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> I just don't like that proponents of age verification are systematically (including in this article) dismissed as authoritarians hiding behind "just another “

by roenxi 5mo ago

> I just don't like that proponents of age verification are systematically (including in this article) dismissed as authoritarians hiding behind "just another “what about the children” excuse to introduce mass surveillance and censorship". It is worth recalling that "authoritarian" is a relatively neutral label for a political philosophy (like "liberal", "democrat", "capitalist" or "socialist"). It isn't that people are name calling, it is that authoritarian policies - like this one - consistently cause more harm than good. The label is basically a slur at this point because the disasters that the authoritarians trigger often veer into being massive and appalling spectacles. People tend not to be very evidence-based, so the people who lean authoritarian tend to try and rebrand to avoid being tarred with their philosophy's consistent failures, but it is still authoritarianism. But the productive path forward isn't to try and be nice to the authoritarians and accommodate them with the rebranding. It is to adopt liberal policies. Like letting people read and comment anonymously on the internet.

palata 5mo ago
I appreciate the comment, but I feel like you miss my point in a way that is (not purposely) manipulative, again. I don't think that we would call "authoritarian" someone who would ask for, say, guns control. Or at least we wouldn't call "authoritarian" someone who is in favour of having more than 0 law, would we? You are being manipulative by saying "If you want a law that I don't want, then you are an authoritarian. I mean no offence, it is just what you are". But reality is a lot more nuanced than that. The vast majority of people who are in favour of age verification are not authoritarians. They really just consider "should kids have access to social media? Not until they are old enough". Whether or not it is technically possible is outside their knowledge. And the fact is that for age verification, there are technical solutions that are privacy-preserving (unlike e.g. ChatControl which is fundamentally building surveillance infrastructure). And even for ChatControl: people who say "I would be in favour of a magic backdoor that would only work for the well-intentioned good guys" wouldn't count as "authoritarians", would they? It just so happens that there is no such thing as a magic backdoor, so they cannot have what they want.
- roenxi 5mo ago
  What political philosophies do you think lay claim to these age verification laws? There are a couple that aren't against it, but to actually implement age controls in the way they are being bought in you basically need to be an authoritarian. Otherwise, you'd be persuaded by arguments like Mullvad's that the social media companies already know how old their users are and don't need a centralised authority to tell them. There are alternatives here that are less authoritarian. Policy makers and the people supporting them don't want to use those approaches, because they support taking a more authoritarian approach. These policies, in practice, are literally authoritarian policy. It isn't the most extreme form of it, but it isn't authoritarianism because I don't like it. I don't like it because, objectively, this is authoritarianism and authoritarianism tends not to work. Otherwise all the research I've seen suggests that kids shouldn't be using social media. If this wasn't likely to take out huge chunks of the healthy political dialog on the way it'd probably be tolerable. If it is manipulation to point out that this is part of a class of strategies that have a history of horrible failures, then you have a very confused understanding of what manipulation is. This is an absolutely classic authoritarian "we can't just let people talk to each other however they like without the authorities being involved" play.
  - palata 5mo ago
    > but to actually implement age controls in the way they are being bought in you basically need to be an authoritarian I don't see how this sentence can make any sense at all in the context of ZKPs. Can you elaborate? > you'd be persuaded by arguments like Mullvad's that the social media companies already know how old their users are and don't need a centralised authority to tell them How do the social media companies already know? Because they track everything? But if they ban kids, they don't track them anymore, do they? Or are you saying that social media companies should be able to track everybody everywhere, such that they can profile them and ban them from accessing social media? > I don't like it because, objectively, this is authoritarianism You would have to explain that. The government provides a service that allows you to prove that you are old enough without the government learning anything from you and without the service learning anything other than the fact that you are old enough, and you call that "objectively authoritarianism"?

by roenxi 5mo ago

palata 5mo ago

I appreciate the comment, but I feel like you miss my point in a way that is (not purposely) manipulative, again. I don't think that we would call "authoritarian" someone who would ask for, say, guns control. Or at least we wouldn't call "authoritarian" someone who is in favour of having more than 0 law, would we? You are being manipulative by saying "If you want a law that I don't want, then you are an authoritarian. I mean no offence, it is just what you are". But reality is a lot more nuanced than that. The vast majority of people who are in favour of age verification are not authoritarians. They really just consider "should kids have access to social media? Not until they are old enough". Whether or not it is technically possible is outside their knowledge. And the fact is that for age verification, there are technical solutions that are privacy-preserving (unlike e.g. ChatControl which is fundamentally building surveillance infrastructure). And even for ChatControl: people who say "I would be in favour of a magic backdoor that would only work for the well-intentioned good guys" wouldn't count as "authoritarians", would they? It just so happens that there is no such thing as a magic backdoor, so they cannot have what they want.

roenxi 5mo ago
What political philosophies do you think lay claim to these age verification laws? There are a couple that aren't against it, but to actually implement age controls in the way they are being bought in you basically need to be an authoritarian. Otherwise, you'd be persuaded by arguments like Mullvad's that the social media companies already know how old their users are and don't need a centralised authority to tell them. There are alternatives here that are less authoritarian. Policy makers and the people supporting them don't want to use those approaches, because they support taking a more authoritarian approach. These policies, in practice, are literally authoritarian policy. It isn't the most extreme form of it, but it isn't authoritarianism because I don't like it. I don't like it because, objectively, this is authoritarianism and authoritarianism tends not to work. Otherwise all the research I've seen suggests that kids shouldn't be using social media. If this wasn't likely to take out huge chunks of the healthy political dialog on the way it'd probably be tolerable. If it is manipulation to point out that this is part of a class of strategies that have a history of horrible failures, then you have a very confused understanding of what manipulation is. This is an absolutely classic authoritarian "we can't just let people talk to each other however they like without the authorities being involved" play.
- palata 5mo ago
  > but to actually implement age controls in the way they are being bought in you basically need to be an authoritarian I don't see how this sentence can make any sense at all in the context of ZKPs. Can you elaborate? > you'd be persuaded by arguments like Mullvad's that the social media companies already know how old their users are and don't need a centralised authority to tell them How do the social media companies already know? Because they track everything? But if they ban kids, they don't track them anymore, do they? Or are you saying that social media companies should be able to track everybody everywhere, such that they can profile them and ban them from accessing social media? > I don't like it because, objectively, this is authoritarianism You would have to explain that. The government provides a service that allows you to prove that you are old enough without the government learning anything from you and without the service learning anything other than the fact that you are old enough, and you call that "objectively authoritarianism"?