Once you realize it’s not “age verification”, but actually “identity verification”, then it’s easy to understand that the real goal is “papers, please” for the entire internet.

@mhoye @txtx @DiogoConstantino @dalias

Enacted by a hard-fought effort from folks like Ralph Nader, yes. In the 60s and 70s.

That's an example everybody loves citing, because it worked. And the stuff that fixed the hole in the ozone. Thing is, nothing anywhere near as comprehensive or effective has been acheived in other industries since, because the corporations vowed to never let it happen like that again.

So. In a world where the regulating mechanisms have already been CAPTURED by immense money, how exactly do you expect regulation to be achieved now?

Tons of awful things are already thoroughly against all kinds of laws, but continue happening anyway. The "international rules-based order" is proving to be a hollow fantasy. Genocides continue unabated, no justice in sight.

Laws are the pieces of paper that formalize power structures with official documentation-- but they're just paper. Labels. Where exactly is the power going to come from, to make billionaires pay taxes or make genocidal war profiteers stop killing people?

How do you regulate the internet without simply lining up to put your own leash into the hands of these technofascist monsters whose corporate feudalism is turning the whole idea of national sovereignty into an obsolete joke?

How does that actually work??

@violetmadder @txtx @DiogoConstantino @mhoye "Libertarian ideals" aren't the answer here. We absolutely need to regulate the billionaire platforms, either out of existence or at least into behaving half decently. What we must reject is regulating ordinary ppl into surveillance hell as a faux substitute for that.

@violetmadder

"How do you regulate the internet
[...] How does that actually work??

These are excellent questions, exactly the kind we should be asking IMO. Some ideas: ban oligarch social platforms completely. Ban foreign platforms when they go over a certain market share. Ban platforms that don't adhere to local law.

I thought this was a niche idea but it turns out that, according to recent polls, some of these are very popular positions here in Europe — including age restrictions.

@txtx @violetmadder "Age restrictions" are absolutely non negotiably wrong. They're a mislabeling for "papers please" which is a fundamentally fascist position. Polls are shit designed to manipulate public opinion and manufacture consensus for what the powerful want.

@dalias If a police officer comes to my home and demands a search, and I respond with "papers please" — is my position fascist?

@violetmadder

@txtx @violetmadder No, because that's not what it means and I think you know that.

@dalias I agree! It is different, and that difference is the core of what we're talking about here IMO.

The Internet is infested with government agents propagandists bots and criminals posing as real people. I'm saying no, I don't want them.

@violetmadder

@mhoye there are other technical ways to do only and just age veification that have been so carefully avoided that at this point it's fair to say it's entirely on purpose and that the goal is "papers, please".

@txtx @violetmadder They're not going to stop their own propaganda bots with "age verification"/internet passports. They're going to stop the people fighting them. This should not be hard to understand.

@txtx @violetmadder "Papers please" specifically means the principle that people don't have free movement or participation in society without having to show their identity documents to an authority. It does not have any relationship with its polar opposite, "come back with a warrant".

@mhoye Unpopular opinion:

Identity verification isn't so unattractive in 2026 — social media is destroying democracies via anonymous armies of bot people steered by aggressive foreign actors like Putin and Musk.

The libertarian model that the Internet was built on is failing societies.

@txtx @mhoye and identity verification will make sure the internet isn’t safe for those fuckn trannies and sex workers, which i am sure everyone can agree will be an improvement all around

@txtx @violetmadder One is about authentication of people to authority. The other is about authentication of authority to people.

@txtx @violetmadder One is about authentication of people to authority. The other is about authentication of authority to people.