Culture Minister Says Government Seriously Considering Age Verification

A Liberal minister says that mass government internet censorship through age verification is being considered as well.

Well, it seems that mass government dragnet surveillance through warrantless wiretapping isn’t enough for the Liberals. It seems that the Liberals do have an appetite for mass government internet censorship as well. Just days after Liberal delegates at the Liberal National Convention voted in favour of mass government censorship through a social media age verification, the Culture Minister has said that the Liberal government is very seriously considering such a bill.

From Global News:

The federal government is “very seriously” considering introducing a social media ban for kids, Culture Minister Marc Miller said Wednesday, days after party members voted in favour of a such a ban at the Liberal party convention.

“I respect and acknowledge the work that’s been done and the concern where that policy proposal came from,” Miller told reporters on Parliament Hill.

“The grassroots have spoken. We do have to study that.”

In Montreal on Saturday, party members passed a non-binding resolution calling on the government to set 16 as the minimum age for access to social media accounts.

A ban could be an important tool but it’s not a solution to the bigger problem of online harms, Miller said.

“I do think it could be an important layer, but it has to be seen as that and not as the answer to everything. Online harms don’t end as soon as you turn 15 or 16 or 17,” he said.

“Our policies are informed by a range of different stakeholders, including what people at conventions say. And this was a convention with over 4,500 people, a very loud voice and a very significant voice, but we’ve also heard from Canadians from coast to coast to coast,” Anandasangaree told reporters.

Now, obviously, the hope was this incredibly stupid proposal would stay as being just that, a stupid proposal that was stupidly passed at the convention. Unfortunately, it appears that ministers are plainly saying that it is being considered as a very serious proposal.

The apparent appetite for age verification represents the biggest Liberal party flip-flop since the warrantless wiretapping flip-flop. Indeed, throughout the Bill S-210/S-209 debate, Liberals expressed deep skepticism over age verification. They called it a national ID program, rightly pointing out that it represents an effort for the government to track every Canadians movement online. Now, we are seeing the Liberals suddenly embrace that mass government censorship and surveillance program.

So, it seems that this whole “it’s only OK when we do it” also applies to the Liberal party. This is rapidly becoming a clear cut example of this. It’s frustrating to witness just how quickly the Liberals have turned into the anti-internet party now that they have a majority government. It always seems to happen whenever a political party has even a taste of running government.

Drew Wilson on Mastodon, Bluesky and Facebook.