This is actually really complicated and possibly (likely?) unconstitutional.
They basically can do limited censorship because of FCC v. Pacifica [1]
But that failed when applied to the internet. [2]
And it even fails sometimes when applied to TV. [3]
A different court in the future may very well overturn FCC v. Pacifica without anyone passing a new Federal law.
And States already are almost certainly prevented from outright censoring porn because:
a) legal porn has already been ruled *not* to be federally obscene via Miller test. [4]
They have to use the 'actionable indecency' bit from Pacifica to censor (ie. these ID laws) otherwise first amendment protected material. [6]
b) the first amendment is incorporated and thus applies to the States [5]
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=FCC_v._Pacifica_F...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reno_v._American_Civil_Liberti...
[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FCC_v._Fox_Television_Stations...
[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miller_test
[5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Incorporation_of_the_Bill_of_R...
Free speech can be restricted when harm can be caused.
If these recent laws are unconstitutional then are you saying no one wants to challenge them? Not even the aclu?
I don't get why we can't instead have regulation requiring porn websites to implement adult content rating meta tags, which most porn sites already do (look at the site source sometime). [2][3]
Then let parents use content blockers and/or built-in parental controls.
If we need even more regulation after that then require platforms to provide parental controls to block tagged content (which I assume they generally already do anyway?)
It's not like the sites that don't implement rating meta tags are going to follow these more strict ID verification laws.
In my opinion, I feel like these laws are not really about protecting children (which most everyone supports), as I don't see that they will meaningfully do so.
That makes me think they're instead about conservative political points at the expense of annoying adults.
[1] https://www.nola.com/gambit/news/the_latest/groups-file-free...
[2] https://developers.google.com/search/docs/crawling-indexing/...
Obscenity has always been censored too:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_obscenity_law
By definition, the minority in terms of voting will see policies they dislike enacted but consuming any content you want has never been a right. For example porn of minors is one of the worst crimes a person can committ anywhere, even just posession.
> Second: this is nothing more than the usual "just think of the children!" excuse for banning legal speech, a standard tool of censors.
Maybe but I am not agreeing or disagreeing with the law. I am simply accepting that not only is it legitimate but states doing things the rest of the states abhor like this is a good thing and only benefits the union of states. A timely discussion given the date of our discussion. America has always been a union of states that disagree on many things like this and it is because I like and celebrate america that I accept and tolerate legitimate excercise of legislative authority by states.
I think what you want is to support passing of federal laws that prevent states from censoring porn, and if that law passes I will accept it's legitimacy.