- cross-posted to:
- privacy@lemmy.ml
- cross-posted to:
- privacy@lemmy.ml
Dame Rachel de Souza told BBC Newsnight it was “absolutely a loophole that needs closing” and called for age verification on VPNs.
Saw that coming. Can’t have the populace living their lives without constant, repressive government scrutiny.
But it’s for the kids what kind of psychopath could be against that???
Stop ministers from using children.
Stop ministers using VPNs to watch child porn.
Told!
FYI, with Mullvad VPN set to UK, sites that require age verification:
Sites tha do NOT require age verification:
- hqporner.com
- xhamster.com
- youjizz.com
- alohatube.com
- qqqporn.com
- xnxx.com
- xcafe.com
- helloporn.co
- go.porn
- cartoonporn.pro
And xvideos.com is a bit special since it shows you the thumbnails of porn videos but won’t let you play them.
But we need to stop VPNs! Think of the whole two children that have VPNs! What if instead of just going to the half of the sites that don’t verify age, they figure out how to use a VPN?! Oh the humanity!
Yeah, UK wants to de-anonymize VPN users as the next step in their attack on free speech. It is laughable to think this is about anything else.
You ban something, and people will always find a way around it. Always.
Yup, and that’s how the US got the Mafia. We banned alcohol, but people wanted to drink, so the Mafia made that happen.
All a ban does is hurt law abiding citizens and businesses.
This is a fairly revisionist history version of the mafia, they were here for decades before prohibition. One might say that they profited greatly from prohibition, but to suggest they began with it is incredibly incorrect. I hate to be the actually guy but I find organized crime fascinating and I can’t let this one go
Eh, not revisionist, just overly simplified. Prohibition massively increased their power and relevance.
Not all bans are bad or hurt law abiding citizens. Slavery and gambling come to mind, both still exist illegally (or, in the case of gambling, semi-legally, what with the deluge of sports betting and online casinos HQd in shitty countries), but I would say them being illegal is a net positive for society.
Eh, I disagree. Slavery being banned is obviously a good thing, but that’s because it’s immoral to own someone else, so it’s essentially just kidnapping. Gambling, on the other hand, shouldn’t be banned for the simple reason that consenting adults should be able to do it if they choose.
Basically, I believe there are two types of rights:
- negative rights - restricts others from preventing individuals from doing things to you (e.g. freedom from slavery, freedom to gamble, etc)
- positive rights - forces others to provide goods or services to you (e.g. free healthcare, right to counsel, etc)
I believe nobody should gamble because it’s a poor financial decision and very addictive (and I choose to avoid gambling), but I also believe you should be allowed to gamble, and the government should ensure that companies that provide gambling services do so fairly (i.e. advertisements about win-rates and whatnot are accurate).
So yes, if gambling wasn’t allowed, people w/ addictions would be better off, but those who aren’t at risk of gambling addiction would be harmed due to restrictions on their freedom. So the question is, do we want government to protect us from ourselves, or merely provide a safety net for when we screw up? I’m absolutely in the latter camp, and I think we should use taxes to fund recovery programs for addictive behaviors in lieu of banning them. In general, I think a tax is way more rights-respecting than a ban.
Gambling between two people or very small groups is mostly ok and something humans have done since cave times.
Now, because real life has profit seeking corporations in control of gambling that know and abuse all psychological tricks available to maximize profits, I don’t think allowing them to exist is good for anyone except the owners. Casinos are also perfect for money laundering, so that’s another reason to not allow them to function, although with the internet they can just pick and choose a country to exist in.
I know that this is all just theater to just destroy any semblance of free speech and privacy on the internet but if I’m completely honest I also don’t even understand people who freak out about kids looking at porn. Like, I get protecting children obviously from predators (fucking Roblox), but also I saw hardcore porn on the internet super early when I was like 8 and the only trauma I ever felt was the fear of being caught looking at it by my parents, who were otherwise pretty chill about me seeing really violent media.
And before me and the internet, kids were looking at their grampa’s/dad’s porn magazines or finding it in the woods or getting some 18 year old to buy it for them. It was harder but I’m telling you they found it.
I feel like a bigger concern for kids right now is microplastics, lead poisoning, and climate change and you don’t see nearly the same hysteria about that shit in mainstream politics.
yeah im older but finding some magazines in a dumpster was gold when I was young and some kid would manage to get a vhs tape or something that would get passed around. I babysat for some kids where the parents were fine with them seeing nudity in movies or such as long as it was not actual porn. They thought it was better to not make it taboo.
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Ministers, stop watching them watch porn…
It’s a bit like “my kids will only eat chocolate” and the therapist’s response “where are they getting the chocolate from?”. If the kids are using VPNs then where are they getting the money for the VPN from? Is this parental consent?
Most likely they’re using “free” VPNs.
Do the government ministers understand that setting up your own VPN is literally a 5 minute operation.
Hire a droplet VM, pre-installed with a server OS. Log in with provided credentials. sudo apt install docker Copy/paste a docker compose file that sets up a wg-easy container. Create a peer. Take a picture of the provided QR code. Connect to the server via a wireguard app. Done.
Are they going to ban VMs?
Do the government ministers understand that setting up your own VPN is literally a 5 minute operation.
Of course they don’t. Most of them type with their index fingers and don’t even understand what a VPN is.
Streisand effect: the BBC is telling every last kid that VPN is exactly the way to circumvent the prohibition.
Because the goal is to outlaw VPNs. To do that they need enough children to use VPNs to make it credible enough.
Is there a plausible way they actually ban the use of VPNs? Like, they can make it illegal on paper, but even in China, which has long had strict restrictions on internet use, I’ve heard that VPN use is widespread.
It just all seems like performative whack-a-mole to me. The only people who can control what a kid sees online are their parents or guardians. A child is not buying themselves a laptop or an iPad.
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