this post was submitted on 02 Dec 2025
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Half of the US Now Requires You to Upload Your ID or Scan Your Face to Watch Porn (www.404media.co)
submitted 22 hours ago by tonytins@pawb.social to c/technology@lemmy.world
198 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

As of this week, half of the states in the U.S. are under restrictive age verification laws that require adults to hand over their biometric and personal identification to access legal porn.

Missouri became the 25th state to enact its own age verification law on Sunday. As it’s done in multiple other states, Pornhub and its network of sister sites—some of the largest adult content platforms in the world—pulled service in Missouri, replacing their homepages with a video of performer Cherie DeVille speaking about the privacy risks and chilling effects of age verification.

Archive: http://archive.today/uZB13

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[–] DupaCycki@lemmy.world -4 points 4 hours ago (1 children)

No offence to anyone, but this post strikes me as coming straight from a spokeperson for Aylo (formerly MindGeek). A mix of baseless claims and straight up misinformation, that happen to align with the company's business model.

You speak as if porn sites are analogous to social media and it's perfectly normal to record your experiences and post them online. Which it absolutely isn't, anywhere in the world. 'Expressing your sexuality' and porn are entirely separate and have very little to do with each other.

It is widely known and confirmed that pornographic content comes with a broad spectrum of negative effects, especially for children and adolescents. The latter really should be common sense in 2025. Watching porn isn't always bad and can be beneficial in some ways (as some sources below even highlight), but those cases represent a small minority.

Below are some quotes and just a few out of countless sources providing much more reliable information on the topic of pornography's effects. I strongly recommend reading at least some, because this comment is like ignoring decades of scientific literature and traveling in time back to the 1700s.

Prolonged exposure to pornography is known to lead to habituation, resulting in blunted processing of pleasurable stimuli and greater sensitivity to negative stimuli (21). Continuous use of pornography impairs emotional processing capacity and flattens affect, reducing emotional connection to real-life sexual experiences.

Source: Impact of pornography consumption on children and adolescents

Research shows that frequent porn use hijacks the brain’s reward system and changes the brain’s structure, much like addictive substances.

This means that prolonged pornography use can weaken natural pleasure responses and reinforce compulsive behavior.

A 2014 study found that heavy porn users showed significantly reduced activity in critical areas of the brain responsible for motivation and impulse control, suggesting long-term neurological rewiring.

Source: The Hidden Cost of Pornography: How It Shapes Your Brain and Behavior

Age of first exposure was significantly associated with reported need for longer stimulation and more sexual stimuli to reach orgasm when using pornography, decrease in sexual satisfaction, and quality of romantic relationship, neglect of basic needs and duties due to pornography use, and self-perceived addiction in both females and males. (...) In the opinion of most of the surveyed students, pornography may have adverse effects on human health, although access restrictions should not be implemented.

Source: Prevalence, Patterns and Self-Perceived Effects of Pornography Consumption in Polish University Students: A Cross-Sectional Study

Additional sources:

[–] jjjalljs@ttrpg.network 6 points 3 hours ago

Assuming what you're saying about the harms of consuming pornography, is it the state's responsibility? Is it a top priority? Do we trust conservatives to implement a solution in good faith?

The answer to all of those I think is no.

There's no analogous ID check for violent media, so far as I know.

There could be a raging wildfire and I would hesitate if a Republican said "let me deal with it". They are fundamentally untrustworthy.

That's on top of the deep irony of the same party that goes on about "small government" and "parents rights" is typically the same one pushing draconian anti-porn laws. It's a joke. "A government small enough to fit in your bedroom". Their motivations are so corrupt I am extremely skeptical of anything they propose.