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Comment by anigbrowl | Hacker News Reader

2. I don't want to live in a permission society where I have to submit to inspection to do anything.

If it’s not a big deal then verifying your age shouldn’t phase you anymore than verifying your age to buy alcohol.

I don't like that either and some years ago I stopped providing my ID on request. Corporate vendors (eg supermarkets) still insist on asking my birthdate. I'm in my 50s.

Paternalistic attitudes infantilize society and that's a lot more shameful than most porn could ever be. Absent specific reasons to believe abuse or exploitation is taking place, lawmakers need to stay out of other people's business.

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"Paternalistic attitudes infantilize society"

It's not 'paternalistic' to require people to pass a driving exam, or gasp, do a safety test to buy a gun.

This pseudo-liberatrian crap is the most toxic part of HN, and frankly what is 'infantile'.

I have a number of nephews and nieces now and completely emphasize with my brothers and sisters who don't want to allow you and others to infect their kids with your supposed 'ideals' willy nilly - it's a cesspool out there.

At minimum parents should have choice.

We can be smart about it and provide anonymous tokens to validate age, it's not even hard, we just have to think about it, it should have happened long ago.

I'm not saying that there should no regulations, or anything even remotely like that. I'm saying that I object to having to ask people for permission to do the most quotidian low-harm things that people have been doing for millennia before this country was even founded.

> At minimum parents should have choice.

Parents absolutely have a choice and always had it. They can always enable the adult filter in their internet box or on the devices they give to their children. Expecting the whole internet to implement sound age verification because they can't be bothered to do such a simple thing and instead need the state to nanny the other 80% of the population - that's actually infantile.

> I don't like that either and some years ago I stopped providing my ID on request.

How does this work with picking up prescription medication?

The only time I've been asked for an ID at a pharmacy was for non-prescription sudafed. I've picked up many prescriptions for myself and my family, and they have never asked for ID.

Same, I pick up prescriptions for myself, my kids, and my wife, all the time. I can't recall ever being ID'd, and I'm certainly I'm not usually asked for ID. Maybe it varies state-by-state?

They only ask for ID if you're picking up a controlled substance.

It depends on the drug (and maybe the state).

I have to show ID for a couple of prescriptions I have, and my understanding is that it then goes into some kind of database that gets cross-referenced between pharmacies to make sure that I don't have multiple prescriptions at multiple pharmacies.

I think that came about as part of the opioid crisis, because some people would have 5 different doctors write prescriptions for the same meds to 5 different pharmacies. No one had a way to detect that someone was getting 5 oxycontin prescriptions.

Funny enough in my small town - I walk into the pharmacy, they ask the name and birthdate of the person for whom I'm picking up the meds (generally my kids), I pay and leave. On the other hand, at least for a while if you wanted to buy Sudafed (OTC) at a grocery store, they would ask for ID and write you down on a paper list. ???

For controlled substances like ADHD medication they do ask for ID. I think for most people the only controlled substance medication they get with any frequency is Sudafed, so that tracks. (For the record, I’m pretty sure “controlled substance” and “Rx required” are separate categories)

They do this because pseudoephedrine (Sudafed) is commonly used in illegal production of methamphetamine. This has been a common practice since the mid 2000s, iirc.

I was addressing the requirement for alcohol sales, for which prescriptions are not required. I am not too hot on pharmacists requiring ID for everything either, the prescription is its own documentation.

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