Canada joins mass surveillance club
this post was submitted on 11 Jun 2026
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Hate these bills sweeping the world disguising what are essentially anti privacy pro surveillance laws as "child protection".
Honestly could we just ban most forms of new social media? Shit is toxic to the health of not just kids but also adults.
We did fine before facebook, twitter and tiktok existed.
Let's go back to Myspace, personal websites, tumblr and random forums! No xenforo tho. Fuck xen.
I grew up with the Internet of the noughties and saw some screwed up stuff. That should have been on my parents, but I turned out okay anyway.
Canada’s just the latest to join the mass surveillance club.
Social media ain’t the same breed though. They’re advertising platforms who don’t give a shit about anyone or anything but money. And they make more than companies generating real value. TikTok shows misogyny and violence within half an hour and TikTok is totally fine showing this for as long as they make money with it. Just like Insta and the rest. Back then with MySpace, etc the algorithms weren’t exactly great at keeping us addicted. At some point we simply logged off and didn’t come back. It’s not the same thing
It's not only mass surveillance but people who grew up with the same internet and opportunities you did, who now want to pull up the ladder behind them. Lame move all around.
In protest, every site should have a lemon party with 2 bathtub girls using one cup while riding a goatse as their only page.
While social media is age-gated by the bill, AI chatbot services won't be. "Chatbots are not as well-studied as the harm caused by social media platforms," Miller said during the press conference announcing the bill. "They don't have the same social role." With that said, the Safe Social Media Act also includes language around "AI chatbot services," seemingly in response to OpenAI's handling of the Tumbler Ridge shooting. As part of the bill, AI platforms are expected to mitigate the risk of chatbots "communicating harmful content" and engaging in harmful behavior, while also introducing "emergency measures" for dealing with crisis situations.
Seems like we're seeing that this isn't just about consumer surveillance but also pushing another platform
Why do we need a separate bill for social media companies to remove content that sexually victimizes children? Existing laws would have worked, if they had been enforced.
Also, not regulating AI chatbot use for children because it hasn't been studied yet is moronic. It is absolutely obvious that AI has serious cognitive impacts on adults. This generation doesn't have any chance.
Every generation doesn't have a chance. Kinda why it's always impressive when one manages to turn out half way functional.
This is just a backdoor to pedo tech bro mass surveillance
Social media needs regulation for everyone, and I'm deeply concerned about the impact of ID verification on the open web, but at the same time, given the clear harms, it's hard to argue with people attempting some form of regulation, even if limited and imperfect.
The obvious solution is a government age verification service. Platform age verification is just more data collection, I highly doubt it will even keep kids off social media.
I don't necessarily disagree.
Though it does raise concerns about government identity systems and fascist governments...
I grew up thinking that was a ridiculous anachronism, but looking at how far the US has fallen, I do understand the concern.
Imho the best option is just OS level enforcement. You buy a device, you set up accounts on them, some can be kid accounts, those ones have their web fetches always include their restrictions.
These laws are not going to do much in my eyes. It's usually cheaper for big tech to pay a fine and any kid who puts some effort in will get around it. I started drinking when I was 14. I'm mid 30s now. I'm of the opinion that most of this is a parenting issue more than anything else.
I mean sort of, but it's a parenting issue in the way that smoking was for our grandparents, but in some ways, much worse.
With smoking back in the day, our grandparents were addicted to it, and inadvertently modelled that behaviour for our parents (or for other people's kids who thought they looked cool), leading way more of our parents generation to smoke, even though they started growing up being aware of the risks and the impact it was having on their parents.
Social media is operating like that, but one difference is that smoking mostly cost people money... It did also cost them time, but most of that time was paid in years of their lives at the end. Social media is costing everyone their time constantly, day in - day out, and sapping their attention, focus, and willpower... Leaving social media addicted parents even less bandwidth to try and make sure their kids grow up different then smoking parents.
Just stop at the word “media”
No, as someone who has grown up and seen the change, it is vastly different.
Oh my. Here we go again.