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Comment by extraisland

2 days ago

People constantly cite this poll as it is proof that British people want this.

You cannot trust the YouGov polling. It is flawed.

> Despite the sophisticated methodology, the main drawback faced by YouGov, Ashcroft, and other UK pollsters is their recruitment strategy: pollsters generally recruit potential respondents via self-selected internet panels. The American Association of Public Opinion Research cautions that pollsters should avoid gathering panels like this because they can be unrepresentative of the electorate as a whole. The British Polling Council’s inquiry into the industry’s 2015 failings raised similar concerns. Trying to deal with these sample biases is one of the motivations behind YouGov and Ashcroft’s adoption of the modelling strategies discussed above.

https://theconversation.com/its-sophisticated-but-can-you-be...

Even if the aforementioned problems didn't exist with the polling. It has been known for quite a while that how you ask a question changes the results. The question you linked was the following.

> From everything you have seen and heard, do you support or oppose the recent rules requiring age verification to access websites that may contain pornographic material?

Most people would think "age verification to view pornography". They won't think about all the other things that maybe caught in that net.

39 comments

extraisland

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cm2012  2 days ago

All polling has problems like this, but YouGov has the same methodology for everything and usually gets within a margin of error of +-8. Even if they have an especially bad sample, the UK probably really does support the law.

Think about how many people are less comfortable with porn than tech interested males between age 18 and 40.

  • extraisland  2 days ago

    > All polling has problems like this, but YouGov has the same methodology for everything and usually gets within a margin of error of +-8.

    The way the very question was asked is a problem in itself. It is flawed and will lead to particular result.

    > if they have an especially bad sample, the UK probably really does support the law

    The issue is that the public often doesn't understand the scope of the law. Those that do are almost always opposed to it.

    > Think about how many people are less comfortable with porn than tech interested males between age 18 and 40.

    It isn't about the pornography. This is why conversations about this are frustrating.

    I am worried about the surveillance aspect of it. I go online because I am pseudo-anonymous and I can speak more frankly to people about things that I care about to people who share similar concerns.

    I don't like how the law came into place, the scope of the law, the privacy concerns and what the law does in practice.

    Even if you don't buy any of that. There is a whole slew of other issues with it. Especially identity theft.

  • johnnyanmac  2 days ago

    >Think about how many people are less comfortable with porn than tech interested males between age 18 and 40

    Are you suggesting that techies do not have any sexual appetite? That runs counter to many stereotypes I've encountered

  • TylerE  2 days ago

    Most questions you could guess a number somewhere vaguely near 50% and be right a substantial amount of the time given such massive error bars.

    • cm2012  2 days ago

      Thats a common fallacy because we tend to care about issues that are 50/50 or divisive. Most opinions are not divisive but thus dont get attention.

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