I do not think it is coincidence. I think it is TPTB Orwellian move to regain control of online content and messaging. To monitor and pick off dissidents. To quash resistance movements before they start. A key vulnerability in government control was they can’t predict what does not yet have a record.
Now they hope to. Across the western / Pissreal allied world they are implementing age bans under the guise of protecting the children and control.
If parents are concerned about their kids online engagements then they should parent. Not depend on government nannies.
Part of it has got to be considered rank incompetence. I think that governments can and should take an interest in what happens on the internet, but they’re going about it in what is simultaneously the most visible and least effective way possible. What they should be doing is going behind the scenes and just controlling the algorithms to suppress the things they don’t like and boost the things they do - like it or not, that’s what Musk did to Twitter, and we’ve seen how big of a cultural shift tweaking those levers can create. When I think of a future “competent fascist” administration, this is what I think about, people who understand the powers at their disposal as a result of 21st century technology and use them effectively instead of a bunch of old people bumbling around.
I mean, they’ve already been doing that for many years, so they’re evidently not satisfied with the results.