Kids are in these spaces because there is no place for them to be. People call the police on unaccompanied kids outside. Teens are banned from malls. Where are teens supposed to be where they won't be harassed. When I was a kid we used to just wander around and chat. There used to be a whole event on Friday evenings where high schoolers would decent on this mall across the street from two movie theaters. We went to the skating ring. There were teen clubs. More. Right now, I can't think of a single place a teen could just hang out besides at each other houses which is mostly what I watch them do. It makes sense why they end up in virtual spaces. They can socialize privately that way.

I agree. I had to coax people out after lockdown and it took years.

We do need offline spaces. I've been out for a Christmas lunch today. Much more meaningful than meeting on Zoom or whatever. I don't hate technology but I think we have to use it widely.

Australias eSafety office only occurred because of the Christchurch shooting. The Australian government wanted a sniff of that moral panic, and said it needed the right to remove videos of the shooting from the internet. Thats the office that has been pushing for this law. You can draw a direct line from Christchurch to this event.

The Kiwis tightened their gun laws after the incident, despite having done pretty well with what they had until that year.

In both events, both governments paraded around saying shit like "Leading the world" such as Australia is once again doing here. Its much like Godwins favourite dictator going abroad to spruik his fantastic free holiday / political retraining resort. "World Leading" is the absence of any other quality terminology.

For Australias case, during the 00s and early 10s we actually had a really huge internet freedom movement. Previous attacks on the internet had bee repelled quite gracefully. It took such a moral panic to finally put Australia in its place, and now we are looking at a further consequence of that moral failure.