Paulo Avelino has made public his stance on the potential banning of US-based tech platform Discord in the Philippines.

The actor expressed his opposition to a possible ban on his X (formerly Twitter) account, where he encouraged authorities to “fix the actual problem” instead.

Discord was asked by the Cybercrime Investigation and Coordinating Center (CICC) to appoint a resident agent in the country to facilitate faster cooperation with law enforcement agencies.

The development comes amid concerns over the alleged use of online platforms, including Discord, by extremist networks to lure young people into committing acts of violence.

“First world countries: Discord, add age verification. Philippines: Discord, bye.🤡,” Avelino tweeted.

Arguing that Discord is widely used for communication rather than violence, the actor added: “People use Discord for work meetings, school, and running small businesses. Block it and they all get hit, while bad actors just move to another app.”

For Avelino, banning the platform would not address the underlying issue.

“Child safety matters. So fix the actual problem, not just the easiest target!” he concluded.

Some of Avelino’s followers agreed with his stance, with one commenter writing: “Nakakapagod pag puro topshelf bobong boomers namumuno at gumagawa ng desisyon para sa lahat. Pang-tamaran lagi solusyon, kung hindi band-aid. Out of touch lahat.”

Another follower shared a similar view: “My take on this issue is that discord isn't the problem, coz it's just a digital backyard where they happen to be meeting up .. if you ban it, they will just move to whatever platform exists to coordinate- WA, Viber, Telegram etc. Banning the app doesn't solve the behavior, it just makes them smarter at hiding it from you and will completely forget what digital citizenship means. target the real culprit.”

Discord has yet to release a statement regarding its potential ban in the Philippines.