People already post the most racist, hate inducing, vitriolic shit on facebook with their name and life history attached to it.

It might reduce some low effort trolling, but I don’t think it will affect much.

So… Facebook?

I mean, Facebook did this already

All oppressive governments strive for such laws. Sad day for whistleblowers and activists all around the world

I think this comic sums it up well:

https://www.butajape.com/comic/anonymous-a-hole/

There was a time when not revealing your identity was considered the safe way to be online, and telling strangers your name or personal info was taboo. Really, it was basic internet hygiene. The first push for real identities on social networks came mostly from advertisers, and those can go to hell.

Yes, some people abuse anonymity to be assholes with no repercussions, and obviously I am not okay with that. There should be ways to deal with those without forcing everyone to expose their identity to the whole world.

I will keep defending the right to anonymity. You only need one deranged maniac with different views on whatever, or trying to ruin your life for whatever reason to get into serious danger.

I’ll flip the question around: what are you trying to achieve with zero anonymity, and how could it be abused? Is the tradeoff worth it?

If real identity is required to participate, but is not publicly displayed, who would you entrust with this information, and how could it be abused?

There is one more fear which might not be discussed, that is of identity theft.

It is easy to do it offline, but it is a lot easier online.

Queer people would be denied a chance to explore their identities and find peers if they lived in an unaccepting environment. This would be particularly damaging to closeted queer kids.

That it would drastically harm queer people and those questioning their identity. Social pressure, fear and shame keeps people from asking certain questions or exploring their desires when it’s potentially tied to them for life.

Look at the while concept of “queer appropriation” by celebrities. Their entire life is public and ironically while feeling themselves out and experimenting with new presentations, it’s ironically met with backlash from some queer people thinking it’s a capitalist ploy to appeal to queer fans.

Being able to just ask questions and explore is a fundamental part of understanding yourself. Anonymity is a precious gift, but one that is also easy to take granted.

Edit: Also religious folk.

Aside from the obvious privacy issues, which are definitely the main problems here, it isn’t just users that behave differently. I’ve got several bans on Reddit that were literal bullshit, like saying a fascist Italy should be kicked out of NATO and the EU. Apparently this is “spreading hate”, worthy of a permanent ban, despite the fact that both institutions require democratic foundations for their member states. Mods and admins are just as ridiculous, be it out of malice or simply incompetency. And once you’re banned, there’s nothing you can do. You can try to appeal but those are in almost all cases denied too.

But it also goes very much against the basic principles on what the internet was founded on. If we put some heavy identifiable restrictions onto internet accessibility then that’s a very powerful tool of oppression. Maybe you trust you current government enough to handle that, right now. I personally don’t. But even then, you never know what the next one will do. Tools of oppression like this, or AI based surveillance, could strangle any sort of meaningful resistance before it even gains the slightest bit of traction. Just look at how many far right governments had been gaining votes or even got into power over the last decade. Do you really trust those people to handle such tools with the needed responsibility?

It would put victims of domestic violence and other similar situations in a lot of danger. It would also paint a red x on the queer community, feminist activists, police reformists, housing rights activists, people opposed to war and genocide, so on and so forth. Meanwhile, Chase and his white supremacist buddies would continue to post their bile behind their real identities, just as they always have, and Mark and Elon would still sleep like babies.

Personally, sometimes I’m going to say things that are against the industry or specifically the actions of the company I work for. If my real name was shown someone could connect me to the actual business and they’d see me as some disloyal employee and not only would I not have a job, I could be blackballed by the industry because most businesses follow the same practices.

With this level of anonymity I can post my opinion about these subjects and not be calling out an individual company or connect the comment to myself in order to alienate myself from other potential employers.

Would be pretty awful for any minority group.

Queer kid in Idaho is going to have an even worse time trying to find community and such on the Internet when their identity is publicly associated with their activities. People would die. They would be murdered by conservatives.

prohibition of anonymity means that everyone is mandated to dox themselves…That’s a bad time for everyone if they’re forced to have their real name and real location attached to literally everything they do online.