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Comment by aosaigh | Hacker News Reader

Do you have kids? I don’t, so I don’t have any idea how realistic this is. How do you ensure your kids aren’t skirting any blocks you put in place, looking things up with their friends, getting access to a VPN, etc.?

I also don’t think this act is the way to address these issues, but I don’t think it’s as easy as just putting everything at the feet of the parents as I imagine it almost impossible to police at home, not to mention at school.

When I think of older technologies like television, we have rules and regulations about what can be shown when.

Again, this isn’t to say this approach is right, but wanting to regulate isn’t an attack on free speech. It seems there is regularly a tension on HN between free speech absolutists, usually from the US and those more happy to accept regulation, usually from the EU

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> How do you ensure your kids aren’t skirting any blocks you put in place, looking things up with their friends, getting access to a VPN, etc.?

I don't, because I don't need to.

I had unrestricted access to internet when I was my kids age and I turned out just fine, just like the extreme majority of my generation.

I know that serious discussions about important topics are enough to make sure that even if my kids do access content that's not meant for children, they're not negatively affected by them, just like I wasn't.

The world is a very very different place technologically then when you grew up.

Again I don’t have kids, so I’m not in a position to judge, but I can only imagine the pressures on children are completely different nowadays. For example, we didn’t have computers in our pocket 24/7 with all of our peers on the other end influencing us indifferent ways.

So you agree the problem isn't the technology but other children...what is the solution then? Ban other children?

No I don’t agree with that. Technologies can exacerbate problems.

We cannot legislate away this problem. We will try, we will fail, and the costs in this case are absolutely massive.

Just as an aside, the UK has been doing this for decades. One of the most permanent causes of legislative failure in the UK has been making laws based on media pressure that have potentially huge costs in the future. And as these costs emerge, guess what the only solution is? More interventions.

I would suggest that a country which cannot control crime, cannot control borders, has a collapsing economy, cannot house people, etc. has bigger problems than trying to arrest people for saying things on Twitter or shut down end-to-end encryption.

> The world is a very very different place technologically then when you grew up.

Hmm no it's really not. By the time I was a teenager, porn was easily accessible on the web, social media were in their peak use, etc.

Yes, it's now a hell of a lot easier to exist on the internet and not see gross shit. Shock content was a huge part of the internet while I was growing up, it's now a lot less acceptable. As far as the kind of thing the OSA is seemingly worried about, the internet is already miles safer than it was.

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