I wish. Unfortunately, most sites need this for legal reasons, to determine whether or not the user is above or below a certain age.
One could theoretically ask "how old are you" but then you don't know when to lift limitations. Say a user joins six months before their 18th birthday. Are you going to block 18+ content for a whole year from then?
How many sites filter content based on age and really do so selectively based on a birthdate? Most age verifications, even ones that request a date, seem to be just asking the question, "Are you of legal age?"
(I prefer websites just ask that binary question, like this brewery - http://www.newbelgium.com - instead of making me waste time with a date input.)
One could theoretically ask "how old are you" but then you don't know when to lift limitations. Say a user joins six months before their 18th birthday. Are you going to block 18+ content for a whole year from then?