Rahm Emanuel says U.S. should follow Australia's youth social media ban

Anyway, the government can already take away your bank account. No need for them to introduce such a complex scheme.

We could have a real conversation about tradeoffs (and maybe this one isn't worth it!) but not if you just assume/pretend the worst-case scenario is real. I'm Australian and I'll happily bet that N years from now I'll still be able to criticize the government without being debanked or sacked.

If we do ever fall to authoritarianism, I doubt this will have been a crucial step; it's already easy for the government to deanonymize most posters if it wants to, and an evil future government that wanted to go further could probably just... do it, regardless of precedent.

Submit a zkp that you are over 18 to the website that requires it. The proof need not be tied to the identity of the user.

I personally don't think self-regulation works. It's harmful so the next best option is the government regulating it.

Completely the opposite of what you would hope.

When has this happened in the countries you listed?

1: https://www.nationalreview.com/2021/03/rahm-emanuel-hey-lets...

2: https://old.reddit.com/r/reddit.com/comments/816qf/rahm_eman...

It's not really "amazing" at all, when you consider that the working class in those countries has finally woken up to the fact that their biggest present day issues, like housing unaffordability and low purchasing power, have been caused by the intentional fiscal policies of their governments over the last 30+ years, instead of the usual boogeymen (Xi Jinping, Putin, Covid, immigrants, etc).

And now after 20+ years of constantly vote hopping between left and right, hoping "this time it will be better than last time" but in practice it always ended up worse, the people are trying to hold them accountable for it, so the elite are switching tactics now that the ye olde reliable tactic of gaslighting the people doesn't work anymore.

If the carrot doesn't work anymore, time to move over to using the stick to keep the peasants in line.

From that point I would view social media essentially like alcohol.

As an adult you can choose to (ab)use it if you wish, but it's arguably the government's responsibility to protect children at large from social dangers like this.

It's absolutely a thing that people are asked to prove their age to buy alcohol, or even to enter a licensed venue that serves alcohol. I don't think I've ever heard anyone except underage teenagers complain about the invasion of privacy to hand over your ID for beer/etc.

Does the implementation around safe proof of age need work? Probably. Does that mean the whole thing is a not-so-subtle attempt to fire you for swearing?

I don't fucking think so mate.

People are already fired for saying stupid shit on social media, they're already debanked for being out-and-proud White Supremacists.

Given the current political situation in the USA and how it got there, if you have any illusions of a continuing democracy, you should be champing at the bit for anything which reduces social media use.

I walk through a casino and see all the flashing lights and sounds and like the casino screen is half as busy as an RTS. It's just not the same level of engagement; it's not overwhelming, it's just slow.

I get that it is all about balance, but it is hard to disagree with Rahm here. Top down ban is the only real way to go.

I don't see this as being any different, and as a parent, I'd support a ban like that.

If this were true, I’m sure that you wouldn’t have any trouble advocating that we ban it. Many of us remember social media before the algorithmic feed took over, and it was a good way to stay connected to friends and family. Some us also were lucky enough to experience a protracted period of socializing on the internet in the pre-social media days: MUDs, web forums, chat rooms, etc. I enjoyed all of those, in my teen and college years, and like you I count myself fortunate that I was not exposed to social media during a formative time of my life. I think that’s why I hesitate to say that we should outright ban it: I know that the internet _can_ coexist (and even augment) a healthy social life. That said, I don’t use social media at all anymore (unless you count HN), so I’ve definitely voted with my eyeballs.

When you start to think about that statement, and why it was written there, why a company chooses to pay $ to tell you this, you know that inherently something went REALLY wrong in the past.

And because it's a company, they're doing the bare minimum to fix it, as to minimize the impact on their bottom line.

It reminds me of the ads against a certain prop in CA, the one that would make app workers (?) employees.

Advertisements taken out by Lyft, Uber, etc, all to sway people.

When companies want you to do something it's not in your best interest. It's in theirs.

Citation needed.

Look, I am greatly opposed to how US social media giants handle and monetize data, and I don’t like them having the level of control that they do. Antitrust is a great lever to use here, because concentration is the source of many problems. But banning what is in effect public social communications is a giant step over the First Amendment.

People can and do use social media to their benefit, whether it’s for political organizing, whistleblowing, mutual aid, OSINT, or gathering on the ground media and first hand accounts from active events (such as conflicts, protests, or police actions) that may never show up in the news. The professional media cannot be everywhere, and sometimes they will not cover certain events. That’s what social media is good for, despite its flaws.

We will come to see social media in its current form the same way we view smoking.

Just go into the classroom and witness children and their six-seveeen.

This is 100% like smoking except worse, because entire population of children are being deprived of their attention span. They just learn how to peddle useless products onto their peers without brain development to understand the consequence.

And free speech: you don't need a mobile phone or tiktok to exercise that right.

Credibly fixing both social media and cost of living would be an effective platform across the West.

They are going to find out soon enough.

It’s a shit message, but they’re apparently permanently damaged by the 1980 landslide re-election loss to Reagan and incapable of moving on. IDK if liberal democracy will survive here long enough for us to see if another wing of the party can ever get those folks to let them try something else.

[edit] not for nothing, Obama lightly hinted at a move away from that in his campaigning (if not his governing) and it seemed to work pretty damn well. Why they didn’t double down on that is anyone’s guess, but I’d suppose it rhymes with “bobbying”.

Trump won during a time where incumbents lost by ~10 points. He narrowly beat a candidate that lost their only primary run by <2 point.

Trump's very vocal minority is very good at making people think there is a silent majority.

However, the democrats have been elected quite a lot this millennium and they've fully shown they're incapable of making necessary reforms so there's going to keep being populist candidates until there's new blue blood.

As it is we now have two parties obsessed with “regulating” the morality of citizens while bleeding them out financially.

"Social media" is far too ambiguous anyway. For example, under most definitions, Steam is a social media platform. Yet no one is addicted to sharing things via Steam. But you can! You absolutely can share and browse people's posts, screenshots, videos, and even chat (text and voice)!

The reason why no one complains about Steam's social media features is that they're not designed to be addicting. That's not the point of the platform (it's to sell more games).

The driving, smoking, and drinking laws are enforced outside the home. Everyone has to prove their age at the DMV to get a license and at commercial establishments to buy cigarettes and alcohol.

The only way to enforce the social media law age minimum is to force everyone to show their ID just to use the internet, even from their own home. That seems more Orwellian to me.