Sweeping social media bans for adolescents undermines their development

France has been attempting to pass legislation banning social media for under 15-year-olds since last January. The law passed through the lower house, then got snagged and modified in the French Senate, and this month it got blocked by France's highest court.   

France's legislative efforts are newsworthy because they are the most advanced and rigorous in Europe, and that will have an impact on similar, yet less advanced efforts in other European countries. France's effort in this sense signify momentum in Europe in the wake of developments in Australia, which became the first country in the world to legislate a sweeping ban on social media accounts for children under 16 years old.  

Aside from France, there has been decisive steps elsewhere in Europe towards legislative restrictions on social media use by adolescents. Various governments have expressed an intention to legislate, and this has fostered debates and public consultations about the how far should restrictions go.   

Human rights commission of Council of Europe called sweeping bans neither proportionate nor necessary.

In Malta, the prime minister announced that the government is working on restrictive legislation. He has talked rather generically, but also said he does not agree with the kind of sweeping ban implemented in Australia.

There is no doubt that excessive screentime is detrimental to children’s development, and that a proportion of content on social media can be harmful to children. There is also widespread concern over cyber-bullying. At the same time, uneasiness surrounds the kind of sweeping ban that Australia has adopted.  

Personally, as someone who parents a 14-year-old, I consider a sweeping ban to be simplistic, reactionary and counter-productive.

And I am not the only one. The British magazine Social Work News reported last January on a letter signed by 42 child protection charities which were critical of governments talking of social media bans for adolescents. The United Nations also criticized such bans, and so did Michael O’Flaherty, human rights commissioner of the Council of Europe, who said that such bans are neither ‘proportionate nor necessary’ and argued that there are other ways to protect adolescents online.

Social media has its benefits for adolescents. It can be used as a tool in education, communication and creative expression.

You Tube particularly is possibly the vastest open classroom in the world. It has tutorials on almost everything and it is possible to learn entire subjects, including languages, to a high degree of competence simply by watching tutorials on Your Tube.

It is possible to learn or practice languages on You Tube, and I regularly watch tutorials on aspects of the skills I use for work – video production, web design, graphic design – on You Tube.

My 14-year-old daughter uses it in other ways as well; she even watches technique videos on sports she is practicing, as well as knowhow on hobbies. She has also produced a couple of short videos for her You Tube channel, videos that allow her to learn skills of video production, hone her creativity, and learn how to publish and promote and gain exposure.

In this way, adolescents hone their creative expression – in producing videos, writing posts, taking and posting pictures – as well as skills in marketing and entrepreneurship by posting on social media. That is part of their education nowadays.

Have you noticed that today’s teenagers are more mature for their age than previous generations at the same age?

Technology, including social media, contributes to the accelerated maturity and larger pool of knowledge that today’s young people possess. Young people are exposed to wider sources of knowledge on the internet, including social media, and television.

Even aimless scrolling is not necessarily a bad thing if it allows a young person to rest, or switch off, from mentally or physically strenuous tasks. Of course this assertion has to be qualified: aimless scrolling is fine in moderation (and I have a dim view of certain social media channels such as Instagram and Tik Tok that seem to feature a high proportion of superficial, self-indulgent content that hooks teenagers into endless scrolling). 

Still, I find talk of legislative sweeping bans merely based on age with trepidation. It also feels strange the way us adults talk about imposing restrictions on adolescents without involving them in the debate and giving them a chance to act responsibly.

On the other hand, a report adopted by the European Parliament last November is heartfully nuanced. It calls for social media use to be banned for under 16s, but then qualifies that by allowing 13-16 year olds to access social media, or have accounts, with parental consent.

In reality this is already happening on a proactive basis. Many if not all social media channels only allow accounts to be opened by children who turn 13 years of age, and there are apps that parents can use to limit screentime and other things.

The question is whether even further controls are needed, including legislation? EU parliament surveys show that more than 90 percent of Europeans are concerned of the potentially harmful effects of social media use by adolescents. Such awareness suggests that we can help parents to take the initiative to place appropriate and nuanced restrictions on social media use by each of their children, depending on what would be appropriate for each specific child.

There have also been other developments that might address concerns without having sweeping legislation.

The latest significant development is the lawsuit in America that has led to META – the company behind Facebook and Instagram – to be forced in a settlement that saw it pay $18 billion. As part of its settlement, it agreed to change its apps to limit daily usage by teenagers as well as block night-time access in America. This provides an opportunity for the EU to make moves to compel social media channels into making similar changes, but do it in a way that it would not hinder teenagers from using social media – You Tube particularly – for learning, whether that is learning skills, subjects, crafts and hobbies.