The concepts of NSFW is being cleared of the Internet under the false pretense of children’s safety when it’s really about the people in power sanitising for advertisers and pushing evangelical narratives AND that not enough is done to keep legitimately harmful content off of spaces that minors have access to are ideas that can coexist
can adults have their own fucking space?
a lot of people are misunderstanding this post. minors arent taking away your spaces. the internet is not being made safer for children, it is being sanitised for advertisers.
And also: minors’ spaces are being taken away.
When I was a kid, “barbie.com” looked like this
But now, if you type “Barbie.com” you’re taken immediately to Mattel’s online shop, surrounded by nothing but “shop now” links and toy collections.
Disney channel’s website is now “Disneynow.com” which still has games and shows appropriate for kids, but is aimed towards a younger audience as it combines Disney Jr and Disney Channel properties, and the look of the entire site is very juvenile and not very appealing to kids in the tween and young teen demographics.
Nick.com has been similarly streamlined and is focused primarily on streaming its shows, and the only games still left are 10 apps that can’t be played on browser.
Kid-friendly sites like icarly.com, Poptropica, Club Penguin, Neopets, Webkinz etc used to be insanely relevant and popular spaces built for kids and tweens.
Now, kids are being funneled into less moderated, more exploitative, and more public spaces like Roblox (its dangerous and exploitative nature exposed in these videos from People Make Games: (x)(x)), Fortnite (known for its gambling and microtransaction issues), and social media sites like TikTok, YouTube, and Twitter.
My elementary aged cousins spend their time on Roblox, YouTube, and some less than reputable game sites that are full of ads and stolen/reposted/reskinned games. My sister was on Musically/Tiktok and Twitter in middle school. They don’t have the same options for having fun online that I did when I was a kid, especially not when they get too old for nickjr and disneynow.
The internet has been condensed into about 5 popular sites that are full of ads, and it’s not fair to anyone.
[Image ID: Facing left, a turquoise, navy, and gold-accented sea dragon with two arms and a mermaid-style tail in front of a basic oceanic backdrop. It is posed not dissimilar to a seahorse; upright with its tail beneath it. Its head features feathery axolotl-gill-style appendages, cream in colour with a metallic gold base; there are three such appendages on either side of its head. Its eyes and eyebrows are rimmed in a metallic gold colour. Along its head and rest of its body, the edges of the scales lining its back and forehead are rimmed in a metallic gold (though not the scales along its sides nor underbelly, which is smooth and a lighter turquoise colour. It has a large, wavy crest from its forehead down the the middle of its tail; it gets gradually larger down its neck before becoming smaller at the base of the neck, then grows in size again down the body with its greatest extent midway down its back. The crest is navy with a gilded gold outermost edge, patterned with intermittent gilded ‘rays’ extending from the body the crest’s edge, each ray differing in length. The dragon has a pair of cream/white fins flaring out behind each arm with smaller decorative metallic gold fins at their bases. It has a secondary, large set of fins around their hips styled similarly to its crest, with a smaller set of cream/white decorative fins and two golden scales at their base. Its large tailfin resembling a fan is again styled the same as its crest, albeit with white at its base. End Description]
