Hello World!
We’ve made some changes today, and we’d like to announce that our Code of Conduct is no longer in effect. We now have a new Terms of Service, in effect starting from today(October 19, 2023).
The “LAST REVISION DATE:” on the page also signifies when the page was last edited, and it is updated automatically. Details of specific edits may be viewed by following the “Page History” reference at the bottom of the page. All significant edits will also be announced to our users.
The new Terms of Service can be found at https://legal.lemmy.world/
In this post our community mods and users may express their questions, concerns, requests and issues regarding the Terms of Service, and content moderation in Lemmy.World. We hope to discuss and inform constructively and in good faith.
I’m not sure if I should be angry at yet another attempt to exclude young people when the internet is already practically the last refuge in which they are allowed to exist at all…
… or laugh my ass off that literally anyone thinks this rule will be obeyed.
It’s about legal liability. The admins don’t want to have to worry about dealing with all sorts of EU and US regulation for minors so they can have an official policy that minors can’t use the site.
Nobody really cares if kids participate but it’s not the admin’s responsibility to bend over backwards for regulations to accommodate them.
Sir, I just need you to confirm you date of birth is indeed: Jan 01 1999
But have no fear. It’s not the rule people should worry about, its the punishment!
Clause 66, section 6: All ages 16 of less will be sentenced to 15 days in the meme mines. And possibly made mandatory mod of Boomer Memes for an hour. May the odds be ever in your favor.
No one wants kids shitting things up dude
I want young people being able to express themselves equally and without fear.
Remember Lemmy does not only have safe content and communities, and this includes our federated network. If you think kids should be able to view some of those, then you are free to disagree. We are happily following obligations.
An instance doesn’t have to follow, or show, the content from all the instances it’s federated with. If you chose to do so, that’s your choice, there is likely another “kids friendly” Lemmy federation split on the horizon.
And the admins (and myself, for that matter) want to exist without the risk of doing a perp walk because Little Timmy saw a peen.
I’m on an NSFW Lemmy instance. I have multiple NSFW accounts spread over the various platforms, and my single biggest fear is that some shithead kid is going to ignore the giant “18+ only” warnings because they’re so MATURE for their age, they’re going to find adult content (or worse yet, try and message me and pretend they’re over 18 so I don’t block them), and one of their relatives find out and call the police. Intentionally done or not, I’ve seen exactly that scenario play out, ruining the lives of multiple people through no fault of their own.
The Lemmy admins all have to worry about this exact same thing too, except they have to worry about every kid and every NSFW account/community, unless they decide to either play whack-a-mole with the various NSFW instances, or move to default deny federation and only federate with known-SFW communities. And that’s on top of the existing CSAM spam concerns that they appear to have only recently gotten under control.
I don’t give a single solitary flying fuck about whether children can express themselves equally. They’re NOT equal to an adult, because I don’t risk jail time by showing off my [REDACTED] to them.
Let’s take a look at what comments look like when you encourage kids to sign up
And who could forget this classic
Age limits are entirely self-selected. If you’re dumb enough to out yourself as breaking them, you were probably not contributing to the community in the first place
I don’t necessarily. I remember when I was young, and hanging around on BBS’es and forums all the time. I was a little shit.
I remember when I was young and the Internet was the only place I felt like I wasn’t constantly being talked down to. It was the only emotionally safe space I had.
This sure as hell ain’t the place for them.
Said of essentially everywhere.
And then old people wonder why young people are so anxious and depressed these days…
I don’t wonder. I know. It’s because they’re on the internet instead of going.the.fuck.outside.
There is zero wrong with putting age limits in place.
News flash, kids exist and adults already have their safe spaces.
Agreed but the puritans that have to give it up before we can expect sites like this to overexpose themselves to legal action.