Louisiana Now Requires Government IDs To Access Content
Folks in the state of Louisiana are now being forced to verify themselves of legal age to access sites that provide adult content via government IDs.
This all due to a new Law that went into effect January 1st of 2023. This new law is meant to provide a civil remedy against entities who distribute harmful materials to minors. The new Louisiana law is meant to to help prevent minors from accessing adult content on the internets. The document states that due to the advances in Tech, minors are exposed to pornography at an earlier age.
“Due to advances in technology, the universal availability of the internet, and limited age verification requirements, minors are exposed to pornography earlier in age. Pornography contributes to the hyper sexualization of teens and prepubescent children and may lead to low self-esteem, body image disorders, an increase in problematic sexual activity at younger ages, and increased desire among adolescents to engage in risky sexual behavior. Pornography may also impact brain development and functioning, contribute to emotional and medical illnesses, shape deviant sexual arousal, and lead to difficulty in forming or maintaining positive, intimate relationships, as well as promoting problematic or harmful sexual behaviors and addiction.”
The people of Louisiana are now seeing the effect of this new law as shown below in a tweet from @fodderyfodder
It’s getting awfully surveillancey in here. Anyone in Louisiana accessing pornhub will now have to link their drivers license or government ID in order to access the site. Under his eye. https://t.co/uji6Jo3Tde pic.twitter.com/mMNO2pfs96
— Public Defendering (@fodderyfodder) January 2, 2023
Opinion
This is a very slippery slope as adult content within the United States, has been viewed and maintained as a freedom of speech and creative freedom. This new laws hurts that idea and can have ripple affect not just within the adult community, but also other forms of entertainment.
This new law is also does not take into consideration people from out side the state like other folks from the United States but those from out the country. It also does take into account that this new roadblock can easily be bypassed by way of VPN.
Another thing is that it states that information will not be held when submitting you ID and such, but I personally feel that that is a lie and all information that submit online can be collected and used.
With this going into play, another bill that should be taken into consideration and keep an eye on is Senator Mike Lee (R) of Utah trying to outright restrict porn in a nationwide ban (Link). This is just the start of 2023 and the War on Porn will get even worse from here.