No, these bills do NOT protect children. In fact, vulnerable children could have life-saving resources and information censored because federal or state governments deem the material to be “harmful” to them. In fact another bad internet bill that has propped up in Congress before, the EARN IT Act; would’ve made CSAM investigations harder and made it more likely offenders would walk free. Besides, it is NOT the federal or state government’s job to decide what is and isn’t offensive to children; that responsibility ultimately falls to the parents. Device manufacturers, social media platforms, and internet service providers offer tools called parental controls that allow parents to decide what their children can or can’t access and how much time they can spend on various devices, sites, and apps.
If any of these bills become law; they will have global implications. The United Kingdom and Australia have enacted similar laws and some platforms have already implemented global age-verification mandates whether to ensure compliance or for different reasons. Since a large portion of internet companies are based in the United States, if they were to enact similar laws other platforms would likely impose age-verification site wide regardless of if you are an American or not. Additionally other countries are proposing similar legislation.
It is true that Big Tech corporations have engaged in some very unsavory conduct, this website is NOT an endorsement of Big Tech corporations or their actions. However, the proposals presented by Congress aren't actually about regulating Big Tech (if that were the case, why would Big Tech firms be backing a LOT of these proposals), most of the legislation proposed (especially Section 230 repeal) would effectively create a monopoly on the internet because the Big Tech corporations are the only ones who would realistically have money to fight off frivolous lawsuits, forge partnerships with age assurance providers, etc. whereas smaller sites and nonprofits would be forced to either sell out or shut down due to a lack of resources.
Wrong! Congress has tried for a long time to censor and harm the internet but due to public backlash these attempts typically fail. For example, in 2011 into 2012, Congress was discussing two bad internet bills; the Stop Online Piracy Act and the PROTECT IP Act. Due to massive public backlash against both of these bills, neither of them became law and they both subsequently went away. The point is, organized opposition works, and if we work like hell, make our voices heard, and tell Congress that we oppose these bills, they WILL listen.