Safety Theatre

The Australian government should start a theatre company. Seriously, I'm not sure what else to compare what's going on in this country to. Maybe a dystopian social science fiction novel? But it doesn't necessarily seem like malice is the key driver here. Hanlon's Razor. For those unaware, Australia instituted a social media ban. I don't use social media: I have a YouTube account (which I rarely use) and one Instagram account (which I never use, and which has no identifying information on it). So, this ban has not yet affected me; and even if it does I know how to use a VPN (which is a temporary measure, since other countries are also slowly implementing these bans). Of course, the scope of the age verification checking is slowly expanding. Some search engines are now being targeted, though I use DuckDuckGo and am also immune there for the time being. We don't yet have any regulation drafting age verification at the OS level, as they do in some states in the USA. It wouldn't be a…