CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

Computer “Age Verification” is About Political Control, Not Child Safety

Photo by Zulfugar Karimov

Around the US, a number of state legislatures have passed, or ar working to pass, various laws which would require people to “verify” their ages such that those under different ages would find themselves excluded from some or all computer and Internet access.

It all started, of course, with Internet pornography. That’s the easiest sector to boost an “it’s for the chillllllllllldren” propaganda campaign for.

It quickly escalated to social media platforms because woke rightists agree with woke leftists that the wrong words constitute violence and must be controlled “for the chillllllllllldren” (they just disagree on which words are the wrong words), and because many parents are willing to hand off their job of supervising their kids to the state, expanding the base of support for government controls.

Because California is the “authoritarian law idea? Hold my beer!” state, governor Gavin Newsom signed legislation last October which requires operating system providers to collect age information on each new user........

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