The whole age verification thing is being pushed by one "techbro", because he wants others to deal with cleaning up his mess.

There's another misdirection here as well. Much of this mess doesn't just affect children. It's really pretty bad for everyone.

I make this point pretty much every time I comment on this subject and it's generally downvoted. It's more than one, but one may be the most obvious. The social media and big tech companies made their bed here. They want to operate as if they have no social responsibility and just blame all the bad stuff on users and parents. This was never going to fly over the long term.