New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health • Hacker News Board

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#91

Post by Sha1rholder » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 5:23 AM UTC

tw04 wrote: post #18

qwe----3 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These rulings are stupid and if generalized would make doing business impossible. Parents should parent their kids. That law is so board - "public morals"? Should every porn site be taken down?

The world would almost assuredly be a better place if 14 year olds were looking at playboy magazines instead of having easy access to every fetish under the sun. It has distorted many a young man’s ideas of intimacy and sexual relations.

In what aspect is Playboy magazines superior?

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#92

Post by gms » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 5:42 AM UTC

drivebyhooting wrote: post #74

qwe----3 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These rulings are stupid and if generalized would make doing business impossible. Parents should parent their kids. That law is so board - "public morals"? Should every porn site be taken down?

How can I parent my kids when every child in the school is a social media addict? If heroin were commonplace and available in every kid’s pockets would parents be to blame then too?

I know many parents who manage this fine, I don't see why you can't:

1. You control whether your child has a phone and how much they are allowed to use it (Apple provides all sorts of controls for parents).

2. Every child in the school is not an addict. This is (for lack of a better term) a boomer view of the world.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#93

Post by ozozozd » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 5:45 AM UTC

sneak wrote: post #24

drivebyhooting wrote: post #9

What benefit do kids draw from instagram and facebook?

Well, Instagram DMs have entirely replaced sms and phone number exchange for an entire generation. This is like saying “what benefit do teenagers draw from having a phone line?”

Weird defense, do they not need a phone line for Instagram DMs to work?

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#94

Post by gms » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 5:47 AM UTC

drivebyhooting wrote: post #9

What benefit do kids draw from instagram and facebook?

Socialising. Same benefit I drew from playing video games with my friends when I was in school.

(Though, to be a bit pedantic about it, kids don't use Facebook.)

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#95

Post by lobofta » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 5:48 AM UTC

shaewest wrote: post #71

drivebyhooting wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well for one thing SMS isn’t bundled with addictive apps that constantly try to lure you into traps against your better judgement.

Yeah but SMS is also a paid product in most places, same with phone calls, and data too, but given most places (Schools, your home, work, libraries) pay for wifi, platform provided messaging is free. Not that the addictive apps are great, but if we're talking locking, it's deciding between 'paying for' and 'receiving for free' with lock in being constant

So Signal then. It's donation based and works fine.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#96

Post by troupo » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 5:52 AM UTC

judge2020 wrote: post #83

troupo wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem is, what if one of these apps is being used as a messaging app? How is this a problem? We've had messaging apps 24/7 for 15 years. For many millenia we didn't have them, and it was hardly ever a problem.

Because we removed the physical distance barrier to relationships, no reason to artificially close it now.

And this has been shown time and again to be quite detrimental. Yes, you have to disconnect. No, disconnecting for a few hours is not a problem just because "these are messaging apps".

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#97

Post by carabiner » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 5:54 AM UTC

Harm to the world. I seriously believe screen addiction is worse than obesity and opiates but it's so normalized, no one can imagine a world without it.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#98

Post by Barrin92 » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 6:01 AM UTC

Sha1rholder wrote: post #91

tw04 wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The world would almost assuredly be a better place if 14 year olds were looking at playboy magazines instead of having easy access to every fetish under the sun. It has distorted many a young man’s ideas of intimacy and sexual relations.

In what aspect is Playboy magazines superior?

it contained significantly less extreme content. There's studies on kids as young as 12 routinely being exposed to sexual violence, practices such as choking or degrading activity in porn and viewing it as so normal that young women report being expected to take part in it. Fetishes and kinks that were reserved for adults are now normalized among teens.

"In an essay published in The Free Press in August, 16-year-old Isabel Hogben described how, by the time she was in 4th grade, she had seen internet porn featuring “simulated incest, bestiality, extreme bondage, sex with unconscious women, gangbangs, sadomasochism and unthinkable physical violence.” This is not an isolated case: A French government task force on equality recently reported that as much as 90% of online pornography features “verbal, physical and sexual violence toward women.”

Playboy wasn't necessarily a beacon of feminism (although sometimes surprisingly it was) but what young people are exposed to is in an entirely different category.

https://archive.ph/CPeNz

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#99

Post by bandrami » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 6:02 AM UTC

qwe----3 wrote: post #12

tristanj wrote: post #5

Per the court ruling [0], the specific law that Meta violated was New Mexico’s public-nuisance law, NMSA 1978 § 30-8-1. The relevant section that was violated is [1]: A public nuisance consists of knowingly creating, performing or maintaining anything affecting any number of citizens without lawful authority which is either: - A. injurious to public health, safety, morals or welfare; or - B. interferes with the exerc…

These rulings are stupid and if generalized would make doing business impossible. Parents should parent their kids. That law is so board - "public morals"? Should every porn site be taken down?

Meta (née Facebook) hired addiction medicine specialists to work on their platform engagement. It wasn't to make teens use their platforms less.

Re: New Mexico court orders Meta to pay $567m over harms to children’s mental health

#100

Post by aprilthird2021 » Fri, Aug 07, 2026, 6:03 AM UTC

tristanj wrote: post #5

Per the court ruling [0], the specific law that Meta violated was New Mexico’s public-nuisance law, NMSA 1978 § 30-8-1. The relevant section that was violated is [1]: A public nuisance consists of knowingly creating, performing or maintaining anything affecting any number of citizens without lawful authority which is either: - A. injurious to public health, safety, morals or welfare; or - B. interferes with the exerc…

Can any lawyer chime in for us laymen? This seems like such a broad law that can be interpreted to allow any punishment against basically anything especially since "public morals" are such a subjective thing.