AIBU to find a girl's comment about social media quite sad

[FelicityShagsWell]

I just heard the story on the radio about Kier Starmer wanting to tighten up access to social media for under 16s. A few sound bites from some children followed. One girl said it's unfair because there's nothing else to do. Am I unreasonable to find that utterly sad?

I have a girl in my street who walks past my house- head down,face in her phone.
Twice she's walked into my open car door....

lmao why is she silly for saying that? I think we need to extend some grace to the children of the day: The reality is some of them, if not all, are completely and utterly addicted and as with any addiction, withdrawal is often the hardest step. It is good the grown ups have stepped up, but it could be a long road ahead and I hope the government have a contingency plan if this all goes unexpectedly wrong.

The problem with taking away SM is you are taking away most teens only way to socialise.

Parents are naturally more overprotective these days. When I think back to the late 90s and us out down the park for hours - this doesn’t happen anymore
If they want to go someone, there is minimal public transport so they have to rely on parents, who due to cost of living, are having to work all the hours. So this doesn’t happen
there are no youth clubs / social clubs anymore.
For older teens, they can’t afford to go to the pub etc because it’s a fiver a pint. Even a coffee isn’t cheap.
socialising at home doesn’t seem to happen as much

We have a huge loneliness crisis and while I think a SM is a good think on the whole, it might cause different mental health issues

They can still use WhatsApp, iMessage, FaceTime, phone calls…

I think it’s pretty silly to say that if you don’t have social media you’ll have to stare at a wall for 9 hours a day, and I’d be embarrassed if my teen said that on TV.

Did you never say anything stupid as a teen?

Ive got second hand embarrassment that posters think that girl is serious about staring at a wall, it's so obvious she was just being snarky 😭

Not on TV.

That’s what’s embarrassing. We obviously don’t think she’s going to stare at a wall 🙄. It’s the fact that she’s so stroppy about it that she answered the question so petulantly.

Yes. I am worried kids will sign up to free vpn services so parents don’t pay and that may easily lead to the unscrupulous area of internet and AI. Nothing is free so what datamining or other activities or surveys to get free vpn?

I need to travel during the let out time of our local secondary school. They all walk without looking up from their phones. The amount of near misses I’ve had due to them just stepping out onto the road without looking. Luckily I’m anticipating it and drive accordingly

I thought the same
In my day ee played outside or had chores. The problem is though that harm is also outside and no or very little youth clubs around now due to funding cuts
Many parents work in evenings so kids are on own from a certain age.

It is the first good thing govt has done but I also wondered if they would do another u turn

Indeed. Wonderful as reading is, I think it would also be a cause for concern if a teenager spent 9 hours a day, every day, just reading.

Lots of perfectly decent activities can turn into a problem if people do them to excess... but to my mind - just like with adults who become alcoholics - we seek to address the problems for those who suffer from them, rather than just assuming that everybody (or at least most people) from a certain demographic WILL all have that problem.

I think most (adult) people on here would feel insulted and affronted if they were told by a barkeeper or shop assistant that they couldn't be served a glass of wine or pint of beer, "because you're probably an alcoholic, so we don't want to risk it".

The very nature of the internet is that everything is on there. It never ends, and you would need millions of lifetimes to be able to consume it all before you 'completed' it. Are we just going to ban the internet now, and try to put the genie back in the bottle?

There has to be some measure of personal responsibility (and parental, in the case of children) whereby you realise that you've spent enough time on it - that's just modern life. That applies whether it's using a website, reading, working, eating, sleeping... anything that you enjoy can become addictive.

What if your child was a voracious reader and sat there reading the entire works of Enid Blyton in one sitting? Or a passionate musician and wanted to play the complete works of Mozart without stopping?

Yes, this is what I really don't get. If we're going to ban under 16s from social media "because some teenagers bully others on it", why don't we also ban under 16s from going to school - seeing as a great deal of bullying goes on there?

It's not even like most schools actually care about bullying or preventing or stopping it; many schools will point-blank insist that there is no bullying happening in their school - often furiously gaslighting and belittling it as 'friendship issues' or 'lack of resilience', and leaving victims firmly convinced that they have nobody fighting their corner or wanting to protect them; and they have no choice but to come to school and be subjected to it every day.

At least with bullying via social media, you can escape it by turning a phone off.

I think like with anti vaxxers there has been a growth in anti rules parenting.
Many intentionally showing young kids very inappropriate films etc.
So you cant rely on parents to even try to moderate what kids do or see on SM.

I think the ban is focussing on the wrong issue.
FB etc is probably only mostly used by over 13 anyway.
The bigger problems in schools are

bullying on and offline and in classes

kids unable to behave
kids unable to socialise

Schools and parents are pretty weak and the kids are running rings around us all.

School need to show how to work well as a team they group kids up then leave them to it.

My dd seems to be under the impression tech companies will require ID to evidence you're over 18. I don't know if that's accurate?

I never understand the youth club thing. They didn’t exist when I was a kid in the 00s either… we wouldn’t have gone if they did.

There was a headline on the front page of the Telegraph today to that effect - whether it was strictly accurate, I don't know.

It seems to me that it would be the obvious thing for them to do - much, much easier to force people to prove that they are allowed, rather than that they aren't. That's what happens now when buying alcohol and cigarettes if there's any doubt at all; it's not up to the supplier to prove that you aren't a child.

They were definitely a thing in the 80s and 90s when I was a kid, and they were great.
Think somewhere everyone can all hang out. Maybe a bit of table tennis or something, that's about all I can remember of it 😁
A shame that they don't really seem to exist anymore.

@Ventress parents having money obviously hasn't helped her have a range of hobbies. Money doesn't mean good parenting, as the Stately homes thread shows.