A short reflection on the Government’s proposed under-16 social media ban, arguing that online harm to children is real, but that protection must not become the route by which family responsibility is replaced by state control and digital identity.
For three centuries France and Britain have rebelled against religious authority, from Voltaire’s écrasez l’infâme to Nietzsche’s death of God and the modern satire of Private Eye and Le Canard enchaîné. Yet rebellion, once a weapon of liberation, has hardened into reflex. The challenge today is not to keep mocking but to recover conviction—before the state learns to silence even our laughter.