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September 14, 2024 — 5.00am
September 14, 2024 — 5.00am
Ever since Jonathan Haidt’s book The Anxious Generation was released earlier this year, calls for social media bans for young people (up to age 16 is Haidt’s recommendation) have continued to grow.
Kids do way less outside than they used to.
This week, the government announced a plan to enforce social media bans. Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said he would introduce legislation by the end of the year to create a minimum age to access social media. He’s hoping to work with social media companies (good luck!) and the states (less luck needed, probably) to make it a reality.
However, it is important to note that no social media before 16 is only one of Haidt’s suggestions. Another is “more independence, free play, and responsibility in the real world”. We have reached a point, as a society, where many children have little or no supervision on their devices, and too much when they’re playing outside, where we no longer provide adequate activities for them.
Sadly, I am not sure social media bans will be effective. Yes, the algorithms and the feeds and the dangerous messaging online are horrible for young people and I would prefer not to hear any “brain rot” language in classes or in my home.
But we know all too well that despite porn sites compelling users to confirm they’re over 18, many young people still access them.
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We need to educate young people slowly and carefully in how to use social media responsibly, to be critical thinkers capable of differentiating between what is real online and what is not. This task has become more difficult with the dawn of deep-fake AI-generated content, as Senator David Pocock showed us all last week.
However, if a social media ban is how we deal with the issue as it currently is – much like a lockdown worked to flatten the curve of COVID – then maybe it is worth doing. But what about implementation?
If we’re serious about getting kids off social media, we’d better come up with some alternatives for them to socialise. Social media is, at its heart, social. How are they going to keep in touch with their friends, or make new friends, if there are no DMs to slide into or chat groups to join?
Well, they could go and play a team sport, except we are losing green space around this country, and especially Sydney, for housing. Again, we’re in a housing crisis, so building houses makes a lot of sense. But if we’re building houses with bedrooms in which to scroll our screens at the cost of ovals and footy pitches to play on, then where do you want young folk to hang out?
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If local schools can no longer afford the buses to get to sporting competitions, and we know that physical exercise and team sports are protective factors for kids’ mental and physical health, then what else are they going to be doing? The best health advice says children should be doing around three hours of physical activity, one of them vigorous, a day.
If cost-of-living pressures mean parents are cutting back on co-curriculars such as music lessons and drama classes, then what are they going to be doing?
If they can’t play sport, their playgrounds are overheated, they can’t even practise a musical instrument – and they are banned from social media apps – then it seems we’re solving one problem but creating a few others.
The issue with social media use – and frankly, I’m including video games such as Roblox and Minecraft – is that we haven’t normalised behaviour since the COVID lockdowns. Even before COVID, we saw the decline of kids “playing outside” due to helicopter parenting and overscheduling. It still hasn’t picked back up.
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It is difficult to be the only parent letting their kid go outside and play, and it’s really boring to be the only kid playing outside. (In fact, I think you technically need at least one other child outside playing with your kid to avoid it being “Mum kicked me out of the house until 6pm”.) And let’s not even get started on members of the community who don’t want to see kids riding BMX bikes in the local park or campaigning for skate parks.
Communities need to figure out how the implementation of a federal law will look for their local school, area and city. Perhaps, instead of a collaboration between federal and state governments, we need local councils to be onside here too – to help solve the wicked problem of what do kids do when they’re left to their own devices, sans device.
Daisy Turnbull is a teacher and the author of 50 Risks To Take With Your Kids and 50 Questions to Ask Your Teens.
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