Summary
Meta has criticized Australia’s new law banning under-16s from social media, claiming the government rushed it without considering young people’s perspectives or evidence.
The law, approved after a brief inquiry, imposes fines of up to $50 million for non-compliance and has sparked global interest as a potential model for regulating social media.
Supporters argue it protects teens from harmful content, while critics, including human rights groups and mental health advocates, warn it could marginalize youth and ignore the positive impacts of social media.
Enforcement and technical feasibility remain significant concerns.
Fuck off, Meta. My children tell me they want to try cigarettes, driving, using an excavator, and rifles and every time I fail to consider their voices. Actually, I consider it and the answer is an easy, “no.” Considering the evidence, social media like FB appears to be quite deleterious to people’s mental health, young people in particular.
100% - Meta’s opinion on this matter is absolutely irrelevant.
I’d let them try out an excavator as long as I got a turn, too.
Human rights groups and mental health advocates have also warned it may marginalise young Australians.
On the other hand, if more governments follow suit it may force social media companies to reconsider their toxic behaviour
Pretty sure cigarettes went through the same thing. Harder to hook them when they’re older if you don’t hook em young.
Yeah. This rings of tobacco companies trying to convince everyone that cigarettes are good for them.
Thank you!
I didn’t notice that, on my own!
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Fuck Meta but 16 seems a little bit old just because of the enforcement challenges. I’m not arguing social media is good for 14 and 15 year-olds. I’m just saying they’re often clever little shits who systematically test boundaries. They’re like the velociraptors in Jurassic Park.
Basically, I think a better strategy would be something like a ban for 13 and under. Then, a harm reduction strategy for 14-17 year-olds. Like maybe sequester them. They don’t want adults on their timeline anyway and (normal) adults don’t really want teens on theirs. Maybe allow them to follow approved pop stars and athletes or something but not random adults.
Basically, social media training wheels for older teens so they develop some social media literacy before they’re just tossed into the cesspool of adult social media.
I think this assumes that putting restrictions on the behaviour of young people doesn’t have value even if they will find ways to do things anyways. Taking responsibility in circumventing boundaries to pursue your interests is part of growing up and is valuable to explore while still under 18, and it also clearly signals that social media is dangerous and not to be treated without thought.
Kids also: do drugs, look at porn, get in fights, swear (restricted in many households and schools but obviously not usually by law), drink/smoke/vape, play with fireworks, play with gunpowder, play with fire/matches, play with knives, the list is basically endless. Restricting these things does not have no value just because people will do them anyways, we just need to always keep in mind that kids will be kids and our goal is to make things safer and put up guidelines without being overbearing.
I use social media from time to time. The amount of misinformation that is created and spewed without consequence is really alarming. A lot of it is dangerous. People give medical advice and pretend to be doctors. That should be illegal.
If they could filter out all the garbage content and just have children cartoons, comics, food, and cute animals, I would be fine letting kids watch it from time to time.
Meta concerned with people when they can’t abuse them.
Fuck Meta.
And when did Meta start caring about anything but harvesting and selling data? I mean, minors can’t consent to T&C (it’s a contract) so minors should be using it at all.
Their perspective? Up until they are 18 they should listen to mama and papa. And mama and papa voted for this government and live in a country that chose this ban.
Fuck off meta.
This is worthless because it’s not the children whose use of social media is destroying the world.
Well then those kids should have voted. … Oh. ;)
They can still go to school and watch tv, thats all the social and media they need respectively
What about the kids who come to terms with their gender or sexuality through social media?
What about the kids who use social media to connect with other people who share their experiences of being visible minorities?
What about the kids who get their sex education from social media because their parents pulled them out of sex ed classes at school and you sure as shit don’t get that stuff on the tv?
What about the kids who never understood that what their uncle is doing to them is actually sexual abuse until they were able to talk about it through the pseudo-anonymity of social media? The kids who learned survival strategies through social media? The kids who only managed not to kill themselves because of the friends they made online?
Do any of them matter?
Of course those things matter. What is important is that minus the social media, we as a society need to build healthy and affirming alternatives to compensate for this gap. The hard part is figuring out what forms those should take and how to keep them from having similar pitfalls.
The reason why the internet is such an effective tool for people in the situations I described is because it’s so incredibly accessible, and because it possible, to some degree, to do so privately.
You can create an LGBTQ club at school, but that doesn’t help the kid who isn’t allowed to go because their parents are hardcore Christians. And I say 'You can…" but the reality is that you actually can’t because this is smalltown Alberta and any attempt to do so would get you tarred and feathered.
The internet can reach at risk people in places that your “local alternatives” will take decades to be accepted in. Place still matters, and even in more progressive countries and states, there are still plenty of localities where local resources simply cannot exist in a way that will take the place of online resources.
You’re talking about abandoning those kids. The ones who need it the most. The ones who can’t talk to the people in their own lives about suicidal thoughts, depression, questions about their sexuality, or whether or not it was OK for the pastor to touch them there because they live the kind of fucked up backwater where you simply cannot have those conversations with the people around you.
The internet, not only the resources, but also the friendships and human connections it provides, can be a lifeline to young people in incredibly difficult circumstances.
There’s a lot of fucked up shit online, and it’s doing a lot of damage, but we have to find a way to address that that doesn’t involve throwing the baby out with the bathwater. These kinds of blanket bans are impractical, impossible to effectively police, and will cause far too much harm for the little good they can accomplish.
Thank you for posting this: all points important to be considering.
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