Yes I agree the way the UK is going about this is fucking silly and unlikely to even work, however I haven’t seen much debate about the motive behind the act.
I feel like this community has generally been pretty critical of the porn industry and particularly the effect of the massive proliferation of easy to access internet porn on young men (“porn brain” was a pretty common term around here). But when the UK tries to ban it I’ve suddenly seen a lot of defense of teenagers right to see pics or boobs on the internet.
I would also point out this is an ML dominated community, most people here are pretty fine with socialist governments censoring content or restricting access to good that are deemed harmful to the common good. But I have noticed a trend on here where when a liberal capitalist government tries to do the same thing everyone suddenly start sounding very libertarian about porn/booze/slop movies/what have you.
This is just my own uninformed take and I’m hoping to learn more so please be nice. I’m happy to be corrected if I’ve made an error.
I have no issues with an ideological commitment to combat Nazism and genocidal rhetoric, and taking effective measures to limit their spread, but I would still assume this needs to be backed up with the understanding that ideas cannot be killed and risk of the Streisand effect has to be managed.
In the US, governments attempted to impose restrictions on drugs and alcohol during the “war on drugs” and Prohibition, and regardless of the motive, it’s pretty clear the drugs won out both times. Similarly, restrictions on sex work seem to only harm the workers by driving it underground to give them no recourse should problems arise. What do you think a hypothetical “implemented better” restriction would look like that helps more than it harms?