this post was submitted on 24 Aug 2023
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Charlie Jane Anders discusses KOSA (the Kids Online Safety Act).

If you're in the US, https://www.stopkosa.com/ makes it easy to contact your Senators and ask them to oppose KOSA.

"A new bill called the Kids Online Safety Act, or KOSA, is sailing towards passage in the Senate with bipartisa>n support. Among other things, this bill would give the attorney general of every state, including red states, the right to sue Internet platforms if they allow any content that is deemed harmful to minors. This clause is so vaguely defined that attorneys general can absolutely claim that queer content violates it — and they don't even need to win these lawsuits in order to prevail. They might not even need to file a lawsuit, in fact. The mere threat of an expensive, grueling legal battle will be enough to make almost every Internet platform begin to scrub anything related to queer people.

The right wing Heritage Foundation has already stated publicly that the GOP will use this provision to remove any discussions of trans or queer lives from the Internet. They're salivating over the prospect.

And yep, I did say this bill has bipartisan support. Many Democrats have already signed on as co-sponsors. And President Joe Biden has urged lawmakers to pass this bill in the strongest possible terms."

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[–] [email protected] 43 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Unfortunately this is just ONE of MANY bad internet bills currently up for consideration and with bipartisan support. Help fight all of them at https://badinternetbills.com

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago

!bad_[email protected] is tracking all the bad internet bills ... right now KOSA's where the most action is.

[–] [email protected] 33 points 1 year ago (3 children)

part 2 of this bill:

Pornography, manifested today in the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology and sexualization of children, for instance, is not a political Gordian knot inextricably binding up disparate claims about free speech, property rights, sexual liberation, and child welfare. It has no claim to First Amendment protection. Its purveyors are child predators and misogynistic exploiters of women. Their product is as addictive as any illicit drug and as psychologically destructive as any crime. Pornography should be outlawed. The people who produce and distribute it should be imprisoned. Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered.

just so we're all clear on the purpose of this bill.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

All the fascist hentai guys on 4chan are about to commit mass suicide or a mass shooting

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[–] [email protected] 32 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Knowing this will probably be passed like

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[–] [email protected] 29 points 1 year ago (48 children)

The internet is about to move to the rest of the world if this passes, no one will host a web server in the US after this.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago

which, considering that the U.S considers accessing a server based in the U.S grounds to extradite a person from the otherside of the world and try them for a capital crime might not be such a bad thing.

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[–] [email protected] 28 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Ooooh... the liberals are about to hand the fascists the keys to the tanks.

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[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I emailed my senators, both Democrats. One wrote me back telling me how proud they were of co-sponsoring the bill. The other told me how important it is to protect kids from the dangers of social media. WTF.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 year ago

WTF indeed. But, thanks for emailing them -- they track how much email they get in each direction, and if there's enough they may rethink their position.

[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Ah yes.. forever and again, the siren song of children being used as an excuse for draconian, rights eroding legislation.. its amazing how much responsibility parents have shirked to the state as they replace babysitters with cellphones and tablets.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

grillman: "You REALLY want little Billy to read a tweet that makes him think he's not perfect because he's white!? YOU MONSTER! Now if you'll excuse me, I have to relentlessly stalk and then bully this freak I found on KiwiFarms for the crime of not being a good normal like me!"

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago (2 children)

More of them “freedoms” that you yanks are always going on about?

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[–] [email protected] 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Thank you for noting the US focus in the title <3

So often I see sweeping headlines like this that are actually only about a single country, and the country is always named (as it's a key piece of information about the story) unless it's the USA, at which point they just assume you must be in the USA too and so being up front about what country they're talking about isn't a priority xD

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Unfortunately this is about the first time, I'd (almost) disagree with you. If the US bans something on, or makes a law about, the internet it almost always affects the rest of the world. The only difference is the rest of the world has no say in the matter :(

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I hang around a bunch of artists who make money through NSFW art...or shit, they just draw it for fun. This isn't gonna be great for them. Why should me and my friends' thirty year old asses have to hold back so Little Timmy doesn't see a boob or something? Shouldn't their parents be the ones making sure that doesn’t happen?

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 year ago (9 children)

American here, and I am totally OK with a tiny bit of extra latency if people & companies want to move their servers to some place in Europe that actually respects freedom and people.

Though I suspect that if you’re a US company with servers located abroad, they will still make the law apply to you since you control it.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

frothingfash in 2014: "Stupid SJWs, my rights don't end where your feelings begin."

frothingfash now: "Stupid SJWs, your rights end where my ego begins."

'Free Speech' mfs really do like their blasphemy laws.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

A bill like this has merit if it's targeted at real problems, like the sources of fascist growth and propaganda that have existed on the internet for decades.

As per usual the US isn't interested in going after the fascists though. This will absolutely be used against already marginalised people and the left, by which I mean socialists. There's a reason it has bipartisan support.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago

yeah, Rs have already been bragging that they're going to use this to go after queer communities online.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (6 children)

You really can't pick and choose. There's really no such thing as 'good' government censorship of the internet, you have to block all of it or you're getting the bad stuff.

[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (8 children)

Yes there is. And yes you can. The only people that say this absurd fucking bullshit are literally nazis who don't want to be targeted.

"Hurr hurr you have to block lgbt with the fascists or you have to accept them both" is a fucking stupid thing to say and you should be ashamed of yourself and the general state of your life leading you to say this stupid shit.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

How is this line up with 'liberty'? The US gov can't stop intruding into the private sphere.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (7 children)

And then everybody slaps a "Only for 18+, fill in your birth day" on their site and nobody can legally claim it's harming children.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago

And suddenly everyone was born on Jan 1st, 2000

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (4 children)

this law requires positive proof with IDs. it's also going to be used by red states to go after online queer communities.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Which you will need to prove by sending your personal identification to a commercial third party provider. Who will eventually get hacked and your data will be leaked.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Unfortunately I live in a backwards, ignorant red state represented by complete idiots. The last time I wrote to my representatives asking them to oppose something like this they wrote back saying "the agree fully" and then went on to explain that they would definitely support it and thanked me for backing them... Then went on to show a complete lack of understanding of the bill in question.

And I've been on his email list ever since despite clicking unsubscribe probably 30 times. The crusty sock puppet probably thinks that means "show me more" based on how he responded to my initial email.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (1 children)
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[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago

Ah yes, children security. Of course.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

"Think of the children" is such a dumb excuse that people keep using in the US to pass laws that restricts citizens and are anti-privacy.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (5 children)

I don't know how American voters can stand for this, how can you re-elect people who cause your children to get shot in schools and believe the same people have set out to protect them with things like these?

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago

"The internet is about to get a lot worse (US focused)" uhh

spoilerfirst-time

everyday is the same but slightly worse

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (3 children)
[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 year ago (5 children)

For fucking what? This is bipartisan!

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 year ago

don't worry, they're making fun of liberals who claim voting will cure all societal ills

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[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I’m shocked that the first openly gay senator Tammy Baldwin is a co-sponsor for the bill. You bet I’m writing her.

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