Why do people want teens on social media??

As per the text if Article 10,
1Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
2The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.

The state prevents under-16s to exercise their freedom of expression (they can't post or communicate on SM).

That would be a theoretical discussion though, I'm not a lawyer to argue about nuances and it's not nearly my main concern about the ban.

Why would they bother to use google docs? Why not WhatsApp or another messaging app? They’re not included in the proposed regulation, which is about social media companies, not messaging apps.

I think you are right that it is unlikely to be scraped as a matter of course. But with no online privacy any more, it means that anyone publicly criticising the government or it's agencies (e.g. police) could potentially be identified. This might have implications for people's jobs, or make whistleblowing less likely. I just feel it's just a dangerous road to start down - the warning and end point being the situation as it is in China. I'm not saying this is the current government's intention, but control is rarely removed and only ever strengthened.

Who the hell do they think they are banning anything? And from a corrupt incompetent government as well. I am the parent and will regulate my child’s uses. If they are really about keeping children and woman safe they know where to really start with this

I don't have children so might not get to have a view... but I'm not sure how well the bans are working elsewhere (mixed views of Australian parents). Children and young people seem to be fairly well-known for being able to bypass most restrictions, like the raptors in Jurassic Park ;) - "They were testing the fences for weakness..."

Yesterday evening I attended the online stream of danah boyd's talk and she mentioned that Google Docs wasn't included in the ban - which suggests the possibility that young people can chat freely there (just needs one person with a Gmail account to create a blank doc, share its link and make it editable (example - type something nice there)). Possibly not that many children or teens actually use Google Docs but perhaps that will change.

Here's an (actually rather lovely) example of a lockdown party in a Google Docs spreadsheet with different tabs for people to chat in. Dress code: Anonymous Animals. The kitchen tab has lots of clean mugs in cells for people to use :-) c() c()

Jo

If more parents actively parented and also demonstrated good behaviour then maybe the state wouldn't have to.

That said, a lot of this has been driven by parents finding that their children/young people are accessing material they shouldn't but also being approached by sleazy adults, being bullied by their peers and so on. With the best will in the world parents can't police their children 24/7.

If that is indeed the case (which, considering the amount of quite divisive matter available on the internet, I would dispute), how does imposing a duty on social media companies to restrict accounts for under-16s make things worse?

The free speech rights have already been eroded.

This sounds like an argument for more government regulation rather than less, potentially impacting the free speech rights of adults.

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💯!!

Gov can nudge population into healthier lifestyles using messaging as opposed to bans.

The good thing about MN is there is no popularity contest, no visible likes. Just discussion. Will it be banned also?

I agree but I think policing company's algorithms would be rather challenging. Similarly, policing thr dark web, which is where the pedos hang out.

They could that is true, and I think mnhq have to provide it.

That’s if needed though, data isn’t being scraped and watched constantly. I don’t feel what I post here is being used in gov tracking. It’s always a trade off. I like mn over other platforms but not enough to do digital ID for it.

If it’s just facial recognition still maybe not worth it for mn.

I read a few posts from parents and one mum summed it up for me... she said "what are they meant to do for 3-4 hours everyday"...

Um I dunno... live normal childhoods with engaged parents maybe hun?

From the neuropsychological point of view, it is possible to make content less addictive.

Behaviourally, children need to keep busy in real life all the time, doing sports and hobbies, reading books, playing outside with friends etc. This is the only recipe against any addiction, internet is not the most dangerous one and no corporation or gov will do parenting to relieve parents of their responsibilities (even though the gov now pretends it will).

Facebook when it first started didn't have the endless scrolling, but they've adapted them all to do this. They used gambling sites and psychology to make it the most appealing and addictive they can. I don't know is the honest answer, I suspect so but it's the algorithms and the ability to radicalise whole groups of people that worry me most.

It shouldn't, no, but presumably all it would take is for the government to ask the social media platform for the real life details of any user they wanted to talk to, with a court order if necessary. I currently use a VPN when I can't access particular content, but that's such an easy loophole for them to fix (I use it for perfectly benign things for me as an adult, like private messaging people I already know, on Bluesky).

I don't think you know anything about my parenting and obviously didn't read my post as I said my children don't have social media.

People can disagree respectfully, there was no need to be so rude. Maybe you need a social media break from Mumsnet.

I think if Labour don’t want to annoy a huge swathe of adults with this ban under 16s they should stick to private checks not linked gov digital ID.

Starmer is very up for digital ID but Burnham was against it, and maybe he’ll be in soon.

What this looks like would be better not behaving like a back door digital ID level of control over society.

On just using mn and linking to who you are, idk it might actually work to get me to log off ;

I know it's not (yet) connected with government per se, but I (as a middle-aged adult) have been bullied and semi-doxxed even on MN, necessitating several changes of username. If I hadn't had that function available to me, I would have just left MN and never come back.

People always cite beating trolls and giving bad actors nowhere to hide, but some of the measures aimed at this can be devastating for innocent people and victims who also get swept up in it. Why do people think that things like witness protection schemes exist in the first place?

Why do we bother with seatbelts in cars, regulations around their use and mandatory car seats for babies? Why do we even use seatbelts when the majority of us are not involved in accidents, especially when there’s some air bags built in by the car manufacturers to protect us, that’s enough isn’t it? There’s even self driving cars now, so why should our kids have to wait until 17 to learn how to drive and to get a licence before they can safely be a driver, why can’t my 8yo have a car now because all her friends have them?
Grrr, if only we lived in a more free society without all these controls on our lives etc, etc. 🙄

How about we hold these companies to account for all the perverts and addictive nature of their apps.
Could they make social media that WASN'T addictive, even if they wanted to? Genuine question, not asking to be provocative.

The linking shouldn’t happen. It’s not necessary for the gov to know.

I already don’t use some major platforms but do I want biometric info going to others, I guess I’ll have to weigh up the trade off.

This is the problem. For years we had it drummed into to that we must protect our identity online for safety reasons. Now we are all being told to hand over our government issued ID to random tech companies that are usually based in other countries, some of whom have already had data breaches. Also, linking your real life ID to your social media accounts makes criticising the government online a dangerous activity - look how some people were treated during COVID if they didn't approve of lockdowns, such as the woman campaigning to keep schools open. And in many people's opinion she turned out to be right. How much do we trust this or any future UK government to preserve freedom of speech online? The actual banning of children from social media isn't the issue I have with this, it's the practicalities and effects of the process.

China even has 'social credit', whereby you might not be necessarily punished for making 'wrong' choices or 'wrong' actions, but you can be officially shamed and lose basic human privileges if you don't step into line.

Nothing at all to do with actual crime - just 'socially wrong'. To be inappropriately flippant about it, a MN equivalent would be to publish a list of shame of all users who have admitted to having a toilet brush.

We're already seeing the beginnings of it in the UK, with people being 'cancelled' for 'wrongthink' or for (calmly) stating opinions that other people disagree with.