The case for banning children from social media • Hacker News Board

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#281

Post by JCharante » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:05 AM UTC

hackerlight wrote: post #89

andy_ppp wrote: post #19

It’s essentially manipulation of the dopamine system in the exact same way as casinos except it’s worse because it uses AI to really start personalising what keeps us hooked. Would you let your children become addicted to gambling?

> Would you let your children become addicted to gambling? The problem is worse because it's not up to the parents. Even if the kids opt out, they will now feel excluded because all their peers are on social media, they will still be a victim of the gossip mills and other nastiness present on social media even if they're not directly participating. That's why a blanket-wide ban for under-18s or under-16s is necessary…

If schools are so toxic then maybe we should rethink schools. Either have a true nuke-from-orbit zero tolerance to harrassment or have people who care do homeschooling.

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#282

Post by akvadrako » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:06 AM UTC

erfgh wrote: post #165

amatecha wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, honestly, just go all the way and ban advertising altogether (I would be so happy if this happened, even though it obviously never will). Pretty willing to tank my karma to say this, I don't care, I think advertising is one of the biggest psychological pollutants in modern society and any possible benefit (??) is vastly outweighed by the cognitive waste incurred by all who are subjected to it.

How would you define advertising? If there were no advertisements how would people know about products? They would have to read discussions and recommendations but how would those discussions and recommendations not be considered advertisements?

You could say no unsolicited advertising. If you go looking for a list of cars it's fine to see a list of cars.

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#283

Post by sw104 » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:12 AM UTC

slothtrop wrote: post #118

tastysandwich wrote: post #46

I just don't see any alternatives to banning social media, perhaps even up to the age of 18. The dopaminergic effects are not dissimilar to drugs and social media is just as addictive. It's not clear how you could effectively regulate this stuff - especially in our highly polarised political climate. The right will immediately target "wokeness", and the left will immediately target "hate speech". And the kids will be…

> But it was clearly different back then If you go back far enough. I think in part we see forums through rose-tinted glasses. Moderation was looser than people are accustomed to now, and I've seen several taken over by conspiracy nuts. Some still make friends online almost the exact same way, using discord or whatever. I've been a part of communities, but never made "friends" online. The idea is a farce to me. I was…

The idea of making "friends" on the internet, on forums, Facebook, or Discord, has always been ludicrous.

Unless you reach a stage where you meet up in real life and share human experiences, you're basically just talking with the equivalent of an AI chatbot.

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#284

Post by smeagull » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:15 AM UTC

tastysandwich wrote: post #46

I just don't see any alternatives to banning social media, perhaps even up to the age of 18. The dopaminergic effects are not dissimilar to drugs and social media is just as addictive. It's not clear how you could effectively regulate this stuff - especially in our highly polarised political climate. The right will immediately target "wokeness", and the left will immediately target "hate speech". And the kids will be…

This fits with my theory that "woke" is actually "change I'm too old to deal with" and "hate speech" is "speech I hate". The worst part of either is having to fucking hear about the complaints about either, which I actually hear about, rather than the things they complain about, which may as well not exist for how much I see them.

Social media is a punishment for those to stupid to avoid it.

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#285

Post by inkblotuniverse » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:15 AM UTC

dotandgtfo wrote: post #258

PragmaticPulp wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Totally, that's why I figured it's easier to just ban it for under 18s, then leave it alone for over 18s. There is no such thing as "leave it alone for over 18s". If you institute strict age requirements, those have to be enforced for every user account. So yes, that means every site you use would require you to go through something like a KYC process. Privacy on the internet would be gone . You can't enforce age r…

Not sure how viable this is in the US due to reasons but a centralized auth service could in theory not provide any PII back to the service requesting an age verification, and the auth provider wouldn't necessarily have to be get data back from the service except for the first time a user registers an account.

[Muffled screaming]

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#286

Post by Popcorn3865 » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:16 AM UTC

lucumo wrote: post #277

jmathai wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m not sure if you have children. Soccer and basketball exist today. I don’t think you’ll find many parents who struggle with their kids’ habits with them relative to current video games like roblox. (Super Mario Kart doesn’t have the same addictive and predatory aspects) Find a random parent and you’ll see for yourself. It’s not that parents are frustrated that their kids are playing too many video games. It’s that…

Kids are as different from each other as adults can be, so there's not really a one size fits all solution. That said, we've found that setting limits works fine. At least for the ages under 10. There's a limit in duration and time they can use a screen, both of which are easy to keep taps on. It's 5-10 minutes before leaving for school, if and only if they are all ready to leave. It encourages them to be done quicke…

> I feel that they do need some freedom in tech land to follow their curiosities

I wish that was how it was used, however my own experience (and that of parents I speak to) is that the firehose is determined by the algorithm, not the individual which subsequently drives the habits and interests.

For example, my son will want to look up how to do something in Minecraft. Ace, he's using the resources available to him to research and learn how to do something.

Then he's effectively spammed with highly addictive content (relating to Minecraft), with sound effects, music, editing visual effects and voice over from some "creator" whose only goal is to monetise.

Now he sits watching endless (if I don't stop him) clips, and if I ask him what he's watched, he doesn't remember (and he's also highly irritated that I've stopped him consuming).

This stuff is, at least, just as addictive to a young mind as pleasure drugs, and worse, it's available without any barriers and pushed towards the consumer at great speed and volume.

At least with TV, someone somewhere made a decision about what to air. With the current technology, anyone chooses what they publish and the algorithm chooses what you'll consume (based on what will increase your addiction).

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#287

Post by inkblotuniverse » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:17 AM UTC

JanSt wrote: post #180

johnisgood wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who else would it be if not parents, the Government? How would that really go? Would we really have to provide our ID to Facebook and such? That would suck.

The government checks or disallows many things, i.e. drugs. Individualism is strong in the US, but if parents sucks kids suffer.

Yes, the war on drugs has been really successful. I certainly want governments doing more of that!

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#288

Post by DoreenMichele » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:20 AM UTC

regulate_this12 wrote: post #279

DoreenMichele wrote: post #274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm a parent. I don't agree with you. My sons are now adults but had substantial internet access from a very early age. They got a "safe list" of kid-friendly links plus some local software just for them. They weren't required to stick to those kid-friendly links. It was just to make it easier for them to cope. One son was so young, he figured out how to roll the ball under the mouse with this thumb because it was to…

Well, I was also a boy growing up with computers and from that experience I can confidently predict that either you helicoptered him to an unreasonable degree (which is in itself damaging to development) or he saw and probably enjoyed some stuff that you'd find horrifying and that might very well have caused some psychological damage. For my part, I had to deal with porn-induced ED as a young adult which I obviously…

I can confidently predict that either you helicoptered him to an unreasonable degree (which is in itself damaging to development) or he saw and probably enjoyed some stuff that you'd find horrifying and that might very well have caused some psychological damage. For my part, I had to deal with porn-induced ED as a young adult which I obviously didn't tell my mum.

Nope. Neither is true.

Sorry you had a negative experience. You are projecting based on that.

I'm not your mom and I apparently don't handle things the same way most parents handle them.

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#289

Post by inkblotuniverse » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:20 AM UTC

andreareina wrote: post #32

CobrastanJorji wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hrm. I'm not a big fan of this proposal, but I think that implementation would be technically interesting. Say we create a "this is a child" header, which would be sent with all HTTP requests and would mandate that the user not be tracked or advertised to. Great solution, except that everybody would immediately switch the header on because everybody hates ads. In effect, everybody wants to be a child. So now online s…

The key can attest "the identity associated with this key is over 18" without leaking the identity

Why would the government do that, though?

Re: The case for banning children from social media

#290

Post by unixgoddess » Wed, Apr 05, 2023, 9:21 AM UTC

boxed wrote: post #234

unixgoddess wrote: post #225

Few months ago there was some sort of challenge on tiktok, most kids at my local middle school arrived to school with self-inflicted bruises on the face. With this shit, if you don't do it too you are out of the group and goodbye social life. Social media are preying on the group-belonging instincts of kids with tremendous damage not only on the kids themselves, but on society as a whole. However, it's up to parents…

Be glad no one died, like with the blackout challenge or the cinnamon challenge.

even back in the day there were raw egg or hot chili challenges... being idiots for acceptance is truly embedded in the human mind. But social media and general societal collapse bring it out several orders of magnitude worse.