Would you take away the rights of someone with an intellectual disability from watching porn or smoking?
I think the idea is that kids brains are still developing, so their decision-making should be considered temporarily impaired. If their brains won’t develop further, then there’s not really any reason to restrict them from things that only harm themselves (e.g. smoking and drinking), though they should potentially have some guardrails around other people harming them (e.g. scams and other forms of fraud).
That said, I’m against this law. I think parents should be responsible for what media their children consume, and this law could conceivably be used against parents who make sure their kids are safely interacting w/ social media, and it could motivate the kids who need the supervision to be more discrete (i.e. use a VPN).
Again, this argument is extremely weak and fails under even the slightest investigation.
Firstly, the claim that kids brains are developing but adults’ brains aren’t is just factually untrue. Redditors love to repeat a little “factoid” about 25 being the age that the brain matures, but it’s just not true. Everyone develops differently and some people may be functionally mature in their mid teens, others may take much longer. Additionally there’s not really an end point where the brain stops developing, so everyone’s brains are always developing. So now you have to draw a line about, how much development is enough? and that asks the question, how do you measure brain development? And there’s actually not really any good answer to that question.
Even if you had some vague range under which brains are developed, which again, we don’t have - where would you draw a line? Anywhere you put it is going to be arbitrary and exclusionary. If you place it somewhere, let’s say, 18, then ask yourself - is it conceivable that there could be a 17 year old who would be capable and mature enough to take on this responsibility? If your answer is yes, then by making that line 18, you’re being ageist.
99% of all oppressions against young people are not justifiable.
I think the idea is that kids brains are still developing, so their decision-making should be considered temporarily impaired. If their brains won’t develop further, then there’s not really any reason to restrict them from things that only harm themselves (e.g. smoking and drinking), though they should potentially have some guardrails around other people harming them (e.g. scams and other forms of fraud).
That said, I’m against this law. I think parents should be responsible for what media their children consume, and this law could conceivably be used against parents who make sure their kids are safely interacting w/ social media, and it could motivate the kids who need the supervision to be more discrete (i.e. use a VPN).
Again, this argument is extremely weak and fails under even the slightest investigation.
Firstly, the claim that kids brains are developing but adults’ brains aren’t is just factually untrue. Redditors love to repeat a little “factoid” about 25 being the age that the brain matures, but it’s just not true. Everyone develops differently and some people may be functionally mature in their mid teens, others may take much longer. Additionally there’s not really an end point where the brain stops developing, so everyone’s brains are always developing. So now you have to draw a line about, how much development is enough? and that asks the question, how do you measure brain development? And there’s actually not really any good answer to that question.
Even if you had some vague range under which brains are developed, which again, we don’t have - where would you draw a line? Anywhere you put it is going to be arbitrary and exclusionary. If you place it somewhere, let’s say, 18, then ask yourself - is it conceivable that there could be a 17 year old who would be capable and mature enough to take on this responsibility? If your answer is yes, then by making that line 18, you’re being ageist.
99% of all oppressions against young people are not justifiable.