Or could have a header saying this is not adult-only content, and a parentally-controlled device will block things that don't participate.
[1] - https://www.shodan.io/search?query=RTA-5042-1996-1400-1577-R... [THESE ARE ADULT SITES, NSFW]
Point being, put the controls entirely into the hands of the device owner. Options can be to default to:
- Block everything by default unless header states otherwise.
- Block only sites that state they are adult.
- Do nothing. Obey the operator. (Controls disabled on child accounts or make them an adult or otherwise unrestricted account on the device).
I think the options are just limited to our imagination.
This is the problem. What is an "adult" web site? Websites that show porn? Websites that show gore? Websites that show violence? Websites that show non-porn naked people? Websites that have curse words? Websites that promote cults and alternate religions?
Why is it the site's responsibility to "state" that they are adult, given whatever parameters they dream up? Why is it the government's responsibility to say "This is adult content, but that isn't adult content?" Shouldn't the parent get to decide which categories of content count as "adult"?
At minimum, it would be a reasonable legislation topic to at minimum mandate that websites publishing obviously “Harmful to minors” content tag it as such[1]. And also it would be ideal to create some kind of campaign to tag the first category as safe (honestly Apple and Google ought to be working together on that one). If you in good faith operate a site in the controversial category, that would be no different than selling books on sex ed in a Barnes & Noble - protected.
Parents could then choose, with simple device controls:
- Allow only “tagged safe” pages (parents with very young kids, or who have a hard time monitoring use)
- Allow safe + no-tag (open-minded parents who choose to err on the side of allow, and monitor the controversial stuff themselves)
- Allow all (parents who want to be solely responsible to regulate it)
I find it frustrating that people are talking like we have to either have a completely “no rules” Internet where obviously any kindergartener is going to stumble upon super disgusting stuff, or this gross surveillance state Internet, where people have to show ID to use any site. Neither of those are how things were before the Internet and it doesn’t have to be how things are now.
[1] you might ask, what do we do when say, a Russian porn site doesn’t want to comply with this tagging. In my opinion, it seems reasonable that someone could put obviously bad faith sites like that into a block list database. In a place like the UK I would expect that to be a government regulator, but there’s no reason why that couldn’t just be something private companies do in the US. As a parent, I would pay two bucks a month to subscribe to a service like that if it were integrated into the operating systems my kids use.
Websites that promote any religions. No way should under-18s be exposed to that.
I don't agree with showing actual children porn, but I also totally expect teenagers to find some way to get access to it in the age of the Internet.
Part of the challenge with this is cultural. Different places in the world think about sex, sexuality, and even the concept of what is a child differently. In the US, showing a woman's bare breasts to a person under 18 is generally considered wrong, and in many cases is illegal. In most of Europe it wouldn't even raise an eyebrow, because bare breasts are on television, sometimes in commercials even.
Set aside for a moment the question of age verification and age limits, we cannot even agree in any sort of universal sense what even qualifies as porn or adult content, and at what age someone should be able to see it. There's a difference between a 7 year old and a 17 year old seeing the same type of content, and there's also a difference between a photographic nude and a video of people engaged in coitus.
The story is basically the same for everything else you listed.
These age verification laws in many ways are trying to use the most heavy-handed mechanism possible to enforce American cultural norms on the entire planet. That's clearly wrong to do. What the GP suggested using RTA headers though puts the control into the parent's hands, which is as it should be.
> These age verification laws in many ways are trying to use the most heavy-handed mechanism possible to enforce American cultural norms on the entire planet. That's clearly wrong to do.
Yes there's a chance our rules spill over there naturally, and I don't consider that wrong either.
Though, one area I am still struggling to grasp is the harm that governments are trying to mitigate. If a child were to see inappropriate material, then what harm can truly arise? Also, why do governments need to enact such laws when the onus of protecting children should be on their parents?
I am not trying to start any kind of flame war, but I really cannot see any other basis for all this prohibition that is not somehow traceable back to Western religious beliefs and the societies born and molded from such beliefs.
I think it’s important, as tough as it can be to identify where exactly the line is, distinguish the concept of a 16-year-old cranking his hog to some Internet porn (which yes, probably pretty harmless and inevitable), with little kids being exposed to explicit types of content. And little kids are curious, so just the fact that they make an attempt to find the content doesn’t mean they’re ready for it.
As to whether I believe in cultural relativism depends on the level of abstraction we are discussing. I believe there is no way to logically prove that something is morally right or wrong in a similar manner to how a mathematical concept can be proven from pure logic alone. But this fact does not often influence my beliefs in terms of morality in the context of social contracts, diplomacy, legal frameworks, etc.. To draw a parallel, I do not believe in complete free will, but I live my life as though it does exist (I believe in more of a 'sandbox' like an RPG video game with clear constraints and limitations).
> many of us believe that it’s harmful to the normal development of children to be exposed to certain types of content.
Are these beliefs supported by evidence or are they merely conjecture? Do not get me wrong, I am not saying I completely disagree. A child exposed to various types of abuse and neglect can have detrimental effects to his or her development, and there is plenty of evidence to support a statistical relationship.
> A five-year-old who sees explicit sexual acts performed on a screen is going to be curious about it and be interested in trying it.
I believe that is quite presumptuous. By that logic, if a child is exposed to comedic content, will that child become funnier? Such conclusions remind me of the debate as to whether violent video games and other media increase aggression and acts of violence in children. The data clearly does not support this conclusion. Now, I would not say there never has been/will be a case of a child trying to replicate a sexual act due to exposure -- much like violent content -- but outliers do not define the norm.
> He or she will likely have no sense of what would be problematic (e.g. trying to initiate such an act with a peer or an adult. Consider how they probably don’t understand ideas of consent).
Understanding consent is irrelevant. Children legally and morally (as determined by my culture) cannot consent to any sexual activity under any circumstances. Consent is de facto impossible. This is a social contract that I also strongly agree with.
> It’s why it’s generally considered grooming for people to exhibit that type of thing to children.
I was under the impression the intention behind the action was more important than the action itself. There is a difference in intentions between a child stumbling upon an adult getting undressed compared to an adult undressing and exposing themselves in front of a child. One action is happenstance and the other is predatory and abusive. It's why family pictures that might have a naked baby in a bathtub is not often considered CSAM.
> Children who have been groomed frequently abuse other children (including by force), and can be taken advantage of by pedophile adults.
I believe this myth is perpetuated too often. The vast majority adults that of sexually abuse children have no history of childhood sexual abuse. Certainly, some do perpetuate the abuse, but it's not as common as some might think. It is just another attempt for abusers to garner sympathy and decrease their punishment. It's very similar to the myth that public urination can result in a registered sex offender. To my knowledge, there are no instances of this type of case in the United States. However, it is a clever little lie to tell comfort folks into living next to a registered sex offender convict of a more heinous crime.
As for children-on-children abuse, I am not certain your claim holds up, but I admit I am less knowledgeable in this area.
Fundamentally, the laws around requiring ID to view adult content do not really prevent any of the harm we are discussing. Sure, I child might not accidentally stumble upon explicit content on Pornhub. However, the laws do not stop Chester Child Molester from sending their dick pics to a kid on Discord or Roblox or whatever.
Why is it the if a child stumbles upon a parent's firearm and hurts themselves or another, the parent can be held liable in both civil and criminal court. However, if a child stumbles upon sexually explicit content via a parent's computer, the onus is placed upon everyone but the parent(s)? If the harm of exposure of sexual material to youth is so damaging, then should parents not also be held to such civil and criminal punishments?
Yes, of course they will. But you do make a good point that 'playing CoD leading to kids wanting to shoot people with real guns' isn't proven, but most parents I know still do not want their kindergarteners playing realistic violent games. As a parent, we are mainly looking for the ability to choose to introduce more adult themes like violence only when we can tell that the child's maturity level is sufficient to understand the morality involved. Shooting Nazis in a video game is fun, but they should first understand why we can't shoot that asshole who makes fun of them at school, or that hardass math teacher, or their annoying little brother.
> Understanding consent is irrelevant. Children legally and morally (as determined by my culture) cannot consent to any sexual activity
We agree there, but set aside this legal definition to understand my point better. If two 12-year-olds fool around with each other, willingly, I'm not that shocked and I don't think it's likely going to cause any real harm in most cases. On the other hand, if a kid (whether 5 or 8 or 12 or 14) forces another child into an act, that's worse. And the less mature, the less likely they understand the severity of that act and its impact on the victim. An immature brain might think that forcing themselves on a cousin or something is no more severe of an offense than borrowing their pokemon cards without asking.
> If the harm of exposure of sexual material to youth is so damaging, then should parents not also be held to such civil and criminal punishments?
As far as I know, in my country, if a kid says at school "My daddy showed me this cool website called PornHub" that school is 100% calling 'Child Protective Services' and the parents will 100% be investigated on suspicion of grooming and abuse because like I said, it's illegal to show such materials to children in most or all states.
Is the header a json encoded map from country code to age rating?
Think of the (current) header as meaning "we would have blocked you if we saw you were under 18" or whatever equivalent and it should make sense.
Surely you mean at least teenagers, and not literally children, right? Consider the prevalence of violence, racial stereotyping, and escalation of fetishism into degeneracy that clearly exists within this medium; what's the line that these parents draw? Are they making sure it's only something vanilla? Or is there no line whatsoever?
Or do you also think we should forbid hardcore pornography also for adults?
this is 1,000,000% not accurate. there are things that vast majority of people support that are never going to happen (e.g. universal background check for gun purchases) and there are things that ruling party easily gets through that are wildly unpopular.
So ideally you want a standardized header that can be used to self classify content into any number of arbitrary and potentially overlapping categories. The presence of that header should then be legally mandated with specific categories required to be marked as either present or absent.
So for example HN might be "user generated T, social media T, porn F" or similar with operators being free to include arbitrary additional categories (but we know from experience that most of them won't).
While this would be required by law, I imagine browser vendors might also drop support to load sites that don't send the header in order to coerce global compliance.