Most Canadians support social media ban for kids under 16: poll (cheknews.ca)

submitted 13 hours ago by Sunshine@piefed.ca to c/canada@lemmy.ca

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An Angus Reid survey says three-quarters of more than 4,000 respondents are in favour of a ban like the one in Australia, where youth under 16 are prevented from setting up accounts on TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat and Threads.

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[-] Sunshine@piefed.ca 13 points 13 hours ago

People are so ignorant asking for Australia’s age verification. That’s basically asking Ottawa to take away their freedom.

[-] masterspace@lemmy.ca 6 points 13 hours ago

I mean the better option would be regulating social media companies and forcing them to change their design to not be as harmful or addictive for all users, but that is a lot harder to do, especially as a small country that isn't host to any of those companies.

A social media ban for kids is not as ideal, but it's enactable now and will curb some harm.

[-] snoons@lemmy.ca 8 points 13 hours ago

The issue is how it will be enacted. It will invariably require transmitting personally identifying information across a network and for it to be stored somewhere for processing. Even if this is done as safely as possible with government systems, there is always the risk of data theft and exposure as well as excluding people that don't trust the government at all, like pretty much every Indigenous person I've ever met.

It as well provides the government with a system and store of information that could be used as tool of oppression.

[-] NarrativeBear@lemmy.world 2 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

Simple home router Whitelist enacted through a parental control setting.

Completely "local" and no personal information is given to a third party website.

Now the question is could we create a job/field were the persons responsible would curates and classifies each website? They could classify based on ages, genres and other useful tags.

What could we call these creators of information?

[-] masterspace@lemmy.ca 1 points 12 hours ago

I mean, in an ideal world, you just implement it at the OS level. You don't need to send PII off device ever.

[-] nik282000@lemmy.ca 6 points 10 hours ago

Why does it matter if it's a checkbox when you sign up or a number held by your OS? Leave the OS alone and hold parents accountable for the actions of their children.

[-] ageedizzle@piefed.ca 2 points 9 hours ago

The problem is that this basically makes these checks mandatory. You can choose not to use Facebook, but you cant choose to not use an operating system. Plus it might mess with linux development to have this at the OS level

[-] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 3 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago)

People don't seem to be asking for age verification. They (we) want social media ban. There's no question about age verification in the survey, let alone intrusive software. When asked who ahould be responsible:

More than seven-in-ten (72%) Canadians agree that parents should be primarily responsible for regulating teens’ social media use, not governments.

This could be easily handled by placing the respinsibility on parents, like it is for many other things.

I've said this before and I'll say it again - it's much easier to answer my child's question as to why she's not allowed on social media with "it's illegal" when most of her peers hear the same at home, than some version of "it's bad for you" while most of her peers are allowed to use it.

[-] FlareHeart@lemmy.ca 6 points 12 hours ago

But how do you uphold a social media ban based on age without some form of age verification process?

No thank you on submitting my ID just for it to be leaked in some data breach down the line.

[-] group_hug@sh.itjust.works 1 points 8 minutes ago* (last edited 7 minutes ago)

All cars can go 160km/h and all speed limits max out at 110km/h.

How can we uphold the law if cars are not speed limited to 110km/h?

Also littering is illegal yet people are still able to buy single use plastics. We either NEED to make littering legal for everyone at all times or ban ALL single use plastic there is no in-between.

[-] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 0 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

I imagine like other laws that threaten warnings, fines and such for parents who let their kids do this or that.

No ID submission, def fuck that. If there's an electronic component it has to be gov't-run and it has to just divulge whether the user is allowed to use that service. Not share age, or other info.

But again, ideally I want a law that tells parents to not let children on social media. That would be enough to mitigate the vast majority of the damage. It would let rebels (parents or kids) do it anyway if they're smart enough to not get caught, while keeping the 80% away from it.

[-] NarrativeBear@lemmy.world 3 points 10 hours ago

Who goes to prison now when a kid is found to be using social media?

And now what counts as social media? Is it only Facebook, or does it include things like WhatsApp, Mastodon, Instagram, Bluesky, Lemmy, a blog or chatroom?

[-] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 2 points 6 hours ago

You don't have to false dichotomy it. There's other options than prison. The gov't determines what's social media. There can be diff criteria. The determination can be made by a regulatory body similar to the CRTC that updates what counts as social media now and then.

[-] FlareHeart@lemmy.ca 4 points 12 hours ago

LOL!

It has been known for a long time that social media is harmful for kids. If parents wouldn't parent properly for the good of their children before, then a toothless law (there would be no way to know children are using the sites) won't make them parent now.

How would sites know there are children using the services? How would the authorities know to issue fines? The only way these things happen is with some form of ID system.

[-] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 1 points 11 hours ago* (last edited 11 hours ago)

Yes I'm looking for essentially a half-toothless law with punishment "if reported" like it is for the laws against leaving your child alone. Someone has to report you. If you're not reported, you aren't punished. Yet everyone I know complies with very few occasional exceptions, even if all of them think it's a stupid law. Even half-toothless laws can change the overall situation. All I need is the majority of her peers to have been forbidden social media. I can do the rest. If everyone she knows is on social... it's my word against the world and while I might be able to pull off argument that sticks, it'll be difficult.

[-] ageedizzle@piefed.ca 2 points 9 hours ago

This shifts responsibility away from the large social media companies, who are the ones doing the harm. It’s like punishing parents for letting kids smoke rather than the cigarette companies for advertising to kids

[-] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 2 points 6 hours ago

Completely agree. I just think an attempt to regulate the corpos would result in mandate for age verification by the corpos collecting IDs. There are obviously smarter ways to do such regulation, I just don't think a Liberal or Consrrvative gov't would go for such solution. That's why I'd be okay with shifting responsibility. It's not what I'd like but I'd tolerate it and it'll do the job I think.