Summary
Several U.S. states have enacted laws requiring pornography sites, such as PornHub, to implement age verification to prevent minors’ access, prompting the site’s parent company, Aylo, to block access in affected states.
Proponents argue these laws protect children, while critics highlight privacy risks, inefficiencies, and potential censorship.
These measures reflect growing social conservatism, with some advocates aiming to restrict adult content broadly.
While privacy-focused age verification methods exist, regulatory clarity is lacking.
Critics warn these laws may suppress responsible platforms, favoring unregulated alternatives, and escalate broader culture wars around sexuality and LGBTQ+ rights.
There are thousands of porn sites. Blocking pornhub doesn’t even register. If someone wants to find porn it is no more difficult than it was the day before the ban, it just won’t be pornhub porn.
They must know that that’s the case. Even if they blocked the entire internet in those states, porn would still be easily accessible. Blocking PornHub is just whacking a single mole in a huge field full of them.
At least they’re wasting some of their time with this limp-dicked bullshit. Better than using it to pursue their broader, more sinister goals.
These states didn’t block pornhub, pornhub blocked these states. Those states passed laws that would require legitimately operated adult sites to check ID at entry and then worry about keeping that information secure against breaches. This is more likely step 1 for those states to taking legal action against websites they deem are “adult oriented” for mentioning Queer people existing and not checking ID first.
The biggest issue here is that (at least in Texas), your ID has to be checked by a specific company.
I didn’t know that… That’s even worse. It is probably a company already setup to share data with Texas officials for the purpose of oppression.
I think this is just step one. Once the porn sites with money stop fighting it then they will go after any search engine that lists porn sites.
If you can’t find it on Google/Bing/Etc. it may as well not even exist for a majority of people.
I welcome the re-emergence of newsgroups again.
It would be funny if it just ended up teaching everyone how to torrent stuff.
The most surprising thing to me is that PornHub is owned by a multinational Canada based private equity firm Aylo. I guess surprising might not be the right word, maybe morbidly reassuring that no one escapes from the slimy hands of late capitalism.
Yeah, let’s get back to small business “mom and pop” pornography vendors!
It’s there like, 3,000,000 other porn sites people can use? I don’t hover how this is a victory in any form.
they keep saying its about trans people but then they keep blocking porn so i don’t know what it is. i think christians and conservatives are stupid as fuck
Every time that a conservative equates the mere existence of trans people with sex, they’re just outing their own kink.
“These people who’ve historically been marginalized to having to do sex work to live authentically and are more likely to be victims of sexusl violence are inherently sex crazed freaks.”
Like, as soon as we could openly do jobs that aren’t sex work we got a reputation as computer programmers. Turns out we’re all multidimensional human beings.
And people don’t seem to notice that more people came out after they could live authentically and do other jobs.
All of this Boomer nonsense about “There were no trans people in my day.”
No, grandpa, they were just too afraid to let you know it, so they lived quietly miserable lives with a socially acceptable spouse and 2.5 kids.
Exactly. I didn’t transition until it was a choice between transition and suicide and I regret holding myself to that bar. It used to be the advice back in the day and like it makes sense when step 1 is start lying to a psychologist because they’re rampantly misogynistic but only to trans women (and also hold trans men to unrealistic standards of manhood), and step 2 is decide if you think it’s worth ever seeing your family and friends again.
I’m sorry that was your experience. I’m sure it was hard, but I’m glad you made the choice that means you’re still here to tell your story.
Socially accepted mental illness
it’s mostly because the red hats love trans porn, and hate themselves for loving trans porn, and they just need a little help resisting temptation
Mad conservative computer scientists: “Yes, using the fear that kids might see porno, we will soon require the implementation of the impossible device: Anonymous age verification! Since no one will be able to implement it, we will ban all pornography off the internet!”
Mad liberal computer scientists: : “Using generative AI, anyone can now produce any porno they want, even offline! And the interface is so easy that even a kid can use it!”
Porn companies: “We will have the computer take a picture of you and analyze your age to grant access.”
Users: Uses generative AI to generate fake pictures to get access to real porn.
User: uses the VPN they had already
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don’t even for a second think this is in favour of you.
it’s some weird christian idea that the human must be “purified” and watching porn stops that. it’s about an ideology, not about you or your wellbeing.
Its about VPN sales.
Fascists view sexuality as a threat to their movements.
Fascists view knowledge as a threat. They use sexuality as another means of segregation.
Also: laughing, knowing things, joy.
They view it as another tool to oppress us. They know it’s not a threat to them. The only threat to them is organized resistance.
sexuality is the core of human desire, and if you suppress that, you suppress the development of the individual’s sense of self-determination. that’s why it’s so important to the government so suppress sexuality.
there are other reasons, of course. for example, almost everyone nowadays is overworked, and of course that leads to a decline in relationships.
also, people are stronger together. sexuality brings people together. if you can suppress the sexuality of large swaths of people, you can basically hinder the forming of social coherence and community.
Yeah. When manifested healthily it is an outlet of joy, community, love, release, and all that good shit. It’s passion bound to pleasure and that disgusts them. To the fascist passion and love are to be reserved for the state. They want pent up angry weirdos who will do awful things. To them sexuality is for reproduction or expression of violence. And there’s nothing wrong with reproduction, but it, even more than sexuality, should exist for the purposes of love.
Authoritarians find sexuality and opportunity for violence wherever they can, and if nothing can be stretched into it, they’ll make some excuse and do it anyways.
I’m curious what this graph looks like compared to states with legal weed.
Lol. Montana’s wilding up there. Toke up all you please, but no porn.
I think the most fascinating thing is that of out of all states Idaho seems to be the only one that doesn’t even allow medical use.
(Not that the low THC states are much better… you could probably get similar or better stuff from the gas station/head shop in almost any state after McConnells farm bill pseudo legalized it)
Wasn’t really a pornhub guy, think xvideos does the suggestions better and overall I’m more into pics as far as that goes but pissing off my home state gets brownie points off of me anyway.
Right. “Protecting children”. Meanwhile, lowering the age range for child workers…
“No beating off! You need to save your energy for the night shift.”
https://clockify.me/learn/business-management/minimum-working-age-by-state/
Several U.S. states have enacted laws requiring pornography sites, such as PornHub, to implement age verification to prevent minors’ access
Doesn’t seem too unreasonable. When I buy alcohol I have to provide verification that I’m over 21.
The thing is, how do they enforce it? People in those states can still access pornhub through a VPN. Plus, what about all the other many, many porn sites?
I get what they’re trying to do, but I think there are some logistics that haven’t really been thought out.
You’re kind of missing the point entirely. We already know that the current methods used to verify age aren’t privacy-respecting and only serve to block legitimate use.
All I’m saying is I don’t think the age verification requirement, in and of itself, is unreasonable. I’m not necessarily in opposition to better, more privacy-respecting verification methods, nor am I necessarily opposed to, for instance the age verification requirement being lifted until better age verification technology can be developed. All I’m saying is I personally do not find the age verification requirement itself to be unreasonable. That’s it.
They, meaning the people behind the bans, have thought it through perfectly well. They are counting on milquetoast centrists to ‘both sides’ the issue so they can start to attack LGBTQ+ people and their concerns as being inherently indecent.
They expect the porn provider to verify age/id through very invasive and onerous means. It is in no way reasonable or secure to give some random porn site a copy of your government ID. They will get hacked; not if, when.
They will get hacked; not if, when.
Not only that, it turns any site that doesn’t just outright block the age verification states into a massive target.
But that’s just it, they have thought about the logistics. We already have Meta changing their rules to allow LGBTQ + people to be called “mentally ill” with no repercussions.
The Great Firewall of China isn’t an accident, it’s actually how internet hardware like routers and switches are built to work from the ground up, with security like access control lists, as well as logging connections and seeing what data goes where and so on. That’s the scary thing about the internet, it just takes people wanting to turn it into a draconian nightmare to flip a few switches. I mean, really, the US already has but it just feels like it less because of the release valve of “free speech.” The NSA Utah datacenter has been around for a while now.
They have thought about the logistics, and they want to bring those kind of controls here. As always the plan is to control what happens online. Musk has definitely made some weird and creepy comments about “making lists” and while he’s an idiot, he’s got the tools and people to make it happen.
They couch it in a reasonable position to start the path to blocking access to content about sexuality for anyone. When youre a queer kid growing up and being told that it’s just the devil’s work and other bullshit the internet and being able to talk about your experience was the first freeing thing you could do in your life. It also lead to women having higher standards because women could communicate more and not be isolated by their male partners controlling behavior. Conservatives fucking hate that. This kind of ban could ban that kind of speech online, and I firmly believe it’s intended to.
When I buy alcohol I have to provide verification that I’m over 21
I was unaware that porn could kill you.
Not your fault. Nobody can be aware of everything.
And yes, people have fapped to porn until they had a heart attack and died due to it.
Source?
My bad. Remembered heart attack story instead of stroke one.
https://nrtimes.co.uk/masturbation-linked-to-stroke-in-medical-case-study/
In other words, could have happened whether he was masturbating or having sex. Wasn’t the masturbation that caused it, was the orgasm. I guess we’re just not supposed to orgasm now?
Regardless, porn wasn’t mentioned anywhere in that article.
Also…
The study authors say that they found just two other cases of masturbation-linked strokes in other scientific literature.
A whole two cases (three counting the linked one). Doesn’t really seem like an epidemic now, does it? Considering legit every boy does it, and the ones that deny it are likely lying.
However unlikely, it can nonetheless happen.
Regardless, porn wasn’t mentioned anywhere in that article.
Now that’s just quibbling. Porn is generally used for the purpose of masturbation.
I never said that it could.
Are you suggesting that it should be legal to sell alcohol to children so long as it’s not a lethal amount? Should a kid be able to buy a single beer? It’s not like it’s going to kill them.
What about selling physical media pornography in a store to children? Should that be legal? It’s not going to kill them. Should a kid be able to walk into a porn store and slap down his allowance for a copy of Hardcore Anal Superstars 2?
This is a terrible analogy. Liquor purchases aren’t tracked by your ID. It’s not even mandatory to scan your ID to purchase alcohol.
While privacy-focused age verification methods exist
verification methods may ‘exist’, but there are exactly zero which can guarantee security and privacy.
“trust me bro” isn’t good enough for you? What’re you hiding?
Don’t you know the government is “If you have nothing to hide you should have nothing to be worried about”-pilled?
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The are absolutely ways to have a 100% anonymous and private age verification. None of the parties here are interested in implementing them though.
At the core of the debate is a genuinely thorny technical and legal question: how to verify someone’s age over the internet without exposing them to cyber theft or government surveillance.
Age verification providers are adamant that this is possible.
I agree that it is possible if you can guarantee absolutely zero corruption in the system. Which you cannot.
Proving, in a safe, privacy-friendly way, that you’re able to provide to some third-party website credentials proving that you’re an adult, is very easily doable. Most countries decided against the good version of it, but it is doable.
It does not, however, prove anything regarding the actual user in front of the computer. Let’s remind people that we live in a world where kids have access to their parent’s CC and regularly abuse it online. I doubt “more technical stuff” will prevent them from getting their hand on whatever certificate/token/thingamajig would be used for age check.
Unless we consider “good practice and proper communication”, or, parenting, to be a key point in this. In which case, there’s no need to do any technical implementation at all in the first place.
