I disagree with almost all of your political opinions, and some of your positions I very much hate. But we should be free to have the argument, without the thread of handcuffs or the threat of starvation. Although I use my real name here, sometimes I prefer not to, and that should be allowed.

The right to actual real privacy is the same thing as the right to actual real freedom of speech, and we should harm anyone who is trying to take that most basic foundation of all rights away.

I agree with Alexander Solzhenitsyn.

> ruin political candidates, powerful CEOs, and wealthy people

This is mostly fantasy propagated by works of fiction. In the real world release of any evidence of sins has practically zero impact on the wealthy people and when it very occasionally does have an impact it just happens in cases of people who weren't wealthy enough for the circumstances.

You've accurately described what could happen with right-wing authoritarians in power. You've not described what could happen with left-wing authoritarians in power.

Don't be fooled that your team doesn't have people with the same impulses. Privacy and civil liberties exist to protect us from abuse of authority on all sides.

- "Oh I see John is connected to this account. I really don't like this HN comment and opinion he posted, I find it deeply offensive. Put him on the bank KYC fail list."

- "We'd love to give you this mortgage backed by the US government, but why didn't you post the right flag in support of the new hip thing?"

- "Before you login to your retirement account, how much wealth are you secretly harboring there from this job we think you unfairly got due to your privilege?"

- "If you just let us monitor your activity and the ideas you see, we'll stop you from wrong-think and will create a utopia"

Good luck, man. Nobody cared in 2012, and even less people care now. The west is lost. 1984 is already here.

How about the first country to ban social media for kids, Australia[1]? So far as I can tell the PM/party leader was not in the files. Of course, if you make your inclusion criteria absurdly wide (eg. anyone who voted or advocated for age based restrictions in any shape or form), you'll probably find some pedophiles or even epstien island visitors from sheer luck alone.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Online_Safety_Amendment_(Socia...

These laws were passed almost exclusively by the party of self-proclaimed free speech warriors led by Epstein's best friend.

    State             | Effective Date | Legislature Control
    ------------------+----------------+----------------------
    Alabama           | Oct 1, 2024    | Republican
    Arizona           | Sep 26, 2025   | Republican
    Arkansas          | Jul 31, 2023   | Republican
    California        | Jan 1, 2027    | Democratic
    Florida           | Jan 1, 2025    | Republican
    Georgia           | Jul 1, 2025    | Republican
    Idaho             | Jul 1, 2024    | Republican
    Indiana           | Aug 16, 2024   | Republican
    Kansas            | Jul 1, 2024    | Republican
    Kentucky          | Jul 15, 2024   | Republican
    Louisiana         | Jan 1, 2023    | Republican
    Mississippi       | Jul 1, 2023    | Republican
    Missouri          | Nov 30, 2025   | Republican
    Montana           | Jan 1, 2024    | Republican
    Nebraska          | Jul 18, 2024   | Nonpartisan (unicameral)
    North Carolina    | Jan 1, 2024    | Republican
    North Dakota      | Aug 1, 2025    | Republican
    Ohio              | Sep 30, 2025   | Republican
    Oklahoma          | Nov 1, 2024    | Republican
    South Carolina    | Jan 1, 2025    | Republican
    South Dakota      | Jul 1, 2025    | Republican
    Tennessee         | Jan 13, 2025   | Republican
    Texas             | Sep 19, 2023   | Republican
    Utah              | May 3, 2023    | Republican
    Virginia          | Jul 1, 2023    | Divided
    Wyoming           | Jul 1, 2025    | Republican

Zuckerberg?

https://mashable.com/article/tech-ceos-epstein-files-musk-ga...

I don't like the "those in power" framing because it implies that they all participated and that such a homogenous group even exists.

I might be misreading you, but are you saying that the whole Qanon thing isn't a baseless conspiracy theory?

>we simply can't pretend that there isn't rampant CSA by those in power, because we've had proof of it despite their best efforts

What's "rampant"? The news coverage provides no shortage of people, but ringing off 100 (or whatever) people that are in the files doesn't say much, even if we make the questionable assumption that inclusion in files implies guilt. I'm sure that everyone would prefer the amount of pedophiles that are in power to 0, but if it's the same rate as the general population that can hardly be considered "rampant", or a "conspiracy". Given some neutral inclusion criteria (eg. members of legislative bodies), is there any evidence they have disproportionate amount of pedophiles?

>the leader of the United States right now was friends with the supposed ring-leader...

You conveniently omit the fact that they broke up 5 years before he was first convicted. From wikipedia:

"Trump had a falling out with Epstein around 2004 and ceased contact. After Epstein was said to have sexually harassed a teenage daughter of another Mar-a-Lago member in 2007, Trump banned him from the club. "

>Useful idiots, perhaps?

So basically https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_consciousness?

> Wanting to protect their own power and gain more?

How does adding age verification help in that? Are they blackmailed by the shadowy cabal? Are they just doing what the voters/lobbyists want? If so, what makes invocation of this reasoning more suitable than for any other political issue? Is everything from tax policy to noise ordinances just something pushed by pedophile elites, helped by useful idiots and people who want to "protect their own power and gain more"?

>Who exactly is influential & organized enough across many western countries to push legislation that no one is asking for?

The anti-social media sentiment has been brewing for a while now, not least due to books like The Anxious Generation (2024). It's also reflected in opinion polls and media coverage. Unless you want to imply there's some massive conspiracy by The Elites™ (ie. not just a few lobbyists Meta hired, but those in academia and media as well), it's probably organic.

> I'm not sure it will work out that way.

why? If age restriction get legislated into the OS, it puts a damper on further attempts on adding restrictions to sites, because they can point to the existing legislation and claim it's enough.

They're pushing for an API at the system level, where they can query the age

Such an API can then be extended to provide location data to "help the police find bad guys", track purchase histories to "prevent fraud"; all the stuff that Apple and Google blocked fb from sniffing from user devices

It's circumvention of these privacy protections with added vengeance since now Google and Apple will be sitting with the cost of implementation and the liability

> I think the execs think its some sort of 4D chess move to put liabilities onto their competitors.

No, they're pulling up the ladder. Meta is fine losing the app store battle because it can easily afford regulation requiring first-party compliance, and no startup could.

They would be no longer responsible for doing it.

My kid had classmates as young as 8 using it. Facebook knows this.

Think of how many quadrillions of hours under-18 spend online. Ads for verified 18+ are more profitable.