If they won’t set limits that’s an issue with the parents, not the internet.

If dad leaves the liquor cabinet unlocked the solution isn’t to ban alcohol.

A free and open internet is non negotiable.

When grandpa was young, if there was a wolf in the forest, they went and killed the wolf. They would not break the children legs to keep them home.

Killing the wolf saved both the children of busy parents that couldn't be bothered to break their legs, and the children that grew old enough to have their leg fixed but weren't yet adult.

Today instead of chasing predators away from children spaces, we just box the children so at one magic birthday they'd be out in the world untouched by evil. The world will be still evil however, and the not children for a day unprepared for it.

What if, here's a radical idea, we terminate corporation with toxic ads or that let predators use their system to target children.

>I do not think kids should have unrestricted access to the internet

I will be restricting my kids access to the internet.

I judge him worthy of viewing whatever he wants when he inevitably works around those restrictions.

"Censorship is telling a man he can't have a steak just because a baby can't chew it." - Heinlein

If you hand power to the state every time people fail to properly handle their responsibilities, you end up in a dictatorship. It is a parent's responsibility to keep their kids away from the dark corners of the internet. Thoughtful regulation would create tools to allow them to do that easily, not hand parenting over to governments.

Where are those former peers now? You reference this like their life trajectory must have been irreparably harmed by it. Are they in prison? Were they killed while committing violent crime? Are they on disability from being permanently emotionally crippled? Or what?