[Skyy93]

I think this is a very funny question. Since different countries seem to answer this very differently.

In countries like the US the first Season of The Walking Dead was aired with an age rating of TV-14. At the same time the same in Germany this season was rated with an Rating of 18 (Germany uses 0,6,12,18 as ages for rating). So I am somewhat puzzled. Similar when a movie shows a pair of boobs or at least implies some sexual elements the US tend to rate the movie often with their MA-rating. However, in Germany thats different. It seems we have different children in both countries. As the ones in the US are more okay with violence and it does not affect them, where the childs in Germany are more okay with sexual elements.

This was just an example how stupid many rating systems are, their are very dependent on the country and the society you live in. So there is no inherent universalism to what a 12 or a 14 or a 16 year old should see or not.

My point, and I tried to argue this multiple times in this post, is that a goverment should not simply impose more and more bans and restrictions. This seems like the easy way out, but has always drawbacks. One is already described in the article, namely that the parents already start loosing awareness that the internet might be a dangerous place. Since they think: Yeah, there is a ban so its solved!

We should rather give the parents the time such that they can communicate often enough with their child to understand what problems its facing. In what kind of world the child lives and what they are consuming. If both parents are working 40 hours+ each week, they are not able to do this. Someone also mentioned in this thread "why is obesity not first fixed.", it might be a different issue, but the solution is the same. More time for parents mean that they can cook more healthy meals and do not rely on garbage food because they are stressed out.

[defrost]

> a goverment should not simply impose more and more bans and restrictions.

Fair point. I'd argue that a government should work to the benefit of that governments employers, aka its citizens.

eg: In the instance where parent citizens want more control over phones that flood in from outside, particularly when

> both parents are working 40 hours+ each week, [and] they are not able to do this

for themselves.

I can see the appeal of a UBI income and a minimum wage guaranteed to support parents and families on 20 hours of work per week but that doesn't seem to be as immediate and practical a solution as, for example, a government requiring foreign actors to adhere to certain standards, or requiring foreign hardware suppliers to issue child safe smart phones, or opening a tender for functional parental control software for phones, etc.

[Skyy93]

I do not think we will come to an agreement here. For me the current solution feels like patchwork and through this behaviour, which goverments all around the world follow, we postpone urgent policy changes further and further.

Especially that once rights are taken they are much harder to get back.

[defrost]

It's a real problem fumbling for a solution - there is a business to be made here.

> Especially that once rights are taken they are much harder to get back.

American?

I'm Australian and more inclined toward keeping a foot on the neck of government and on task with what the citizens appear to want.

The current lot aren't doing a great job on limiting child access so far, but the situation is evolving.

Should it get to the point where I feel I have to take up arms and go and shoot the people we elected I'd see that as a failure on our part.

[Skyy93]

>American?

Nope, German. Would I be American I would probably phantasize of taking up arms to overthrow the dictatorship, without the realization that I probably just would die since the military is much better equipped than me.

[defrost]

As Australians we veer toward large unarmed crowds and telling 'em to get on with the job or get the f' out so we can re elect new ones.

We have a hybrid UK / US "Washminister" system with mandatory voting, obligatory BBQ's, proportional voting and relative isolation.

That isolation is now being punctured and we're seeing unpopular parties that tank whenever they're asked questions in public suddenly get a boost from being "social media" only and trading on "algorithmic" boosts courtesy of unpopular billionaire backers.

That one is more of a pressing issue, albeit related, than parental control of media access.

[Skyy93]

Do you think we don't do the same in Germany? Might be a bit different system, but I would appreciate if you would not treat me as if I don't know anything about democracy. Voting and protesting might seem nice on paper, but people are stupid or kept stupid, for example crime rates are dropping for years but people feel unsafer because of higher media coverage.

However, now we are talking about something different and this is also something I can support much more. Algorithmic boosts and these slot machine like systems are a problem, which I highly agree. Then a ban of all of these systems would be something you would rather advocate then advocate for selective bans. For example, yeah social media can continue to exist but only a very simple algorithm can be used where a user can subscribe to topics he/she chooses. No recommendation, no trending stuff.