You have to laugh at the way the world works. If you don’t laugh, you’ll scream, and screaming doesn’t pay the bar tab. Down in Australia, the politicians have decided they need to save the children with the controversial **Australia social media ban for under-16s**. They always say that, don’t they? It’s always about the children. They want to purge kids from the digital playground—no more TikTok dances, no more Instagram likes, no more rotting their brains on the internet.

It sounds nice on paper. It sounds like something a grumpy grandfather would say while banging his fist on the table. But here is the punchline. The person they hired to enforce this ban is the ultimate insider. Her name is **Julia Inman Grant**, the country's **eSafety Commissioner**. That title sounds like something made up for a hall monitor in a bad sci-fi movie. But she has real power. And where did she come from?

She didn’t come from a school. She didn’t come from a concerned parents group. No, she spent decades working for the very companies she is now supposed to fight. She worked for Microsoft. She worked for Twitter back before it was X. She was deep inside the machine. She helped build the beast that is now eating the world.

This is the classic game. It is the definition of the **tech industry revolving door**. It happens in every industry. It happens in banking, in oil, and now in big tech. You spend the first half of your career making a mess. You get rich helping these giant companies hook people on their products. You help them dodge rules. You help them grow until they are bigger than countries. Then, when you get bored or want a pension, you switch teams.

You join the government. You put on a nice suit. You stand behind a podium and tell the public that these companies are dangerous. You say, "I know how bad they are because I was there." It is the ultimate grift. It is a revolving door that never stops spinning. The poacher becomes the gamekeeper. But do not fool yourself. They are all playing the same game. They all go to the same dinner parties.

So now, Inman Grant is the one who has to tell Elon Musk and Mark Zuckerberg to behave. She has to tell them to stop letting Australian kids onto their apps. The government thinks this is a brilliant strategy. They think hiring an insider gives them an edge. It doesn’t. It just means the theater will be better acted.

Let’s look at the plan itself. It is stupid. That is the only word for it. They want to rely on invasive **age verification technology** for every user. How do you do that? You have to give your ID to the internet. You have to hand over your passport or your driver’s license to these companies. The same companies that leak your data every other week. The government says it will be safe. They lie. Nothing is safe. If you put it online, someone will steal it.

And let’s talk about the kids. Do the politicians in Australia actually know any teenagers? Have they met a 14-year-old recently? Kids are smarter than bureaucrats. Kids are smarter than the eSafety Commissioner. The moment this ban goes into effect, every kid in Australia will learn what a VPN is. They will route their internet through America, or Europe, or the moon.

The government will spend millions of dollars building a digital wall. The kids will spend five minutes finding a ladder. It is a waste of time. It is a waste of money. But it makes the politicians look like they are doing something. That is all that matters to them. They need a headline. They need to look like heroes.

But the worst part is the parents. Why are parents cheering for this? Because they are lazy. They have given up. They don’t want to parent anymore. They don’t want to have the hard conversation. They don’t want to take the phone away physically. They want the government to be the babysitter. They want an app or a law to raise their children for them.

Julia Inman Grant is just the face of this failure. She is the symbol of a society that refuses to take responsibility. The tech companies act like drug dealers. The government acts like a confused substitute teacher. And the parents are asleep at the wheel.

So, she will go to work. She will write stern letters to her old friends in Silicon Valley. She will give interviews about safety. She will pretend that she can tame the monster she helped create. And absolutely nothing will change. The kids will still be online. The data will still be stolen. And the politicians will pat themselves on the back for a job well done. It’s pathetic. It’s predictable. It’s exactly what we deserve.

**References & Fact-Check**: * **Primary Source**: [The woman tasked with kicking Australian kids off social media (BBC News)](https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/ckgyvlgvk43o?at_medium=RSS&at_campaign=rss) * **Context**: The role of the eSafety Commissioner involves coordinating online safety efforts in Australia, a position Julia Inman Grant has held since 2017 after leaving executive roles at Twitter and Microsoft.