Parental Consent and the Internet
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It seems to me that there should be more parental consent when it comes to the internet, not less. But then I’ve never been a free speech extremist or warrior. In any case, I find myself in the strange position of more or less being on the side of Mississippi and generally thinking that it was a good thing that at least for the moment the Supreme Court allowed its law around age verification on social media to not be an entirely horrible thing.
The Supreme Court cleared the way for a Mississippi law that requires age verification to use social media and parental consent before minors can create accounts, a setback for the technology group that challenged the measure.
A trade group representing some of the internet’s most powerful social media companies said the law presents “grave First Amendment harms” because it imposes burdens on teens and adults to access protected speech and to use a powerful tool for making their voices heard.
Mississippi, which passed the law aftera tragedy involving a teen, argued the law imposed “modest” burdens on users and companies, and it requires only that sites “protect children from online harms that the State has power to regulate.” The law applies to people under 18.
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Mississippi passed the law in 2024 after a 16-year-old was victimized by a sextortion scheme and took his own life. An overseas predator had created a fake identity on Instagram and enticed the teen to provide compromising material, before threatening to share it publicly if he did not pay $1,000. The FBI is investigating the case.
In addition to requiring “commercially reasonable efforts to verify” the age of users and parental consent for minors to create profiles, the law also mandates social media sites screen underage users from objectionable content including that dealing with self-harm, drugs and suicidal behavior.
This was one of the bullshit shadow docket decisions and Kavanaugh said he thought the law was unconstitutional. So I don’t know, tell me why we should oppose this, especially considering that social media is a cesspool of horrors that has helped plunge the world into global fascism? I’m open to arguments on the issue.