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Newest post: We must protect children from the fuck word
Age restriction has always been a terrible thing, but in the past it didn't have very sharp teeth when it came to digital content. Everyone underage learned you can just lie. In fact, standard operating procedure when you were young and minded your elders was to ask your parents' permission to lie. Everyone knew it was a stupid, pointless thing, but it was just a button you had to press, like hitting OK on a Windows popup. It was a minor annoyance.
In the fascist hellscape of 2026, we no longer have the privilege to be merely annoyed by these ridiculous, censorial age gates. Governments around the world have been feverishly passing laws to sharpen their fangs. People under a certain age are now legally barred from visiting social websites in entire countries. Porn is effectively illegal in about half of the United States, a country that was previously best in class when it came to free speech, thanks to invasive laws that demand proof of identity. Pending efforts like KOSA promise to end open discourse online and censor anything that would cause the PMRC to clutch their pearls, like mentioning gay people exist. Anyone who thinks any of this has anything to do with protecting children is an utter fuckwit. (The clue is that the legislation claims to protect children. That's literally the only info you need.)
Private industry has followed in kind. In fact, for a while, the tip of the puritan spear was directed right at them, since there were still things like the first amendment to hinder their efforts in the legal realm; Mastercard, PayPal, and other fintech companies especially like to wield their influence to fuck over people whose work is too sexy to be shown at a PTA meeting. YouTube is no exception. Sometime in the last few years, they replaced their age gate with one that can't be bypassed without a login, which effectively bans me and every other Legal Adult™ who refuses to log into their panopticon from viewing videos arbitrarily selected for censorship.
YouTube music videos used to only be censored if they were too queer or contained nudity: one of the first times I remember hitting the agewall was for the utterly harmless, inoffensive, nudity-free "Adam and Steve" by Dorian Electra, presumably banned for hurting the feelings of Christian homophobes. I couldn't find this anywhere else on the internet, and it's great, so I jumped through the hoops and got the damn cookies. Google made me verify my age.
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