Almost every young person in the USA spends hours on social media every day, and experts warn of health risks. Florida now wants to ban young people from using it, and there is also resistance in New York.
A quick post on Instagram, watching a few clips on Tiktok, uploading a video on Snapchat – all of this could soon be a thing of the past for young people in Florida and perhaps in many other states in the USA. There is a battle over the sovereignty of interpretation of young people’s cell phone screens that has broken out in the USA.
On the one hand, there are politicians who see social media as a threat to the health of young people. In 35 out of 50 US states alone, there are efforts to regulate the use of social media for young people. Two years ago, US President Joe Biden campaigned on X, formerly Twitter, for the need to protect privacy and ban targeted advertising to children and the collection of children’s personal data. “It’s time we hold social media accountable for the experiment they’re conducting on our children nationwide,” Biden fumed.
On the other side are lobbyists and social media platforms who see fundamental rights threatened, as well as courts that have so far blocked all new laws.
Florida is now planning the most far-reaching intervention to date in the use of social media by young people – and with unusual unity between Republicans and Democrats. 106 of the 120 MPs voted for a ban on social media for young people, while only a few of the 36 Democratic delegates voted against the law. If the Florida Senate also votes for a ban and Governor Ron DeSantis signs the law, it could come into force as early as July of this year.
Specifically, this would affect all young people under the age of 16. If it comes into force, all accounts of those affected should be deleted. To do this, the platforms would be obliged to have the age of users verified by a third party when they register again. “You all know I’m a civil rights advocate, but the fight to protect our children on social media is a fight I would fight any day,” said Democratic Rep. Michele Rayner. The law targets any platform that “uses addictive, harmful or deceptive features that cause a user to have an excessive or compulsive need to use the platform.” How exactly it could be implemented if introduced is still unclear, but according to the state’s Ministry of Justice, violations could result in penalties of up to $50,000 (around 46,000 euros). Messenger services are explicitly excluded from the law.
Florida: New law faces lawsuit
Even if the Senate and Ron DeSantis pass the bill, it is still unclear whether it will actually become a reality. Lobbyists are already protesting against the banning of young people from social networks. “If the law goes into effect, it will jeopardize the privacy and security of Floridians using the Internet,” Carl Szabo, vice president of NetChoice, a trade association based in Washington, D.C., told The Washington Post. Florida deserves more than an unconstitutional internet surveillance program.
It is likely that NetChoice will also sue against the planned law. The organization had already sued against similar laws – with success. In September 2022, the California Senate unanimously passed a bill to protect children online. According to the law, children should automatically have the highest privacy settings and strangers should be prevented from writing messages to each other. A year later, the law is currently on hold: a judge ruled that it “probably” violates the First Amendment of the US Constitution, which, among other things, prohibits restricting freedom of speech – an article referred to by former US President Donald Trump also likes to invoke this in his court hearings.
Similarly in Arkansas, where in August 2023 a judge blocked a new law that would have required some social media platforms to verify the age of users and required parental consent if minors wanted to create an account. That same month, a judge in Texas blocked a law that would have regulated access to porn sites. Verification of age was also an elementary component of this law.
On social media platforms, the law is – unsurprisingly – viewed with skepticism. “Although we understand the intention, the current situation fails to encourage parents about whether their children use social media. In addition, no sensible standards are set to help parents monitor their children’s online activities,” said a spokesperson from Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram” in a letter to MPs.
Depression and Suicide: Dangers of Social Media
It is undisputed that social media can pose a danger to children and young people. In January last year, an 18-year-old in Hamburg died while trying to jump off the track at the last moment in front of an approaching train. In an interview with a regional newspaper, her twin sister said that the dangers had not been taken into account and that it was important to upload videos of reckless actions on Tiktok. “You get likes, you are someone,” the newspaper quoted the 18-year-old as saying. In 2019, a 16-year-old died in the USA while playing Russian roulette inspired by a Snapchat challenge: two rounds went well, Ian Ezquerra’s third video was his last.
For adolescents in particular, a lot of their lives take place in the digital world. In a Pew Research Center survey last year, 95 percent of teens surveyed said they used social media. Many of them stated that they not only used platforms such as YouTube, Tiktok or Snapchat every day, but almost constantly. This was confirmed by another survey conducted by the market research institute Gallup last fall. It found that teenagers in the USA use social media around 4.8 hours per day, and 17-year-olds even use social media for 5.8 hours. They spend around 90 percent of their time on YouTube (1.9 hours), Tiktok (1.5 hours) and Instagram (0.9 hours).
The influence of social media is now a thorn in the side of many US states. The use of Tiktok on government cell phones in the USA and Canada was already banned in the spring of last year – also out of concern that the Chinese state could gain access to the data. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, a nonpartisan organization that represents the interests of US states in Washington, preparations are currently underway in 35 of the 50 states alone for laws that are intended to prevent the harm of social media to young people. These include democratically governed states such as Massachusetts, Michigan and California, but also Republican states such as Nebraska and North Carolina. Last October, 41 states sued Meta because of the increased risk of addiction. They accused the company of misleading the public about the significant dangers social media platforms pose to mental health. The like and notification functions in particular are a thorn in the side of the states. A verdict is still pending.
New York declares social media a ‘public health threat’
Last week, New York Mayor Eric Adams went one step further. The Democrat became the first major city in the United States to classify social platforms as a “public health threat” and warned of their impact on the mental health of young people. “Our children are fed by algorithms that look for their vulnerabilities, and we have to take action against that. Social media contributes to depression, suicidal thoughts and even riding on subway roofs,” said the mayor in an interview with the television station “NBC4 New York”. Social media is a secret weapon that finds its way into bedrooms, kitchens and sofas, Adams emphasized. “Michael Bloomberg’s (mayor of New York from 2002 to 2013, editor’s note) forward-thinking saved many lives when he banned smoking in all indoor spaces in 2003. Now is our chance.”
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Source: Stern
I have been working in the news industry for over 6 years, first as a reporter and now as an editor. I have covered politics extensively, and my work has appeared in major newspapers and online news outlets around the world. In addition to my writing, I also contribute regularly to 24 Hours World.
