cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/4221949

Court Rules in Pornhub’s Favor in Finding Texas Age-Verification Law Violates First Amendment::A Texas law requiring age-verification measures for porn sites, challenged by Pornhub and others, violates the First Amendment, a judge ruled.

  • @SCB@lemmy.world
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    1610 months ago

    0: both parties tacitly agree that strict scrutiny of this law applies due to merits of the law and prior precdent

    1: law is too broad, in that the law does not specify strictly enough what is “adult content” and does not provide reasonable means for preventing minor access. Just cited that states could just as easily ban newspapers they disagree with under the law

    2: law is too onerous to comply with. Costs too much money, basically, for sites to comply with. Essentially, requiring the company provide the age verification process is an undue burden. “Proper age verification” is not explicitly defined, and can mean whatever the state wants it to mean at any given time.

    3: warning the sites are required to display does not have associated findings, scientifically. Gov agencies responsible have not shown that these outcomes are likely.

    4: “sweep” of law (that is, who it is designed to protect) is unclear due to widely varying harm between different levels of minors. For instance, sites that offer sex Ed to older teens would also be impacted

    5: adults seeking to view adult content are likely to be impacted, making the law too broad in its impact

    6: no guarantee that age verification measures will be deleted and protect consumer privacy

    7: less restrictive measures are available, and the states own research indicates parental measures to prevent minors from accessing adult content are sufficient

    There’s a bit more, but it gets increasingly harder to “ELI5” because it is based on precedents and such. Essentially, the law is very poorly written and likely wouldn’t pass constitutional muster at any improved level of specificity.