It's Time to Make the Internet Safer for Kids

In the real world, we have more than a century of experience figuring out how to share the world with children in order to keep them safe while still allowing adults to engage in adult-only activities, particularly those involving sex, violence, and addictive substances.

In 18th and 19th century America, there were essentially no restrictions on children's consumption of alcohol. However, following the temperance movement’s efforts to publicize alcohol’s harmful effects on families, women, and children, and after the failed experiment of Prohibition, states took on the responsibility of regulating alcohol. Each state eventually passed laws prohibiting the sale of alcohol to those under a certain age, usually 21. This established the principle that enforcement responsibility falls to the bars, liquor stores, and casinos profiting from alcohol sales. The idea that parents alone should manage their children’s access to alcohol would have struck most people as ...