[Barrin92]

>China or Russia, freedom is also lost shortly after.

This may come as a shock but neither China or Russia had their first encounter with losses of individual freedom in the 1990s. This is what the OP is talking about, this is the kind of shibboleth of online libertarianism that has little to do with real world policy outcomes. You'll find many similar laws concerning child safety in Norway that you find in China, different political systems and cultures can value the same things, even implement similar laws, without converging on the same political system.

In most countries on earth protecting children is a collective job, not a parents private business. A functioning and safe social fabric is a condition for successful families.

Just worth mentioning one data point. In the US 50% of young men (aged 18-49) now participate in online betting or gambling, likely as a consequence of the saturation of ads on social media and gaming platforms. Good luck with your parental responsibility when an entire country operates like this.

[strictnein]

I mean, you're cutting off the qualifier with your selected quote. They are clearly talking about online freedom:

> this takes a sledgehammer to the core of internet privacy. In all cases in the world where this has been done before like China or Russia, freedom is also lost shortly after.

Russia's first online censorship was for truly abhorrent things. It moved on to become a ban on things the government didn't like. The book "The Red Web" does an excellent job detailing how this downward slide took place. It wasn't overnight, but it was a constant effort by those in power to erode privacy and freedom, and the first step was putting in place a basic censorship apparatus.

https://www.hachettebookgroup.com/titles/andrei-soldatov/the...

[Barrin92]

>It wasn't overnight, but it was a constant effort by those in power to erode privacy and freedom

yes because Russia is a dictatorship. These recent age limits on social media have had broad public support and are widely supported by parents. Not having your kid grow up on a combination of porn, gambling and body dysphoria and their data exfiltrated by a US mega-corporation isn't the dawn of internet censorship. What about the privacy of children and the ability to grow up outside of the morass of commercial surveillance platforms?

Having your kids grow up free from that crap doesn't make you China, it makes you ca 1990s Denmark. Japan and China both have strict gun control laws, but Japan's a democracy. People are free to live by different values than Americans, just screaming red scares isn't going to convince anyone.

[strictnein]

> Having your kids grow up free from that crap doesn't make you China

Who said that it does? I think you're kind of missing the point here, and it seems rather intentional to be honest.

> their data exfiltrated by a US mega-corporation isn't the dawn of internet censorship

Instead, all adults must submit their PII to those same "US mega-corporations" to verify that they are adults. You realize that the social media companies absolutely love this, right? They support this.

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/uk-to-require...

> People are free to live by different values than Americans

Has nothing to do with being American. I don't even get how you got to that?

> Japan and China both have strict gun control laws, but Japan's a democracy

Ok? They also both enjoy sunsets and long walks on the beach.

[TitaRusell]

Americans don't care because the elite will send their kids to private school and raise children in special elitist bubbles.

The proles are allowed to amuse themselves to death.