This applies to basically every military and company in every country in all of human history. Nearly every single other country tries to spy on every single other country, including on the US. That's just how these things go.
I think a lot of the younger generation supports it, actually. They didn't really grow up with a culture of internet anonymity and some degree of privacy.
The younger generation is growing up where the internet is a giant dumpster fire of enshitification that a tanker full of gasoline just got poured on in the form of AI chatbots. With agents becoming even easier the equivalent of script kiddies are going to make it so much worse.
Privacy with respect to the government was one of the final pillars, but when everything placed on the internet is absorbed by the alphabets of government agencies, and the current admin does searches of it as their leisure they understand nothing is anonymous anymore.
It's funny that this is what the younger generation is going to think Millennials and older are completely stupid for still supporting. The current structure only benefits corporations and bots.
We need to destroy privacy and anonymity online for the noble goal of the government banning teenagers from looking at Twitter and Instagram?
If it's a concern, parents can prevent or limit their children's use. If all this were being done to prevent consistent successful terrorist attacks in the US with tens of thousands of annual casualties, I'd say okay maybe there is an unavoidable trade-off that must be made here, but this is so absurd.
"Preserving privacy and anonymity online" is not an inherent good. It depends on how it is being used and what the consequences on society are.
Thus far, privacy and anonymity have been used to get children addicted to garbage, distribute CSAM, create elaborate schemes of financial fraud (cryptocurrency), and develop drug distribution networks.
It's completely reasonable to limit privacy in order to combat these social evils.
It isn’t just about teenagers though I think I outlined that? We need to make sure people online are real people and yes we should prevent kids from being exposed to algorithms designed to addict then.
Adults are nearly as susceptible to such addiction. If this is the goal then the actual legislation should be to prohibit social media companies from doing it to anyone. (I think this would be government overreach and a possible first amendment violation, though. I say this as a center-left person who deeply hates what Musk has done to Twitter. I would even describe myself as an anti-free speech person; I just respect the nation's laws and the principle that the state should not be able to imprison you just for speech.)
What problem? I don't think internet websites and apps actually need to know the face, age, or name of their users if their users don't want to provide that information. With exceptions for things like gambling websites.
Crippling debt from unwise impulsive gambling by a teenager is probably worse than whatever occurs from a teenager scrolling Twitter all day.
The latter may not be great, but eating potato chips all day also probably isn't, and I don't think the government should outlaw minors eating potato chips. Plus it's variable: some get positive, educational, pro-social, productive outcomes from social media and some don't. Gambling is always bad in the limit.
A simple rule could probably be that if a website can make you lose over $200 of real money, it should probably require age verification. I don't see why other things should.
While I agree with much of what you say, there are a lot of urban, educated, socially left, economically right people (including myself) who complicate some of this analysis. Many economically right-wing people believe a free market is the most effective and helpful path to improve the standard of living for the working class and the poor. ("Progressive neoliberal social democracy", one might call it.)
The issues with Republicans right now go far, far, far beyond "they care more about the wealthy than the poor" (though that is definitely one of their core problems). They're basically destroying the rule of law, the country's internal and international reputation and credibility, all of our most important institutions, our ability to discern what is true, our sense of decency, our civil liberties, our basic respect of human rights... The class stuff is secondary or tertiary to the bigger issues, in my opinion.
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