I make this argument to neutralize the "protect the children" excuse and also delegitimize the age verification "solution" by pointing out that on-device settings are more effective and easier to implement yet rarely discussed.

There are some parents genuinely concerned with parenting. We should give them the tools to do that and thereby removing them from the discourse, then we can focus on the bad faith people that want more control. I think there are still enough well-meaning people in governments that if we popularize on-device settings, it will prevent age verification in at least a handful of countries, and that's good enough to keep the spark of the free Internet going until we figure out a more permanent solution.