The attitute expressed in the quote, "until mothers no longer are forced to have 'the talk' when their daughters get their first mobile phone," is both wrong in its assumptions and dangerous for its well-known consequence: the enabling of petty tyranny. Forced, indeed.

There will never be a world populated by humans in which you do not need to have numerous talks with your children about the nature of humans, especially humans they do not know and cannot trust, and about the technology those other humans know how to use. Saying you are forced to do so on account of some particular new technology is like saying you are forced to provision food for yourself on account of this newfangled capitalist system... As if needing to provision food for oneself were not a state of affairs dating back to the dawn of cellular life. And as if the uglier parts of human nature emerge from the smartphone and do not in fact date back to the dawn of humanity as a species.

Demanding everyone on the Internet show their papers to the government so that the author can hand their teenage daughter a free, always-networked pocket computer plus microphone and video camera without having to think about any related risks is an attitude repugnant for its laziness, its entitlement, its delusion, and most of all its contempt for the freedoms of others.

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antonvs 3 hours ago | parent [-]

Well put.

But the problem is, those same forces you're describing are employed to fool people into believing the fictions that support these regressive movements. The real danger we should be focusing on is "won't someone think of the impressionable adults".

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sfRattan 3 hours ago | parent [-]

Long term, I think we need computer age fables. As in: stories children can listen to and read growing up to acquire effective instincts about computers and the digital, networked world, rather than trying to apply instincts about the analog world to computers. Inter-human societal complexity has long outstripped our genetically developed instincts, but we've already solved that problem with storytelling and cultural transmission/cultivation of instincts. That solution is as ancient as spoken language.

When humans come to these deeply flawed conclusions about computers, networks, and governments, it's a new case of an old problem. Maybe the old problem is screaming toward us at a new velocity and intensity. But I think we can improve the existing humane cultural solution with new stories for our children, rather than surrendering to the supposed inevitability of government mandates to lock down and restrict general purpose computing to only well identified citizens in good standing. The restriction to "in good standing" almost inevitablty follows from the "well identified."

	▲	antonvs 15 minutes ago \| parent [-]
		> Long term, I think we need computer age fables. That seems undeniable. After all, look at religions. The major ones have survived, and perpetuated their positions - including many glaringly counterfactual beliefs! - for thousands of years. If we want to communicate to the majority of humanity, fables seem like the only way. But the fables will need to be assembled into a coherent ideology, with a motivation for following it. Whenever I have discussions like this I'm reminded of the L. Ron Hubbard quote: "You don't get rich writing science fiction. If you want to get rich, you start a religion." It's a bit surprising that more religions haven't started with the motivation of making life better for everyone, instead of getting rich. Another strike against human nature.