I'm not sure why I need to debate against obvious illogical positions, but here we go:

> Well that's not much of a solution is it now? More like an attempt that we all can see will fail.

Some entities not wanting to implement a perfectly fine technical solution is not the same as "that's not a solution". If schools not bothering is your issue, just like the state can mandate a "age verification", it can also mandate schools add such parental control locks to the devices they give to kids.

>Harm reduction is not the same as a solution.

It absolutely is, and that's what any solution will be anyway.

There's no perfect solution short of throwing kids in some kind of restricted area without access to any devices. And even in prison prisoners get ahold of startphones.

Age verification can be beaten even more easily, getting access from some older kid for example, borrowing or buying verified accounts, getting an older/hacked OS that doesn't check, and countless other holes.

The difference is that the parent controls case directly affects the device the kids have, let's the parents set the policy based on their beliefs and the child's mental maturity (not authoritarian one-size-fits-all approach), and doesn't add OS mandated id and age tracking to everybody regardless if they're kids or not.

But it is an argument against age restrictions since you could just as easily pass a law that instead required schools to enable various filters. You could even require mainstream devices from major manufacturers to support certain filtering standards. And you could require websites to send self categorization headers.

There is no valid argument for why ID checks are necessary if the goal is simply to get filtering implemented in places such as schools.

If instead the goal is to entirely prohibit all children from using social networks regardless of parental consent then it makes sense. It also makes sense if the goal is actually to violate privacy or something similarly sinister.