Influencers Starting To Realize How The Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) Will Do Real Damage
We've talked a lot about just how bad the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) is. Yet some people (including people who, frankly, should know better) keep trying to tell me how well meaning it is. It's not. It's dangerous. But it has real momentum. A massive bipartisan group of Senators are co-sponsors of the bill.
And, no matter how many times we explain that KOSA (in the name of protecting the children") will put kids at risk, politicians still want to pretend it's fine. Hell, the Heritage Foundation even flat out admitted that they planned to use KOSA to censor LGBTQ+ content, in an attempt to bar children from such content. It remains incredible to me that any Democrat could support a bill when Republicans admit up front how they plan to abuse it.
But, of course, because it's called the Kids Online Safety Act" and you have brands like Dove (yeah, I don't get it either) running a whole campaign in support of it, even convincing Lizzo that the bill is good, it feels like the anti-KOSA voices have been muted.
Hopefully that's changing. A friend pointed me to a TikTok influencer, pearlmania500 (aka Alex Pearlman), with about two million followers, who has posted a fun little anti-KOSA rant, pointing out just how dangerous KOSA is.
@pearlmania500
A quick transcript of his righteous rant:
40 Senators have sponsored a bill to make sure you have to upload your driver's license before you can use your First Amendment on the internet. That's what they want. That's what this bill is.
This bill is designed to make sure that they have your home address before you can actually post about ANYTHING on the internet.
The bill is Senate bill 1409. 40 Senators have sponsored it. Republicans and Democrats. This isn't a left or right issue. This is a speech issue. And they call the bill the Kids Online Safety Act." Or KOSA for short.
But in reality, this is some garbage to make sure they know where you live when you post. This bill, they claim is to protect kids from restricted material on the internet, but what it's gonna do is restrict the internet for everybody and then make you prove you're over 18 before you can look at anything.
So maybe there's some history of America that's a little bit dicey, right? Maybe you want to learn a little more about the Second Amendment. Maybe there's some controversial stuff out there. Well this bill, allows every Attorney General in every state of the union to make sure that they can sue internet companies. Like TikTok. Like Facebook. Like Twitter. That they can sue them if they aren't making sure that everybody who looks at controversial topics are over 18.
So, all these companies are going to have to keep a database of all their users, to prove that everyone looking at all these controversial topics are over 18. So how are they gonna do that?!? They're gonna collect your driver's license. The bill doesn't tell them. But the bill does make it very clear that all of these companies are going to have to prove that their users are over 18. The only way to do that is to have you upload information that proves you're an adult before you're allowed to touch the rest of the web.
So, if you want to make sure you have unrestricted internet... I'm not just talking about... listen, I'm not even talking about the spicy stuff... I'm talking about if you wanted to go find out gun safety information. If you wanted to find out medication information. If you wanted to find out some history that they don't want to teach you in schools, this bill will allow Attorney Generals to sue all of these companies under the guise of protecting kids."
Senate bill 1409.
And it is bipartisan. My Senator. Senator Bob Casey. A Democrat. Is cosponsoring this bill. With Lindsey Graham. And Marsha Blackburn. And Dick Durbin. It's all over the place people. They're ALL OUT TO MAKE SURE that they can trace YOUR SHITTY POSTS on Twitter and on Facebook, back down to your home address.
And they're doing it claiming they're protecting the kids.
So call your Senators. Does not matter where you live. Call your fucking Senator and say I do not want Senate bill 1409 to ever be touched or passed."
Now, you might say that this is just one random, if well followed, TikTok influencer, but he appears to have some big fans in government. In recent months he was invited to the White House and to an event put on by Pennsylvania's governor. He's definitely involved in politics, and it's good to see him speaking up about this terrible bill.
I'm still perplexed at how much support it has, but if the internet starts speaking up about how dangerous this is, maybe that will finally kill its momentum.