Summary
Several U.S. states have enacted laws requiring pornography sites, such as PornHub, to implement age verification to prevent minors’ access, prompting the site’s parent company, Aylo, to block access in affected states.
Proponents argue these laws protect children, while critics highlight privacy risks, inefficiencies, and potential censorship.
These measures reflect growing social conservatism, with some advocates aiming to restrict adult content broadly.
While privacy-focused age verification methods exist, regulatory clarity is lacking.
Critics warn these laws may suppress responsible platforms, favoring unregulated alternatives, and escalate broader culture wars around sexuality and LGBTQ+ rights.
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I think they mean the other way around…
“That is because all those states have passed laws requiring porn websites to verify that their users are under-18”
It would be kind of funny to make a kids only website (NOT porn) and have it fail to load if you enter an ID
they keep saying its about trans people but then they keep blocking porn so i don’t know what it is. i think christians and conservatives are stupid as fuck
it’s mostly because the red hats love trans porn, and hate themselves for loving trans porn, and they just need a little help resisting temptation
Every time that a conservative equates the mere existence of trans people with sex, they’re just outing their own kink.
“These people who’ve historically been marginalized to having to do sex work to live authentically and are more likely to be victims of sexusl violence are inherently sex crazed freaks.”
Like, as soon as we could openly do jobs that aren’t sex work we got a reputation as computer programmers. Turns out we’re all multidimensional human beings.
And people don’t seem to notice that more people came out after they could live authentically and do other jobs.
All of this Boomer nonsense about “There were no trans people in my day.”
No, grandpa, they were just too afraid to let you know it, so they lived quietly miserable lives with a socially acceptable spouse and 2.5 kids.
Exactly. I didn’t transition until it was a choice between transition and suicide and I regret holding myself to that bar. It used to be the advice back in the day and like it makes sense when step 1 is start lying to a psychologist because they’re rampantly misogynistic but only to trans women (and also hold trans men to unrealistic standards of manhood), and step 2 is decide if you think it’s worth ever seeing your family and friends again.
Socially accepted mental illness
don’t even for a second think this is in favour of you.
it’s some weird christian idea that the human must be “purified” and watching porn stops that. it’s about an ideology, not about you or your wellbeing.
“Another method, used in Germany, lets people show their ID card at a post office and get a unique ID to access adult sites. This could potentially be done without logging the person’s identity, but as CNIL points out such systems require much work to set up.”
This exactly what I was thinking of while reading the article. It’s just like going to a bar and getting carded. As long as no info is stored, I would be fine with this if were seriously looking for a solution for the kids
When I got my first smart phone, to access adult media and even Facebook, I needed to go in to a shop and verify my age using ID and they edited my account details, with this phone I had an instantly refunded penny charge on my credit card. There are very simple ways around it, which they apparently aren’t interested in.
Who is “they” in this context.
Honest question I promise. I don’t understand what’s going on…
I don’t know a lot either. By “they” I just mean those who are trying to ban porn.
It’s a classic tactic, use a somewhat legitimate concern (Minors having access to pornography). And blow it far out of proportion, and use it as an excuse to crackdown on what you’re really after. You will see people defending these bans because the “reasoning” they’re being presented SEEMS rational, but unwittingly they’re supporting a mass crackdown on their own rights.
somewhat legitimate concern (Minors having access to pornography).
Counterpoint: accessing pornography is part of growing up.
There’s A LOT of unhealthy porn, especially for kids. Especially for kids with no sex education. It’s also easier for them to get addicted.
You could also say alcohol is part of growing up, because for many it is.
There’s A LOT of unhealthy porn, especially for kids. Especially for kids with no sex education.
Which is why comprehensive sex ed is so important.
Honestly learned more (and better) sex ed from porn than school. hentai specifically i could see putting age restrictions on, shit is horrifyingly accessible and has no semblance of consent as a concept.
Like spitting in an open asshole? Lets face it, the industry is pretty fucked up.
Just so I’m clear, porn should be available and these laws are privacy and security nightmares.
I learned everything I know about human growth and development from spitting into open assholes.
Hentai is just drawn porn. Not all of it is rape stuff, and there’s loads of rape/incest/abuse roleplay in live action porn too.
Yeah, but the people banning porn are also banning sex Ed, so definitely seems more about control/abuse of power than concern for kids.
An oppressed and suppressed population is easier to control
Literally 1984
So, to an extent sure, I don’t think it’s some horrible thing for simply moralistic reasons, everyone has to discover their sexuality one way or another. However, I do think maybe having an entire digital library of smut dumped in your lap the moment you have access to a smartphone and some private time is probably not good for your sexual development. Ideally we’d just have parents/guardians use some common sense and take advantage of parental controls to limit access. But, we both know that many are neglectful or simply busy with trying to make ends meet to constantly monitor these things. Is the right answer government intervention? I’m personally more than a little skeptical, but I can see why some people see it as a valid concern.
But the old ways of stumbling across smut are gone now. No finding someone’s porno mag stash, or accessing uncensored porn on the illegal cable box, or reading the smut novels at the grocery store checkout, or the porn VHS section behind the bead curtain at Family Video…
I am just wondering in which age you grew up. Most millennial (like me) had access to a digital library of smut while growing up, and I certainly made use of it.
Won’t someone pleeeeeease think of the children!
See also: The constant push by governments to take away our right to private (encrypted) communications.
ItS tO prOteCT the CHILDRen’s comMUNIcaTIoN.
yeah no for sure and that’s why we should all install spyware onto our phones. there’s no “switch in the settings” to turn it off. (for a recent example, see the EU commission’s newest proposals.)
Several U.S. states have enacted laws requiring pornography sites, such as PornHub, to implement age verification to prevent minors’ access
Doesn’t seem too unreasonable. When I buy alcohol I have to provide verification that I’m over 21.
The thing is, how do they enforce it? People in those states can still access pornhub through a VPN. Plus, what about all the other many, many porn sites?
I get what they’re trying to do, but I think there are some logistics that haven’t really been thought out.
But that’s just it, they have thought about the logistics. We already have Meta changing their rules to allow LGBTQ + people to be called “mentally ill” with no repercussions.
The Great Firewall of China isn’t an accident, it’s actually how internet hardware like routers and switches are built to work from the ground up, with security like access control lists, as well as logging connections and seeing what data goes where and so on. That’s the scary thing about the internet, it just takes people wanting to turn it into a draconian nightmare to flip a few switches. I mean, really, the US already has but it just feels like it less because of the release valve of “free speech.” The NSA Utah datacenter has been around for a while now.
They have thought about the logistics, and they want to bring those kind of controls here. As always the plan is to control what happens online. Musk has definitely made some weird and creepy comments about “making lists” and while he’s an idiot, he’s got the tools and people to make it happen.
They couch it in a reasonable position to start the path to blocking access to content about sexuality for anyone. When youre a queer kid growing up and being told that it’s just the devil’s work and other bullshit the internet and being able to talk about your experience was the first freeing thing you could do in your life. It also lead to women having higher standards because women could communicate more and not be isolated by their male partners controlling behavior. Conservatives fucking hate that. This kind of ban could ban that kind of speech online, and I firmly believe it’s intended to.
They, meaning the people behind the bans, have thought it through perfectly well. They are counting on milquetoast centrists to ‘both sides’ the issue so they can start to attack LGBTQ+ people and their concerns as being inherently indecent.
When I buy alcohol I have to provide verification that I’m over 21
I was unaware that porn could kill you.
I never said that it could.
Are you suggesting that it should be legal to sell alcohol to children so long as it’s not a lethal amount? Should a kid be able to buy a single beer? It’s not like it’s going to kill them.
What about selling physical media pornography in a store to children? Should that be legal? It’s not going to kill them. Should a kid be able to walk into a porn store and slap down his allowance for a copy of Hardcore Anal Superstars 2?
This is a terrible analogy. Liquor purchases aren’t tracked by your ID. It’s not even mandatory to scan your ID to purchase alcohol.
Not your fault. Nobody can be aware of everything.
And yes, people have fapped to porn until they had a heart attack and died due to it.
Source?
My bad. Remembered heart attack story instead of stroke one.
https://nrtimes.co.uk/masturbation-linked-to-stroke-in-medical-case-study/
In other words, could have happened whether he was masturbating or having sex. Wasn’t the masturbation that caused it, was the orgasm. I guess we’re just not supposed to orgasm now?
Regardless, porn wasn’t mentioned anywhere in that article.
Also…
The study authors say that they found just two other cases of masturbation-linked strokes in other scientific literature.
A whole two cases (three counting the linked one). Doesn’t really seem like an epidemic now, does it? Considering legit every boy does it, and the ones that deny it are likely lying.
They expect the porn provider to verify age/id through very invasive and onerous means. It is in no way reasonable or secure to give some random porn site a copy of your government ID. They will get hacked; not if, when.
They will get hacked; not if, when.
Not only that, it turns any site that doesn’t just outright block the age verification states into a massive target.
You’re kind of missing the point entirely. We already know that the current methods used to verify age aren’t privacy-respecting and only serve to block legitimate use.
All I’m saying is I don’t think the age verification requirement, in and of itself, is unreasonable. I’m not necessarily in opposition to better, more privacy-respecting verification methods, nor am I necessarily opposed to, for instance the age verification requirement being lifted until better age verification technology can be developed. All I’m saying is I personally do not find the age verification requirement itself to be unreasonable. That’s it.
The most surprising thing to me is that PornHub is owned by a multinational Canada based private equity firm Aylo. I guess surprising might not be the right word, maybe morbidly reassuring that no one escapes from the slimy hands of late capitalism.
Yeah, let’s get back to small business “mom and pop” pornography vendors!
There are thousands of porn sites. Blocking pornhub doesn’t even register. If someone wants to find porn it is no more difficult than it was the day before the ban, it just won’t be pornhub porn.
They must know that that’s the case. Even if they blocked the entire internet in those states, porn would still be easily accessible. Blocking PornHub is just whacking a single mole in a huge field full of them.
At least they’re wasting some of their time with this limp-dicked bullshit. Better than using it to pursue their broader, more sinister goals.
I think this is just step one. Once the porn sites with money stop fighting it then they will go after any search engine that lists porn sites.
If you can’t find it on Google/Bing/Etc. it may as well not even exist for a majority of people.
I welcome the re-emergence of newsgroups again.
It would be funny if it just ended up teaching everyone how to torrent stuff.
These states didn’t block pornhub, pornhub blocked these states. Those states passed laws that would require legitimately operated adult sites to check ID at entry and then worry about keeping that information secure against breaches. This is more likely step 1 for those states to taking legal action against websites they deem are “adult oriented” for mentioning Queer people existing and not checking ID first.
The biggest issue here is that (at least in Texas), your ID has to be checked by a specific company.
I didn’t know that… That’s even worse. It is probably a company already setup to share data with Texas officials for the purpose of oppression.
I’m curious what this graph looks like compared to states with legal weed.
Lol. Montana’s wilding up there. Toke up all you please, but no porn.
I think the most fascinating thing is that of out of all states Idaho seems to be the only one that doesn’t even allow medical use.
(Not that the low THC states are much better… you could probably get similar or better stuff from the gas station/head shop in almost any state after McConnells farm bill pseudo legalized it)
Fascists view sexuality as a threat to their movements.
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Fascists view knowledge as a threat. They use sexuality as another means of segregation.
Also: laughing, knowing things, joy.
sexuality is the core of human desire, and if you suppress that, you suppress the development of the individual’s sense of self-determination. that’s why it’s so important to the government so suppress sexuality.
there are other reasons, of course. for example, almost everyone nowadays is overworked, and of course that leads to a decline in relationships.
also, people are stronger together. sexuality brings people together. if you can suppress the sexuality of large swaths of people, you can basically hinder the forming of social coherence and community.
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There’s no reliable way to verify age without extensive face verification with liveliness checks. A child can easily upload a parent’s or some other adult’s id card photo to get ‘verified’. Also nothing stops kids to explore porn corners of social media (including lemmy) and thousands of porn sites operated not by the Big Porn. Porn is fundamental to internet.
Edit: I purposefully omitted vpn, that being the most trivial solution.
That’s all besides the point however.
If a young kid is motivated by highschool seniors to watch porn, it is s parenting issue. If some adult encourages some child to watch porn as a grooming technique that’s a much more serious case of child abuse. If a teenager is porn addict and doesn’t do anything else, it is a major mental health concern, not a porn concern itself.
It is kind of accepted fact that many late teenagers are familiar with porn and explore it like any other sexual aspects of their life. Whether that’s harmful is upto debate but teenagers/adults do many things harmful everyday and banning everything with law isn’t realistic either. It is not end of the world if a teenager has sex or watches a porn movie. Children have greater dangers in general where they get abused by their relatives, teachers and even by their own parents and are continuously attempted to be programmed not to critically think by the religions.
“While privacy-focused age verification methods exist, regulatory clarity is lacking.”
It’s not lacking clarity. Privacy-focused age verification is simply not wanted by big tech and politically (because money from big tech) as they wouldn’t be able to collect and make money with building profiles of what you do online.
While privacy-focused age verification methods exist
verification methods may ‘exist’, but there are exactly zero which can guarantee security and privacy.
“trust me bro” isn’t good enough for you? What’re you hiding?
We miss you, Larry Flynt. (Not really, he sucked in other ways a great deal, but he at least fought the good fight in this domain)
I loved it when he decided to get revenge on Republicans prosecuting Clinton for getting a blowjob by publishing and distributing a single-issue magazine filled with detailed information about prominent congressmen and their mistresses.
Like you said, he was a piece of shit in a lot of ways, but he did a few things I will happily remember him for.
Larry Flynt was the Thomas Jefferson of the modern age.
Oh, did he have a concubine as well?
His gross side is exactly what allowed him to shamelessly do his advocacy work.
