The dangers of social media are being acknowledged by courts and society at large. And now the companies running the platforms will have to pay.Hollie Adams/Reuters
You get to a point in parenthood – and this point is creeping ever earlier – when more and more of your worries and conversations with other parents centre around technology.
How much iPad time to allow? Our daughter is asking for a phone; she says all the kids her age already have one. Do we let our son use Snapchat? He says this is how his friends communicate.
And so, maybe like the parents in Toy Story 5, you cave and get your child a device and watch them descend into a different version of themselves. And then, possibly get cyberbullied.
Our hearts break and we blame ourselves. Should we have allowed one hour a day instead of two? Do we take the thing away altogether? Boy, did we mess up.
But parents: it wasn’t you.
We are up against a system designed to keep our children glued to screens as long as possible so the tech behemoths can make as much money as possible. Billions are being earned on the eyeballs of our children.
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This week, Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, settled a landmark U.S. lawsuit that had argued its platforms were deliberately made to be addictive for children and teens, with severe mental health consequences.
Meta will pay as much as US$17.1-billion and make major changes to its products. Platforms will employ a list of restrictions, including time limits for teens.
“Ensuring teens have a safe and productive experience on our platforms is an absolute imperative for Meta,” it said in a blog post. “We want to get this right for parents and teens.”
They’re trying to position themselves as altruistic. But if they were, wouldn’t they be making these changes worldwide, instead of just in the U.S., where they were backed into a corner by legal action? These changes will not apply to users in Canada.
Attorney for Meta, Paul Schmidt, right, walks out of court on Wednesday.Heather Diehl/Getty Images
“Meta already has strong protections in place for teens and offers simple controls for parents around the world today,” the company said in an e-mailed statement.
“We’ll continue to monitor how these changes are working in the U.S. and engage in productive dialogue with other governments to support age-appropriate experiences.”
Ottawa has introduced an online safety bill that would bar people under 16 from accessing social media.
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Legislation is key, says Erin Popolo, a U.S. mother whose daughter Emily died by suicide at 17 after being bullied online. “Their platforms are not a safe place for our children,” she told CBC’s As It Happens Wednesday.
Toy Story 5 has a happy ending, but IRL (in real life), too often bullying via social media has fatal consequences.
What’s encouraging is that it feels like the outrage has hit a critical mass. The dangers of social media are being acknowledged by courts and society at large. And now the companies running the platforms will have to pay, even if the settlement doesn’t admit wrongdoing.
Parents hold images of their children, who were harmed by social media, during a House Energy and Commerce Committee markup of nine bills, including the Kids Internet and Digital Safety Act, in Washington, in March.Kylie Cooper/Reuters
Meanwhile, what are they doing with their own kids? According to a recent New York Times report, tech execs don’t let their children use technology the way many other parents do.
They don’t have to! They have staff to keep their kids entertained and their compounds sparkling while they make their billions – unlike us plebs who struggle with addicted children zoning out on devices and freaking the heck out when we try to take them away. This is addiction by design. And too often, anxiety is a consequence.
I spent months thinking one of my Facebook friends didn’t like me. I had commented on something they posted. But while they thumbs-upped the other comments, they did not “like” mine. What had I done to offend this person? Was it something I said? But it couldn’t have been. I hadn’t spoken to this person in … years. We are Facebook friends.
I am a grown woman having these thoughts.
So put that onto a kid, whose brain, social skills and ability to make their way in the world are still developing and delicate.
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Serve them up videos set by algorithms that know them better than their friends do. Keep those reels going, non-stop. Oh – and much of this content will make them feel bad about themselves. But it will offer a solution! All you have to do is buy the thing our advertiser is selling, and voilà – your life can be Instagram-perfect too.
Meta argued it was already trying to protect young people. In testimony before the settlement, Instagram head Adam Mosseri said the company tried to get youth to take advantage of its “Take a Break” option.
Give me a break.
As you get the kids ready for back-to-school, I hope knowing this is what you’re up against gives you some comfort. And I hope there are joyous times ahead for you and your kids, IRL.
