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Comment by bboygravity

2 days ago

Ah, the good old "think of the children" argument. Does anyone buy that?

“Think of the children” is a persistent nemesis of modern civil liberties precisely because people buy it so often! One of the easiest emotional arguments to make is “your children are in danger” because parents have extremely low risk tolerance for the safety of their children.

  • Also parents of young children are typically overwhelmed and freaked out, and easy to manipulate.

    • Don't the parents have a legitimate interest here though? Just being tired does not make them irrational or credulous as seems to be implied here.

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Yes, especially lots of people with children are terrified that their little darlings will be able to access the best German BDSM content in 4K at an early age.

  • I’m not a parent, so it might be I completely do not understands some important aspects of this due to lack of expirience, but I hope I’ll be more smart than my parents. It was quite easy to google things my parents were silent about, but I still remeber that feeling of guiltiness. It affected me much more than knowing what the bdsm is

  • Terrified? Maybe they just calmly rationally don't want them to have access to the best German BDSM content in 4K at an early age?

    • I was exaggerating a bit for comedic effect. I can completely sympathise with the sentiment.

      If there was a way to prove one's identity/age online, double anonymously (so both the website doesn't know who you are, and the identity service doesn't know what website is asking) I'd be a 100% for it. It would prevent minors from accessing stuff they're not ready for (on average), and it would limit the amount of bots and foreign interference.

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Unfortunately, yes.

Maybe it'll die off in a generation or two, when cynical millennials and zoomers become the backbone of politics. But for now?

"Think of the children" is hilariously transparent to us, but it enjoys moderate support across population, and, much worse, it gets overwhelming support of geriatric politicians. Which is what makes fighting for liberties so hard.