Slowly Fading

So the German government is working on some new internet law, and it’s basically going to kill everything about the German web that’s worth your time. At least that’s what happens if nobody stops them, which obviously nobody will.

The official pitch is youth protection—the usual argument that sounds reasonable until you look at what it actually means. They want to rate every website by age restriction, block anything deemed harmful to minors between 10 PM and 6 AM, make site operators legally responsible for every stupid comment their users post, and completely block any international site that doesn’t comply with German youth protection rules. It sounds almost reasonable until you realize what they’re actually trying to kill: the sex, the real language, the uncensored bodies, anything that makes the internet actually interesting.

This website would vanish. Tumblr, StudiVZ, VICE, SuicideGirls—anything with adult content, anything that refuses to play it safe. Not because any of this is actually illegal or harmful. Just because it’s easier to block than to let exist.

What gets me is how banal the whole thing is. People who don’t use the internet and don’t want to are always the ones deciding anything raw is a threat. They look at what actually brings people online—the honesty, the sexuality, the language that feels real, the refusal to pretend—and they see a threat. They’re not entirely wrong about that. But they’re wrong about what the threat is. The threat isn’t the content. It’s people thinking for themselves, finding community in places nobody’s monitoring them.

I don’t know if this actually happens. Maybe I’m catastrophizing. But I recognize the shape of it now: something good dying slowly because the wrong people are scared of it, and everyone watching and shrugging because the official reason sounds fine. The good years never end loud. They just fade while you’re busy with something else.