New Zealand kind-of moves to ban social media for under-16s, require age checks for new accounts New Zealand’s government has signaled its support for a bill to ban social media for children under 16, but without explicitly making it a government initiative. The bill that will enact the ban was put forwarded on Tuesday by member of Parliament Catherine Wedd and is what New Zealand calls a “member’s bill” – a law proposed …
Likewise for heroin, guns, driving cars, alcohol, cigarettes, ...
'Parent', that well known label for a subset of 'Human being' - a creature well known for it's reliable ability to behave in socially responsible and constructive ways without any need for support, guidance, or constraint.
Yes! I have complained about all the homework being on a bloody computer and Interweb. So what do the kids do? They do 2 things they guess in their hurry to press a button, ask ChatGPT and never work through it on a piece of paper, never read the text properly. Schools are appalling dumbing down indoctrination centres.
Used to be blocked in my school in Australia in the 2000s. Then they decided to unblock it shortly after I graduated high school.
Just block it again at school. No need for us to try to block it everywhere. All it will do is drive it underground, stop kids from participating in political dialogue and make it hard for support services to work with kids and their parents on dealing with social media harms. Maybe it will bring some short term relief but that's it.
Then there are all the kids who don't fit in socially like I didn't during school and lgbtqi+ folk who see social media as safe space away from the school yard bullies. Who also are more likely to take steps to remain anonymous to avoid mixing schoolyard l lives with their digital lives (a key driver of cyber bullying).
Okay. When are we going to look into how social media harms adults? Or have we already established that turning 18 flips the immune-to-bullshit switch, so everything magically becomes harmless?
I don't want them banned, but I do want someone to look into this. And to do it properly, not do one study following 16 people for three weeks and then forget about it.
So is your solution to restrict adult access to read social media? Or to make sure only the 'right sort' of people can post or is suitably pre moderated?
Any 'solution' is likely to end up worse than whatever you think the problem is.
Also slightly ironic that this was itself posted on social media, doubtless with full expectation that any study would find all the author's posts perfectly harmless.
And when you get the report saying they're rife with disinformation (criticism of governments), what do you think will happen. We all know there's loads of crap, it doesn't need a report, what it needs is teaching kids without introduction of bias, how to think through the statements. Usually, simple logic and extrapolation yields the truth. There will still be mis/dis information on state TV. We are drowning in BS. Maybe it was ever so, it just comes at you faster. Check out the film; "They Live" from the 90's I think. Ignoring the alien invasion bit they have these glasses that show you the truth.
Two things.
One, ban recommendation algorithms. When I log on to a social media platform, I should be able to see "latest posts from accounts I follow" and "the results of any search I care to make", and that is all. No "hot posts", no "people who liked that also liked..." - nothing. This would remove a whole lot of social media's ills: limit the viral spread of misinformation, creeping extremism and rabbit holes. It would also severely limit the value social media companies can get by slurping their users' data, thus making them less anxious to do it.
Two, tax attention. If a user spends hours a day on the same platform, it's a good bet that the platform owners are deliberately trying to hold their attention. So make them pay, let's say $1 per user per hour over 2 hours in any 24 hour period. Exemptions available for, say, platforms that charge users more than $5 per month to access them (because, e.g., educational sites are a thing), but in general, incentivise platforms to encourage users to click away.
Has anyone considered the effects of first allowing children to have smartphones immediately prior to the first important set of exams? Isn't this going to add significant distractions right at a critical point in their education? Earlier and managed or later and unmanaged would be better.
Alternatively just make the person who pays the phone bill legally responsible for all use of the device. As children can't have credit cards, this might make their parents more responsible.
Or BBC Bitesize GCSE. Or Khan Academy, or any number of YouTube videos that involve skilled educators explaining things carefully. How awful, what is the world coming to?
Some people will just object for the sake of it. "didn't 'ave that in my day. Never done me no 'arm"...."
... at a convenience store near a school, a slightly-greasy-haired male wearing a baseball cap, muscle shirt, and jeans lounges in his clapped-out Honda Civic DX, smoking a cigarette. The driver's-side window is rolled down. As a gaggle of young teens walks past, headed into the store, he calls out in a conversational tone of voice: "Anybody here wanna buy an 'X' account? A hunner't smackers."
What isn't explicitly mentioned is that in implementing these rules to help the poor vulnerable kiddies, you just happen to require an ID check for *all* users.
Funny how often 'think of the children' turns into a general purpose way of imposing onerous registration rules on the adults. Absolutely no scope for that to be abused!
If getting that data wasn't an underlying aim the proposed rules would be set up differently.
If it is left to parents to do, you can prosecute parents who fail to do it effectively. But if you implement any form of online checks, you will be forcing your adult population to submit passport or biometric data to third parties, where it will not be safe, and monitoring everything they do online. Just like China.
Either you trust parents and prosecute them when they fail badly enough or you switch to fascist oversight of absolutely everybody.
There are other options, like having whitelisting filters for kids, but with all of them, it is the same. You trust parents or you become a fascist regime.
The only halfway house I can think of is selling adult ID codes across the counter of stores for cash, without taking personal ID. It wouldn't be 100% but it is not as bad an idea as becoming the KGB.
"selling adult ID codes across the counter of stores for cash"
Not sure that would work. There are plenty of shopkeepers who are willing to sell cigarettes or booze to those who are clearly under-age. Plus there are kids who simply pay a dodgy adult to buy these things for them. There will just be a thriving black market in the ID codes.
The National party have made a series of inept, inflammatory decisions since taking the reins and managed to piss off a majority us here with their 'cost cutting' of public services & abuse of the urgency provision for passing unpopular legislation. Like most things, this is beyond their comprehension and, if implemented, will likely seal their demise in the next election.
As a parent, I hate the impact social media is having on kids, namely doom scrolling time away most of all and second trying to emulate ham acting You tubers feigning excitement over the mundane. Third is unsavoury material. That has always existed, it was just harder to find. I recall getting hold of certain magazines or scouring the library for all sorts of things I wont mention for fear of triggering some terrorist alert. It was part of growing up.
But ... that all said I don't believe the braying calls for ID have anything to do with protection of minors, no this is about censorship and protecting the government from the people it is supposed to be serving. They are trying to complete the inversion of having the people serve the government. Those calling for ID to go online either don't want to be exposed themselves or are just virue signalling idiots. There is an easy way for parents; stop giving your children smartphones and monitor / control their access to the Internet. It's your job don't delegate it to others. If you don't want to parent why did you have them? They're not toys, they are a responsibility and duty. You don't have to be 100% successful, you are still showing them what is right and wrong.
I may not always work but please try to talk to your teen kids. Do not yell or get angry, explain things clearly and if that doesn't work hit tbem in the wallet as they still depend on your money until they have to get jobs. Unless of course they are already working in that case, better suscribe them to a course on how to deal with toxic social media or something similar.
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