[cowboylowrez]

There is nothing good on the internet for kids. If we ban kids from the internet this will all go away. Make a smartphone every bit as regulated as alcohol or cigarettes or sexual intercourse. If a parent is found providing their kids alcohol, cigarettes, sex, or internet, we have to hold them accountable and rehabilitate the kids from their traumatic experience. These parents deserve serious prison terms, and those victimized kids will need to be institutionalized as they are now traumatized for life (plus their parents are deservedly now serving decades in prison for child abuse).

Why are we pushing our kids onto the internet? There is nothing there for them. Any politicians pushing for kids internet access are probably doing it for nefarious reasons in my opinion. The internet is not really all that safe for adults either, why are we pushing kids onto it?

[duxup]

I don't think internet puritanism imposed by government will protect anyone.

[rexpop]

I was afforded limited exposure to alcohol and sex starting around age 13, and I've got a vastly healthier relationship with the two than the rest of my society.

I think the internet, however, is a much greater threat to growing minds.

[cowboylowrez]

Yeah, I've thought about this some. I as a website owner do not want to babysit your kids. Parents probably do not want me babysitting their kids either. I should be able to put meta data in my website that says "for adults only" and that should be it.

I'm not against kids having some sort of child friendly network access. The trouble is that there is no tech that is child friendly any more, its all vibe coded crap that keeps no one safe at all anymore with hidden traps inside the cesspool of crazies posting all sorts of wierd crap conspiracy shit.

Heck a super beneficial appearing thing like wikipedia is literally an encyclopedia yet the GOP for instance can't stand it if someone talks about any sexuality at all or some other bogyman subject of the hour.

Just ban kids at the internet's points of entry. Phones, Modems. Age gate amateur radio too, no kids interested in amateur radio anymore anyways, no packet switched communications at all until 18 or whatever.

[IshKebab]

[flagged]

[dang]

Can you please edit out swipes from your HN comments, regardless of how wrong someone is or you feel they are? This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Your comment would be fine without the first and last sentences.

[IshKebab]

I dunno, there's a definite tendency to say extreme and trivially falsifiable things on HN as if they were fact. I think those should be called out because they really derail rational discussion and encourage "us vs them" narratives.

He is clearly exaggerating for effect so much that it doesn't make sense any more, and IMO that is what leads to unproductive debate. It should be called out as such.

The last sentence is a genuine question.

[dang]

The phrase "call out" is already an indication that HN is not being used as intended (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...). You can make your substantive points without any of this.

If you feel that someone else is posting incorrect information, it's sufficient to post correct information. Getting aggressive about it is unnecessary and damages the commons.

[IshKebab]

Well, I'll have to agree to disagree on that. What is moderation if not "calling out"?

[dang]

Calling out, as I understand it, is a tactic of online shaming. We try not to shame anyone, although it does still happen unintentionally.

[cowboylowrez]

[flagged]

[dang]

Please don't respond to a bad comment by breaking the site guidelines yourself. That only makes things worse.

If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.

[IshKebab]

I'm not sure what you mean by id, but I'm 41.

[Eddy_Viscosity2]

Banning kids from alcohol, cigarettes, and sex sure did work. I can't think of a single kid I went to school with that did any of these things (and certainly not me). All those laws and rules were absolutely effective in preventing us as kids from doing them. /s

[cowboylowrez]

Yeah but we can sanction the parents. If your friends at school were having sex with strangers for money and their parents were doing the pimping, society would like to have a word.

Why is letting your kids sext with adult strangers any different? Is it because the only "pimping" you are doing is giving in to your brat nagging for an iphone?

[Eddy_Viscosity2]

It isn't any different, parents can already be sanctioned if they let those kids do those things.

The thing is, the vast vast majority of kids are not doing those things and are savy enough not to. It's the same as the alchohol and drugs for teens. Yes there are some that go to far and even get hooked on hard stuff, but most don't.

Don't get me wrong, I think social media is bad for both kids and adults alike, but predation is not its biggest problem. I'd say the biggest problem is the attention black hole it creates along with a misaligned sense of self. But that's a harder story to sell then 'super scary bad thing is happening so we need to do super extreme thing to prevent it'.

[voakbasda]

I wonder if creating more laws designed to punish parents correlates with declining birth rates. Sure makes me think twice about having them.

[cowboylowrez]

No, I'm pretty sure declining birthrates are caused by the smartphones, either that or the AI lied to me again but I'm still pretty sure its the smartphones.

"Recent economic research links the rise of smartphones to the persistent decline in birth rates. A National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) study estimates that early smartphone adoption accounts for 33% to 52% of the drop in the U.S. general fertility rate, particularly among teenagers and young adults under 30"

-- this quote is from AI and could be a complete fabrication

[Citizen_Lame]

This whole thread is dumpster fire of sovereign citizens caught in AI psychosis supporting authoritarian bullshit.

[filoleg]

Yeah, this isn't the HN I remember, but the one I am, unfortunately, stuck in.

Slow but steady reddification of HN audience (judging by the comments) is its biggest existential threat imo. And the worst part is that, unlike with the actual reddit, this isn't due to the platform owners/admins at all (as I can only think of good things to say about @dang and the HN itself).

[kelipso]

What kind of argument is this? "Banning murder sure did work. I can't think of a single person who did any of those things. /s".

Bans would work for >90% of kids and that's good enough.

[Eddy_Viscosity2]

There is a big difference between personally knowing a lot of people that do a thing, and hearing about some stranger on TV who did a thing.