That's where you're wrong. Most people actually do agree with age verification. Just because a decision is stupid it doesn't mean it's undemocratic. Trump was elected democratically, twice. Brexit passed through a referendum.
E.g. In a country of 100M people, if 60% agree with a bill and it becomes law, the country has imposed that law on 40M people against their will. That's just as true in a dictatorship as it is in a democracy. The more areas of our lives government involves itself in, the bigger this problem becomes.
No, it did not.
> E.g. In a country of 100M people, if 60% agree with a bill and it becomes law
That's not how that law was adopted.
People make dumb decisions and don't think about possible outcomes twice, or even once. But (unfortunately, in this case) this is a core principle in a democracy. People may be lied to, or at least they are fearmongered into thinking that age verification is needed and encryption needs to be weakened because they thing they have nothing to hide, but if in the end they elect the people that are pro-age-verification, it's perfectly democratic.
IMO the media (including, most importantly, social media) is the problem, not the politicians and/or the democracy or whatever. They all play their part, sure, but it's how people are influenced by the current state of media what's driving all these populistic forces.
> Social media is destroying children's brains! Do you want access to be delayed until a certain age?
> Do you want children under a certain age to be banned from social media, which means that you will now have to give your ID, only with Android or iOS?
99% of people understand this as "you need a smartphone" which is not a problem in 2026, even for the elderly.
Maybe 99% of people have surrendered to Google/Apple (include me there), but the 1% has a valid point...
1. By doing this, the EU is killing any alternative operating systems for phones: no one will switch to one if they can't access online services. Banks are already making it extremely hard.
2. Google and Apple might be better regarded than Huawei, but they are not moral (or they are not guaranteed to remain so).
3. The very idea of a de facto state-enforced monopoly on operating systems is outrageous.
It's just like democracy. Without the "dem(b)" part. Much better now.
We have such warm feelings about it! What could possibly go wrong with doing such strong governance and extreme-right parties polling at record highs in more than half the EU countries? We have warm feelings now. Or maybe the warm feelings the result of 30 years of climate action in the EU. Luckily, the extreme right is hard at work defending our right to airconditioning!