in order to have age verification?

SkyeCA 6mo ago
> I wonder why? Because the internet, for all it's good, has caused society and individuals some pretty serious problems. I don't like the idea of mandatory age verification, but having unrestricted internet access as a kid was objectively bad for me and many of the people I know.
- righthand 6mo ago
  [flagged]
  - deleted 6mo ago
    [deleted]
  - palmotea 6mo ago
    > That is your parent’s fault that it was bad for you. So don’t punish me or anyone else because you never learned control. I think you're suffering from a lack of empathy. That doesn't mean OS age verification should be implemented or not, but that you're going to be insufferable and pretty ignorant about what's going on. IMHO, the popularity of age-verification is due to the increasing awareness of the harms of much online activity, plus the impracticality of putting the whole burden of mitigating that for children onto the shoulders of parents. If you flippantly and contemptuously ignore those concerns, people will be happy to ignore your concerns. And since you brought it up: honestly, I wouldn't feel bad "punishing" you with this policy, just because of the attitude displayed in your comment. It's needlessly aggressive and making contemptuous assumptions. Your comment actually shoots your position in the foot.
    - righthand 6mo ago
      [dead]
      - palmotea 6mo ago
        > I am increasingly in belief that more of the world will be split into the cattle camp and the cattle with agency camp. "Cattle camp"? Seriously? FYI: you're off the rails if you use terms like "sheeple" unironically. I suggest you get help for that. > I am not interested in your “this will be good for society” bs. You also need to work on your reading comprehension. > I don’t have to be empathetic to you or your “well I have an argument to help make the world worse” ideas and beliefs... You're not going to get far acting self-righteous and pissing on other's legitimate concerns because you labeled them "mak[ing] the world worse." > ...you... ignore opposing beliefs and criticisms. Look in the mirror.
        righthand 6mo ago
        You’re in denial if you think the average person isn’t being turned more and more into cattle. Yes seriously, cattle camp. > And since you brought it up: honestly, I wouldn't feel bad "punishing" you with this policy, just because of the attitude displayed in your comment. > You're not going to get far acting self-righteous and pissing on other's legitimate concerns Look in the mirror as well. You started with the “punishing you just because”.
        palmotea 6mo ago
        > Look in the mirror as well. You started with the “punishing you just because”. You actually introduced the "punishment" framing, which I think was unhelpful so mirrored it back to show that. You should also note that I scare-quoted it. And the point I was making was your attitude is harming your own advocacy.
        righthand 6mo ago
        You’ve already rejected the advocacy why would I be trying to convince you of anything?

izacus 6mo ago

Yp, similarly how gambling and smoking restrictions aren't popular among gamblers and smokers.

deleted 6mo ago
[deleted]
deleted 6mo ago
[deleted]

like_any_other 6mo ago

Perhaps the voting population should first be made acutely aware of the extent of surveillance they are under, and how much age verification would expand that surveillance, and then be asked again. They'll claim they already "know", but watch their opinion change after they get paper mail with a list of recently visited websites, or their words written on public or unencrypted chats, or their movement history thanks to phone spyware.

gnfargbl 6mo ago
That's likely, but only if it's possible to materially articulate some specific negative ways in which age verification data is actually being used. You and I can strongly suspect that there's a significant downside to these providers having so much sensitive personal data but, until that is proven, the voting population will only see the upside.
- like_any_other 6mo ago
  The death of online anonymity isn't negative and specific enough? People understand this intuitively - hire someone to obviously follow them everywhere, record everything they do (or only as much as current surveillance records), and they'll want to put a quick stop to it. Do the same thing, but out of sight, out of mind, and their correctly evolved instincts fail to carry over.
  - deleted 6mo ago
    [deleted]

randusername 6mo ago

I don't think surveys like this are a meaningful indicator of societal attitudes. "age verification" is not unlike "DEI" in that everyone will have different schemas about what it is and how it will be assumed to be implemented. We're not learning anything about the public unless we try to pose the question more directly. https://yougov.com/about/methodology https://yougov.com/about/methodology