Tag: moral panics

A Public Health Epidemic to Restrict Digital Rights

Remember that time a few years back when the government completely reshaped day-to-day life and restricted our basic rights to protect us from a disease that wasn’t that dangerous? Remember how our leaders forced us to comply with a suite of safety protocols that seemed mostly symbolic at best and a test of compliance at worst? Well, it’s happening again but not in the way you’d expect.

No, this time the threat is not some plague of medieval proportions. It’s not a new strain of super-Covid. It’s not Ebola or Disease-X. It’s not monkeypox or hantavirus. It’s not even explosive diarrhea from dirty lettuce. No, this time the threat is social media and the open internet.

That’s right. In case you haven’t heard, social media is causing a mental health crisis amongst young people. Porn and the potential for children to interact with adult strangers online probably isn’t great either. And therefore in order to protect our nation’s youth we all need to accept that the government has no choice but to reshape day-to-day life in the digital world.

A Brief History of Another Scientific Consensus

To give some background, starting roughly around 2012 depression, anxiety, self-harm, and suicidality began to increase among minors. These trends coincided with the growing ubiquity of smartphones and social media. Subsequently, many parents, teachers, psychologists, and activists went on to suggest a link. Moreover, these claims were said to be supported by a growing number of scientific studies showing associations between social media use and measures of declining mental health.

When discussed in popular books such as Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation, these societal trends and supporting studies often are portrayed as undeniable evidence of a mental health epidemic caused by social media. When discussed in the media and by politicians, there can be a sense that this is a consensus position among experts overwhelmingly supported by “The Science.” 

Consequently, legislators across the country are rushing to demonstrate how seriously they take this and related issues by restricting access to certain digital corridors to those able and willing to convince a computer algorithm that they are in fact an adult – or by at least requiring everyone to jump through a couple additional government-mandated hoops just to get online.

Protecting Children by Requiring ID

Although many pieces of legislation have been proposed, and in some cases enacted into law, the most comprehensive and probably most threatening at the moment is the Kids Internet and Digital Safety Act (KIDS Act).

The KIDS Act, which recently passed in the House (and which I wrote about in more detail for The Washington Examiner), has been sent to the Senate. What happens next is unclear. But if it were to become law, it would require certain types of websites and digital technologies to provide distinct user experiences based on whether a user is an adult or a minor (or in some cases an adult, teen, or child).  

On paper, this is intended to protect minors from age-inappropriate content (e.g., pornography and cigarette ads), questionable practices on the part of social media companies (e.g., location sharing with third parties, personalized ads, and design features that encourage compulsive use), and online interactions with adult strangers and deceptive AIs. It also is meant to give parents greater control of their children’s social media accounts and online lives. 

In practice, however, the KIDS Act would require covered sites and technologies verify or at least estimate the ages of visitors or users through an array of mechanisms that at best legitimize current data collection practices by Big Tech (e.g., age estimation based on one’s online activity) and at worst mandate even more invasive ones that can be used to verify a user’s real-world identity (e.g., presentation of a government ID or submission to a biometric face scan). 

A similar effort has been proposed by the Senate. At the state level, places such as California, Texas, and Utah have their own age-gating legislation. Additionally, California and Illinois are pushing requirements that at least some operating systems collect age-bracket information on users to relay to websites as a means to ensure age-appropriate user experiences. 

Also, the Senate is considering the SCREEN Act, which is intended to prevent minors from viewing sexually explicit material online, seemingly by imposing more invasive age-gating protocols on anyone attempting to access such content. However, according to some analyses, the SCREEN Act may not only cover porn sites but also major streaming services and social media platforms. Furthermore, the SCREEN Act would require covered sites to crack down on people using VPNs to protect their privacy by circumnavigating compliance with age-gating requirements.

Despite some differences in the precise rationale and specific mechanisms imposed by these different pieces of legislation, the end result is always the same: an internet that is a little less free.   

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The KIDS Act: A Bipartisan Mass Surveillance Megabill

Just weeks after Americans criticized the United Kingdom for imposing intrusive and heavy-handed social media rules, Congress is now advancing legislation that raises strikingly similar concerns about government overreach, privacy erosion, and the expansion of online surveillance.

A bipartisan agreement on children’s online safety legislation unveiled by House Energy and Commerce Committee leaders would impose new obligations on social media platforms, while creating powerful incentives for companies to end online anonymity.

The proposal is part of the Kids Internet and Digital Safety Act (KIDS Act), an omnibus package that bundles together multiple bills, including the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), the SCREEN Act, the SAFE BOTs Act, COPPA 2.0, the SPY Kids Act, and more, as well as data broker provisions and research and education initiatives.

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

Committee Chairman Brett Guthrie and ranking Democrat Frank Pallone announced Monday that they had reached agreement on the legislation, which would require social media companies to provide additional safeguards and parental tools for minors. The lawmakers said it would “hold Big Tech accountable.”

“We worked across the aisle for many months and have now found common ground on policies to significantly improve the digital environment for kids,” Guthrie and Pallone said in a joint statement.

As always, under that framing lies a familiar and deeply controversial approach: imposing broad obligations on platforms that hinge on whether companies know a user is a minor, without clearly defining how that knowledge is supposed to be obtained.

Congress has tried for years to set national rules for social media and youth safety. Those efforts have repeatedly stalled, in part because of unresolved tensions between child protection goals and fundamental privacy rights. In the absence of federal action, states have moved ahead with their own laws, often pushing even more aggressive requirements.

One of the main disputes appears to have been resolved in favor of House Republicans. According to a committee spokesperson, the agreement does not include a “duty of care” provision, a requirement backed by many child-safety advocates and several Senate lawmakers.

The bill text states that nothing in it may be construed to “impose a duty of care on a provider of a covered platform.”

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California Marijuana Regulators Unveil New AI Tool To Prevent Product Packaging That May Appeal To Kids

California cannabis regulators are rolling out a new AI tool to help businesses identify marijuana product packaging may appeal to kids in violation of state rules.

The Department of Cannabis Control (DCC) on Monday announced that licensees can now utilize a Cannabis Product Image Analyzer (CPIA) that was developed to aid in preventing the market launch of potentially problematic packaging that violates state statute by enticing minors.

Marijuana business licensees can “simply snap a photo using their smart phone or mobile device, screenshot or any other supported file format and upload to the CPIA tool,” DCC said. “The image will be analyzed and provide a summary of its findings.”

DCC said it won’t retain images uploaded to the CPIA database, or the summaries of findings that it produces. Rather, the goal is to “assist licensees in their independent evaluation of whether packaging or labeling may be attractive to children.”

That includes packaging and labels that depict:

  • Images of minors or anyone under 21 years of age
  • Cartoons
  • A likeness to images, characters, or phrases that are popularly used to advertise to children
  • Images that are any imitation of candy packaging or labeling and
  • Images with the terms “candy” or “candies” or variants in spelling such as “kandy” or “kandeez”

“The CPIA uses artificial intelligence technology to review images submitted by a user to identify issues that may indicate attractiveness to children for further evaluation,” DCC said in a notice. “The CPIA may not identify all concerns an image may present, or that the Department may find attractive to children.”

Regulators stressed that licensees should not “rely on the CPIA’s output, as it does not establish definitively whether advertising or marketing violates” state rules. And if the tool finds that an uploaded image is likely compliant, that alone “does not preclude a finding by the Department or a factfinder in a disciplinary or administrative action from determining the uploaded image violates the regulation.”

“Because artificial intelligence systems evolve, update, or produce variable outputs, the CPIA’s evaluation may change from day to day, even when reviewing the same image. The quality, clarity, angle, lighting, or completeness of an image uploaded by a user may affect the CPIA’s review and assessment. Users are solely responsible for ensuring uploaded images accurately depict the product’s labeling.”

Cannabis licensees are being encouraged to provide feedback on the AI tool through an online survey.

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Westminster Recycles Tobacco-Style Panic Campaign For Internet Crackdown

The British government ran a public consultation on whether to ban social media for under-16s. The consultation opened in March. It closed today. In April, while the public was still filling in the forms and expressing their outrage, ministers announced they would impose “age or functionality restrictions” regardless of what the consultation found.

The Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Act 2026 already requires restrictions for under-16s. The consultation was the democratic version of asking someone where they’d like to eat dinner after you’ve already ordered the food.

Today, on closing day, a coordinated media blitz dropped with the subtlety of a carpet bombing.

Wes Streeting, the former Health Secretary who quit earlier this month and is now clearly auditioning for the Labour leadership, used the usual trope and compared social media to tobacco.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer was photographed meeting bereaved families. Leader of the Opposition Kemi Badenoch wasn’t doing much opposing and accused Labour of dithering on the decision.

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Jess Phillips Resigns, Pushes Phone Scanning Law in UK

Stuffed inside a resignation letter about the UK’s Labour Party’s leadership crisis is a proposal that should alarm anyone who owns a phone.

Jess Phillips, who stepped down as Safeguarding Minister today, spent a significant portion of her parting shot to Prime Minister Keir Starmer, complaining that the government failed to mandate technology on every phone and device in the country that would prevent children from taking explicit images.

We obtained a copy of the letter for you here.

Phillips framed this as child protection but what she described is device-level surveillance deployed at national scale.

Her letter stated that “91% of online child sex abuse is self-generated by children groomed, tricked and exploited in to abuse,” and that she presented solutions to Starmer “over a year ago” that would “end the ability for children in the UK to take naked images of themselves.”

She wanted this installed on every device in the country.

The government dragged its feet for twelve months before agreeing to “even threaten to legislate in this space. Not legislate, just threaten.” Phillips called this “the definition of incremental change.”

An announcement planned for March got pushed to June. She’d “given up believing it” would happen.

The resignation falls during a brutal stretch for Starmer. More than 90 Labour MPs have called for him to go after disastrous local elections.

Phillips told Starmer he is “a good man fundamentally, who cares about the right things” but that she’d “seen first-hand how that is not enough.” His instinct to avoid confrontation, she argued, had paralyzed the government. “The desire not to have an argument means we rarely make an argument, leaving opportunities for progress stalled and delayed.”

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UK Gov’t Promises More Social Media “Restrictions”

While embattled PM Sir Keir Starmer takes a pointless grilling on the even more pointless existence of Peter Mandelson, other members of his cabinet were busily paving the way for the next construction phase of our increasingly dystopian society.

Speaking to Sky News earlier today, Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson promised…

“more action to keep young people safe online, including around social media”.

Which is delightfully vague.

Education Minister Olivia Bailey kept her cards similarly close to her chest, whilst trying to sound forceful:

“It is a question of how we act, not if, but to put this beyond any doubt, we are placing a clear statutory requirement that the Secretary of State ‘must’, rather than ‘may’, act […] We are clear that under any outcome, we will impose some form of age or functionality restrictions for children under 16.”

So we know they’re going to do something…we just don’t know what. And, if I had to guess, neither do Bridget or Olivia. Neither seems like the kind of people that get kept in the loop, and that flavour of waffle is usually the reserve of those who have no idea what’s going on.

Many commenters – both for and against – have interpreted this promised action as an Australia-style social media ban for children. Certainly, that’s what Conservative MP Laura Trott seems to think in her champagne-popping tweet:

…but the signs might be pointing in another direction.

After all, the Social Media Ban is practically on the books. It was introduced as an amendment to the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools bill, and has already passed the Lords four times. It could have become law already, but Ministers and MPs have repeatedly overturned the vote, declaring the need for further consultation.

Then, earlier today and coinciding with this government pledge to take action, the Independent published a report that suggests Australia’s social media ban doesn’t work.

Two thirds of Australian teens still using social media despite under-16s ban

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The Top Ten Marijuana Myths That No One Should Believe

Even today, with 80% of states legalizing cannabis in some form, and half the country legalizing it for medical purposes, I have been called a lunatic for ever thinking that cannabis would be recognized for the miracle plant that it is. Shockingly enough many have yet to see through the mainstream media facade to the ruling puppeteers behind. 

Many still hold fast in their belief that cannabis is dangerous and not medically efficacious, despite the overwhelming evidence to the contrary backed by scientists and industry leaders alike. The only ones, it seems, that are not reconciling their incorrect beliefs, and intentionally so, are the politicians with their hands in Big Pharma’s back pocket, also known as, the American political elite. 

They continue to stand on their podium of lies broadcasting their misinformation, casting aside what little integrity they retain while making the conscious decision to sell out their constituents, their country, and themselves, all for a little extra paper, that they most likely did not truly need in the first place.

Despite the onslaught of ridiculous claims and outright lies reminiscent of the days of “Reefer Madness” that have been cast into minds of unsuspecting Americans, it would seem that We, as a nation, or rather as the people of a nation, have chosen to see past the obvious attempts by the government to misdirect our attention and feed us State-sponsored comforting lies, that only benefit an elite few, and perpetuate a Deep State agenda. 

We, as the American people, have shown this country’s ruling masters that we see though their half-hearted attempts to coral us into an aligned way of thinking and viewing the world, a way of thinking that primarily benefits those in control and casts what little remains down to those of us still scrabbling for the scraps from their table. We have shown them, that we will think for ourselves. 

As there are most definitely more pressing issues facing this nation, and the world for that matter, the topic of cannabis and its subsequent legalization is, in my opinion, one of the primary catalysts that began the awakening we are currently experiencing. It showed every American citizen that when the people stand together, truly unite, our voices are all that matter.

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Federal Judge Blocks Arkansas Social Media Law on First Amendment Grounds

A federal judge blocked Arkansas Act 900 today, one day before the law was set to take effect, handing the state its second courtroom defeat in the same fight over who gets to decide what people can see and say online.

We obtained a copy of the order for you here.

US District Judge Timothy L. Brooks granted NetChoice’s motion for a preliminary injunction, freezing enforcement of a statute that would have imposed strict liability on social media platforms for a growing list of “addictive practices,” forced default settings on anyone in Arkansas the platform couldn’t verify as an adult, and required platforms to build parental dashboards tracking minors who don’t even have accounts. The ruling came in the Western District of Arkansas, Fayetteville Division.

The First Amendment problem is obvious. The government wrote a law that restricts what platforms can say, who they can say it to, and when. It restricts what minors can see and post. Then it backed those restrictions with $10,000-per-day fines and rules so vague that platforms cannot tell in advance what will trigger liability. Each of those features is a constitutional problem on its own. Act 900 combined all of them.

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3 Disasters That Legal Weed Didn’t Unleash—Despite the Forecasts

Happy 4/20 to the millions of people across the country who celebrate, including much of the Reason staff. As someone who’s never been interested in pot—save for one summer in college—or drugs in general, I’ve always found the day a bit strange. But as I’ve grown older (and more libertarian), I’ve come to appreciate it as a celebration of personal freedom. 

I’m not the only one who has changed his mind. In 2025, 64 percent of Americans thought marijuana should be legal for both medical and recreational use (up from 31 percent in 2000), according to Gallup. Meanwhile, 40 states have legalized medical use of cannabis, including 24 that also allow recreational use. Late last year, President Donald Trump ordered that marijuana be reclassified from Schedule I to Schedule III under the Controlled Substances Act, putting it in the same category as prescription drugs such as “ketamine, anabolic steroids, and Tylenol with codeine,” explains Reason‘s Jacob Sullum.

Prohibitionists warned that legalization would have dire consequences. Here are some of their predictions that have yet to come true. 

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OneTaste Founder Nicole Daedone Gets 9-Year Prison Sentence

Nine years in prison for preaching unpopular ideas about sexuality? That’s the sentence that a judge imposed today on Nicole Daedone of OneTaste, a company built on orgasmic meditation (OM) and other unconventional wellness practices. Daedone has also been ordered to forfeit $12 million—which is how much she got for selling the company in 2017—and to pay hundreds of thousands of dollars in restitution.

The government will say that this is about human trafficking. But that’s just a sign of how “human trafficking” has become a catchall term for sex-tinged antics that prosecutors want to punish.

In this case, no one has accused Daedone and her colleague/co-defendant Rachel Cherwitz of violence. No one has accused them of confining victims, or of withholding identity documents or other items that employees might have needed to get away.

The alleged victims in this case could come and go as they pleased. They were adult women. They had college degrees, outside professional opportunities, and sometimes even independent wealth. They testified in court that they remained affiliated with OneTaste—some as employees, some as volunteers, some simply as people who took classes from the company or lived in group houses that it maintained—because they believed in its mission, believed in Daedone and Cherwitz, or wanted to maintain social status within the OneTaste community.

The government’s assertions about how Daedone and Cherwitz employed “coercion” in this case are a huge affront to freedom of speech and freedom of conscience. Prosecutors suggested that the ideas Daedone and Cherwitz spread served as a form of brainwashing. These supposedly dangerous ideas include such things as being open to new sexual experiences and the notion that engaging in daily OM—a 15-minute, partnered, clitoral stroking session—could focus the mind and help empower practitioners, especially women. Daedone and Cherwitz appear to sincerely believe these ideas, which they saw as rooted in both Buddhism and feminism.

The government’s case was also a huge affront to the idea that women are fully agentic people capable of consent, sexual and otherwise. Prosecutors suggested that anxiety about being shunned by the OneTaste community was a harm so powerful that grown women were effectively “trafficked” by it. They argued that these women’s consent—to OM, to participate in sexual fantasy scenes, to enter into and out of relationships, to engage in sex acts with OneTaste members or donors, or to pay for OneTaste classes—was rendered null by the force of fear of social exclusion and/or fear that stopping OM and other OneTaste practices would have a negative impact on their lives.

Ultimately, the case portends a dangerous new standard for what counts as forced labor and what counts as harm under federal trafficking statutes.

Sentencing for Daedone started this morning, following a June 2025 conviction on one count of conspiracy to commit human trafficking. Cherwitz, convicted of the same, is scheduled to be sentenced this afternoon.

The government sought 20 years in prison for Daedone and more than 15 for Cherwitz—basing calculations in part on alleged conduct for which they were not even charged, let alone convicted. Judge Diane Gujarati denied the government’s request for a sexual abuse enhancement based on untried conduct.

The government’s star witness was to be a woman named Ayries Blanck, whose journals were a big part of the prosecutors’ case (and, also, of a Netflix documentary). Prosecutors would eventually disclose that Blanck had fabricated evidence, producing journals she said she had handwritten in 2015 but had actually composed much later. After heavily featuring Blanck and her journals in their arguments leading up to the trial, prosecutors declined to call Blanck as a trial witness and said they no longer believed in the authenticity of portions of her journals. The case nevertheless proceeded, and now a woman is heading to prison for nearly a decade.

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