Why do people want teens on social media??

[theprincessthepea]

I have a teen.

Today I told her that by the time the ban comes into affect when she is 16, it won’t make a difference to her life. But it will affect my toddler, and I’m happy that he will be growing up during a time where social media will be banned for children and young teens.

What I realised is that there are so many parents against the ban.

I see it every day. I was the last parent (out of my DDs friendship group of 6 girls) to give her a smart phone and allow her on social media - mainly because I was aware of what it’s like, and I witnessed my friend abuse MSN and Bebo back in the day and end up with older guys and pervs - that’s another story. But I remember a parent (DDs friends mum) telling me “I’ve set up a Snapchat for my daughter” (there were in year 5).
I asked her “why”
she said “I was told it’s good for them to socialise”

WTF!? AIBU for thinking that a lot of the work will go into convincing the public and parents that social media is bad. Just like we had to convince the public that smoking is bad.

If the amount of exploitation, low self esteem, online bullying, literally having an online account that is borderline only fans when you are a minor, whilst mum and dad think you study and love school (me and my daughter are super open about socials, she might have an account I don’t know about - but this is the point - us parents don’t get to protect our kids when they are in a virtual world that could be harmful).

Anyways that’s my rant. I’m all for the ban. Good luck with them implementing it. But I think we will be in a better place 10 years later (if the multiple crisis don’t get to us first).

Im also all for educational videos - but I don’t think this falls under this. As I do tell my DD to find an appropriate video when she’s stuck for revision.

I agree with you but I still voted YABU as I think it's state over reach to start being involved in parenting our children. I won't allow social media, but what others do with their children is their choice.

I also disagree that banning teenagers from social media is the answer. The world has changed since we were young and there is no going back, it's how they communicate, have fun, and interact. How about we hold these companies to account for all the perverts and addictive nature of their apps. It's obscene how they get away with lack of safety and accountability.

I'm also concerned about it from a civil liberty pov. If the government gave a shit about children they'd reopen SEN schools, actually tackle violence against women and girls, invest in leisure facilities and sort out housing. This seems punitive.

I agree with you, but let’s face it, the tech companies are doing absolutely nothing to help our children. Parents that have lost children to unfortunate events triggered by social media have campaigned about this for decades. All they have to do is control the algorithms so they are more positive (in general as I don’t think adults need to see violence unless they look it up I guess …).

I have friends who have pretty innocent accounts as adults, usually advocating for stuff and they get shadow banned in an instance - but the tech companies can shadow ban exploitive content for children (and maybe adults as I don’t want to see that stuff).

It’s like MN, when a post becomes too wild they step in and delete the post if relevant. I think the ban will force these companies to do something - as we know, if it isn’t law, they won’t do anything.

I agree with you.

I also know that so much hate and violence can be spread on social media too as it’s easy to create echo chambers. Even though it happens online, we all agree the manosphere is real.

I agree with you, I volunteer a lot int he community and I’ve seen the public take matters into their own hands to advocate for safety and SEN support - they government need to do more there too.

How is it involving the government in parenting your children? It's placing a mandatory duty on social media providers to introduce a lower age limit. Is banning the sale of cigarettes and alcohol to kids government involvement in parenting your children? How about age limits for viewing certain films at the cinema? Or the age of consent? People are utterly ridiculous sometimes.

The govt deciding at what time in the evening you must stop your teen using YouTube is huge overreach.

Banning media access is a very illiberal step. Evidence for it should be strong, other methods unavailable, and any law applied neutrally.

In fact evidence for harms of social media is weak (see link), and for ban is weaker. We aren’t even waiting to learn from Australia’s ban which is only a few months old.

And the reported list of banned sites appears pretty arbitrary. X but not BlueSky, US apps but not Chinese ones. What other age laws do we enforce based on the brand of the product?

During Covid we took away a lot from children because it was politically expedient. Now we are doing it again.

www.sciencemediacentre.org/expert-comments-on-evidence-on-benefits-and-harms-of-social-media-and-social-media-bans-on-young-people/

To put it another way, adults will only be able to use social media if they verify their identity. Do we really want to make it easier for the government to crack down on dissent?

Because why should I have to provide ID because some people can’t parent?

If the government can legislate teen behaviour, they can legislate tech behaviour. After all, it's not just teens who are harmed by tech companies' pursuit of profit at all cost...

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-06-17/why-apple-is-being-sued-by-women-over-airtag-stalking/102421614

https://unwomen.org.au/faqs-trolling-stalking-doxing-and-other-forms-of-violence-against-women-in-the-digital-age/

I'm glad about it as well..How often do we hear that teenagers have anxiety, they can't go into school, depression and so on? Whereas ten, twenty years ago - virtually unheard of. Certainly nowhere near as common in those days. Why can't their dependency on these apps be postponed? Sounds a good thing to me..

I have posted many times about such things on MN over the years.
I cannot tell you how much time I (and my colleagues) spend sorting out children's arguments on social media. I'm the DSL in a primary school and the things we see from children as young as year 4 would, if you were a half decent human, horrify you.
I totally support the ban. There are so many parents who dress their atrocious parenting as human rights, entitlement, liberty, that they completely forget they are raising children to become decent adults. I wouldn't have wanted my then 8, 9, 10 year old DD to be rated by her classmates, have unflattering screenshots of her turned into Tiktoks, have memes made about her being fat, gay or thick, or be sent screenshots of porn. But some people genuinely think their right to please themselves trumps the need to keep ALL children safe which is why the ban is needed. Sadly, some parents won't support it and this spiral will continue. I have many discussions with parents who want me to read the riot act to the child who told theirs to fuck off, but won't remove Snapchat from their child's phone, or block them from being added to GCs. If parents can not parent, someone needs to help them do that.

I think it's a good thing. The genie may be out the bottle for this generation, much in the way that smoking was for others, but that doesn't mean we can't improve things for the generations below them. I don't understand why some parents don't see this as a good thing. Do you really want your children on social media being exposed to violence, pornography, self harm, extreme ideologies and the like? You do not see what your children see online. Honestly, I think a lot of the reason why people are protesting this is lazy parenting. They do not want to have to deal with the potential fights or have to expend time and thought to provide their child with something more enriching for them to do.

I agree with it, there's a reason these tech giants and social media owners don't let their children use it. They know it's dangerous for them in multiple ways.

I think it's great. My little one is only 6 months old but knowing he's going to grow up in a world where it's much harder to access social media, porn and cigarettes than it was for me and my friends growing up has got to be a good thing!

Agreed

I agree! This morning I saw a SEN influencer type posting about the ban. She said her kids need to watch endless YouTube videos for hours to self regulate.

What did Autistic kids do to regulate before YouTube?

My DC is autistic - we banned YouTube the second he told me about Andrew Tates supercars. We had all the family link apps and controls and he STILL saw a clip. Autistic kids need even more protection from YouTube- because they can get obsessed really fast and the last thing I wanted was a "mummys little incel".

They want their child to be cool/popular, and don't want to have to enforce this because they like Instagram etc themselves. They are worried other parents will allow their kids to bypass restrictions but feel a bit uncomfortable doing that and don't want their kid to be a social pariah not using social media.

Their child is quiet/happy scrolling on their phone, it buys mum & dad some peace and they know they will have to deal with a moody teenager over this.

Because if they've allowed this stuff, it now being banned is a fairly irrefutable signal that it really is bad for DC, and that allowing it wasn't a great parenting decision. No one likes having to accept they got it wrong.

My autistic cousin used to watch a tweenies DVD until it literally broke. He wanted it on the big TV so we all had to watch it over and over when he needed to self regulate. Getting his own TV and DVD player did not work.

Laptops and tablets have meant that his need for that type of self regulation doesnt force everyone into watching what he wants or just staying in their rooms where they can watch or listen to what they want. He very much associated TV with the big TV in the living room but is happy to use a more personal device when it comes to other types of screens that arent TVs.

still voted YABU as I think it's state over reach to start being involved in parenting our children.

Honestly i wish the government had the power to step in more with some of the shit permissive parenting I see regularly. The current crop of 12- 25 year olds in particular i think are worse than the kids coming behind, it was like peak gentle parenting and it really shows in school behaviour, school refusal, a generation of kids who haven't been socialised to become useful, hard working cooperative adult society members.

Luckily the generation behind seem to be heading for a bit of a backlash to this and there's a bit more firm boundaries & FAFU and less constant dwelling on feelings.

Some parents don’t give a shit, I also think a lot of people don’t want to accept how damaging social media can be for children. They want to convince themselves they haven’t been totally slack in giving their very young children phones and basically leaving them to it because it keeps them happy and quiet.
I mean nearly a quarter of children have a phone at 5 and 20% from 3!! It’s an epidemic of shit parenting at this point.
20% of 3 year olds have their own phone, I mean that’s just unfathomable.

@Pineapplewhip

the whole sen argument for smartphones is such a red herring. My dd is autistic and they hadn’t been invented, but we went to restaurants, did activities, lived and she self regulated by other non screen based activities. I personally think short form videos is actually making regulation and concentration worse, and that’s just in me! Reading a book seems such a chore when you can endlessly scroll! No smartphones until at least 13 (my dc had them for 13th birthday, old Nokias before) and the dodgier apps, unregulated YouTube etc only after GCSEs. Kids today seem in such a worse state than even 10 years ago and certainly 20,30 years ago before such tech

When we grew up we had things like MTV, Top of the pops, music magazines, fan clubs. Social media is now really the only way to follow y oh r favourite entertainers, the way you find out about new music, new artists. It is the only way you find out about upcoming tickets etc. Following your favourite celebrities is not a new thing, but without social media even something as innocent as that becomes very difficult. When going to concerts these days a big part of that is coordinating and planning outfits for example and “fan projects” that is part of the experience now and how many fans connect with each other. This has been particularly important for my own teen who has extreme anxiety, is neurodiverse and has managed to meet friends this way, something she struggles with hugely.

Learning new hobbies is done via you tube, tik tok and instagram, I know lots of teenage girls who have taught themselves to crochet for instance via these platforms.

Removing everything in one go is not the right thing to do, especially when they have grown up with things like you tube etc and there isn’t anything in its place.

People are much more scared about their child's physical safety than they used to be, insisting on phones so they can track their child's every move. I helped on a school trip for 7 year olds yesterday, 3 children had airtags (that I knew about) so parents follow their every move. They feel they have to give them a phone, even for a 5 minute walk to school. This level of anxiety is passing on to children, contributing to the mental health crisis we are seeing grow among young people

Luckily most of the schools in our area have banned smartphones, if children want to bring a phone it must be an old fashioned 'brick phone'.

This is an amazing point. My younger brother doesn’t even have SEN but he always ruled the roost in the house because he had the loudest voice. The amount of times I had to watch the film The Iron Giant or Power Rangers episodes was untrue… When he was younger it was Bob the Builder on repeat. So yes an iPad would have been a lifesaver for everyone else back then.

Anyway, that aside. I had a 14 and 15 yo, older one will likely only be affected for a month or two but younger one just over a year. I think I should have the parental autonomy to decide which apps they do or don’t use, it’s down to me to parent them and do my research - not the government.

At present they use Snapchat to socialise with friends as most of Gen Z do. They only have school friends on there, I have checked and to be frank they’re not idiots anyway so know not to accept requests from strangers. They have private Instagram accounts again with just friends and family on there. They do not have TikTok and I don’t know anyone even my age who uses Facebook anymore. I also implement screen time and always have. They have to ask my permission to download new apps.

I see zero issue with them using these platforms to engage with friends outside of school. In the 00s when I was a teen, I was on the phone CONSTANTLY to my friends racking up almighty bills. Then as soon as MSN, myspace and bebo were invented, I was on those. My DC should have the same.

I imagine there’s a very strong link between normalising SEN children being able to sit alone and endless watch YouTube from a very young age. It seems to be quite widely accepted for them to do this and at some point we need to acknowledge the children being churned out now vs the 80s and 90s.

Being at school in the 90s it really didn’t seem like the behaviour was anywhere near what is it today and that’s without the wider reaching SEN policies of today.

At some point people need to accept that they are actually not helping their SEN children by ignoring them for hours on end and leaving them to be parented by devices.