Is a social media ban the right move to protect our youth?

Kyoder. I'm Richard Martin in for Chelsea Daniels and this is the Front Page, a daily podcast presented by the New Zealand Herald. The National Party is looking to follow Australia and ban social media for under sixteens. It has submitted a member's bill that would look to limit how young people engage with the likes of Instagram, TikTok and Facebook. Since Australia's world leading ban was passed into law last year, multiple countries are looking at bans as a way of

Well, there's an increasing interest in spending more time offline and I think everyone can relate to that. But alongside there's also increasing research on the topic of how social media affects people, particularly young people, And there was a book published a couple of years ago by a professor of psychology called Jonathan Hyatt, for The Anxious Generation, and my understanding is that book has had a large impact on policy both in Australia and here in New Zealand.

And then, so what is act's main issue with this proposal.

Well, I can't speak for ACT, but I do understand that they have raised some good points around how on earth to enforce such a band age. Verification technology is quite immature, meaning that they're not that reliable. They use a combination of people in putting their users and putting their age, but also AI to assess photos and to to make a calculation based on how old a user is, and there's lots of issues with that. So I think just the practicality of the ban is one of the issues.

Yeah, you mentioned some of those verification tools there. Do we know at all how this band would actually play out?

No, we don't, but I know that in Australia, they're working quite hard to whip this all out, but there's still big question marks on how these technologies will work. Academics in Australia criticizing these technologies for not working very well or being very easy to work around. And they also require buy in from the platforms who will have their own opinion about this band and how it will affect their business.

Yeah, because I guess the other thing as well is like, yeah, if we're talking about using AI or uploading some sort of ID that you know adults are going to have to be doing this as well, raises issues around privacy and giving too much information, right.

Yes, I mean we already give so many information to these platforms, right we don't think about all the data we share and all the insights that we give these platforms. But giving a copy of our ad seems like another step something that you usually gives your government rather than a social media platform that's from another country. So I think people are right to really raised some privacy concerns about that, particularly for young people.

To break it down, I guess what actually counts as social media because I guess you know you hear that term, and especially with the younger generation that your mind goes immediately to Instagram and TikTok, and you know, for a millennial that's probably more Facebook and things. But I've seen some discussion around arguments whether or not YouTube counts as this because like they've got YouTube shorts, which is essentially a TikTok line, right.

Yes, that's right.

I believe the spill is looking at any online platform that has an element of social interaction, which arguably is even broader than social media. So as you, as you rightly pointed out YouTube, you have the ability to comment and discuss underneath the video that would come within scope. Interestingly, Google lobbies quite hard to get YouTube removed from the Australian Band, so it could be interesting to see if that happens here, depending on if the bell picks up momentum.

But look, we're looking at a wide.

Scope of tools that are within scope, and that's raising again feasibility issues.

You know, is.

Discords or Twitch or readdits some of these other platforms which have different elements of social interaction, less news feed and less sort of you know content, maybe groand TikTok, but there is a large range, a wide range of tools that it's going to be really hard to keep on top of.

Yeah.

I saw Chris Hopkins as well mentioned something like Roadblocks, which is like a game that has a social chat element. I've never played it personally, but yet you know Fortnite and things like these, any things where anything where people can talk to each other, I guess is muddy, right, Yes, I.

Mean it's at what point are they try trying to, you know, ban the entire Internet, because the Internet is social interaction. So you know, I can understand the intent behind this bill, but it's just not workable. It's just not feasible.

There's also, like you mentioned something like Redda there, whereas you know, on a site like Redder, there's not the sort of expectation to be yourself in the same way that you know, Facebook and Instagram and like sort of traditional social media is that you're representing yourself. So you know, when you introduce that element of anonymity, that's a whole other issue, right.

That's right, And I suspect this sort of speaks to you know, this bill is designed by people who have a very different relationship to the Internet. Gen x's or baby boomers. We spend less time online and don't perhaps understand these nuances, these differences between a reddit it's and an instagram, the role of anonymity, as you were saying, they don't quite understand, you know, these these differences, and there is quite a generational difference I think on this.

Topic because at the moment, most sort of social medias have in their terms and conditions that you need to be thirteen, I believe to create an account. But you know, as you mentioned earlier, there are ways around there, and that thirteen year old limit comes not from developmental safety, but like a legislation in the US against collecting children's data.

Is that right? Yes, I believe that's true.

The way in which they manage or govern thirteen's and under is through users sharing their age. And then also, as I talked about before, using AI to make an assessment, if the person actually is older than thirteen, potentially something similar would need to happen for this ban, But it's very very flimsy, Like do you.

Think that thirteen is a good age for that sort of thing, because I mean, you know, a lot of development happens between thirteen and sixteen, So like, is there a line that needs to be drawn somewhere? And I guess, what's the difference between drawing at thirteen versus drawing it at sixteen.

It's a great question, and I think depending on who you ask, you get different answers.

I work in media and communication.

So I'm always interested in the kind of more social media and communications aspect of these questions.

If you talk to a psychologists, they'll think about this developmentally.

What I do think is interesting is these platforms are thinking about this right now. I know that Meta has developed a special type of account for teenagers for those ages between thirteen and sixteen. So they're responding to these increasing concerns about how much time young people are spending on their platforms, and they're offering a kind of paired back version of Satan Instagram and Facebook, whe there's more privacy settings, there's sort of nudges to get you off.

Parents are constantly telling us that they're really worried about the impact that social media is having on their children, and they say they're really struggling to manage access to social media. Now I'm here with National MP Catherine wed who has launched an incredible bill, a member's bill actually to restrict social media for under sixteen year olds.

That's right, Chris. This bill is about protecting children from online harm, including bullying, addiction, and exposure to inappropriate content. By restricting social media access for under sixteen year olds, it puts the onus on social media companies to verify that someone is over the age of sixteen before they access social media platforms, and it mirrors the approach taken in Australia and follows work in other countries like the UK, the EU and Canada.

Should the onus even really be on the companies to be doing these things?

Do you think? Absolutely?

I mean, these platforms have become multi billion dollar companies in a reasonably short amount of time, and they certainly should be responsible for a lot of a lot of these kind of alleged arms. I'm against the banning because I think it's too simplistic and it doesn't really work. But I'm definitely all for more regulation on these platforms to create safer spaces, spaces that children young people can use.

Also can be quite predatory.

I think we could do a lot to actually regulate these digital spaces like we do with physical spaces.

You know, we know that there are standards.

Every time you walk into a building, you know that it's a safe place to be right some the same digital spaces. It's a bit like the wild West, and I think we could give consumers and people confidence that these are safer spaces.

I read in an article you wrote that there's a fallacy in calling people addicted to social media. You argue that their habitual users. Do you mind just sort of explaining what you mean the difference there?

Sure, well, I think we're all pretty familiar with just casually saying I'm so addicted to Instagram, I'm so addicted to my phone. What's happened is, you know, the term is being so used so broadly, it's at risk of losing meaning. You talk to any clinical psychologist or someone that works in addiction services. There's a reason why there's

That's a higher.

Standard, and if we use it too broadly then it kind of undermines the experiences that actually addictive people do have.

I mean, obviously there's no shortage of documentation and commentary about are the dangers of spending too much time on social media? But there is also some positive aspects right that could be taken away from people if this band were to go ahead.

Absolutely.

One of my favorite things to do with my students is to ask them to temporarily go offline a day, forty out hours, thirty two hours whatever a weekend. And when you go offline, you become more acutely aware of your relationship with your phone, the bad and the good, and how we actually use these things for a lot of good things, keeping in touch with your grandma on the other side of the world, or you know, sort of overseas and you're you're keeping touch with or you

Also, yeah, I saw you mentioned because social media has you're able to spread out your experience and you know, used to just be calling out into the void. But if you're going through something now, and especially you know there's kids in like a rural towns that are going through something, they now have the ability to like talk to other people going through the same thing, where you know they used to have to hop on a bus to a major city to talk to someone about that.

Right, that's right.

I think if you're if you're already fit in in your community, then going offline is less of a tough task because people like you are in your community. But if you're different for whatever reason, if you're you know, if you're gay, or if you're from a different ethnicity and you stand out, then going offline could be a lot harder. Because these online communities that social media provides are these only spaces where you can be celebrated.

For who you are.

So social media is a crucial place for identity formation, and that kind of stuff has not really been talked about enough. So it's easy for the kids that already fit in to maybe go offline, but less so for the others.

The introduction of this bell sort of feels like a next step to what the government introduced last year. The Phones Away for the Day policy about banning phones and schools a year on from that now was introduced in April of last year. How has that gone?

Do we know? We know a little, but we could learn a lot more. So.

The students that have gone through this high school phone band have started university for the first time of this year, and I'm about to teach a lot of them and I can't wait to do that and put it to them and short you know what we tend to do in this area as we just to the parents, don't talk to the younger people enough.

There's been I think one survey.

Researchers have our students about their experiences and during the high school phone bank and the responses are mixed. Some enjoy the reduction of distractions, while others feel frustrated that they can't use their phones during the school breaks and think that maybe there's somewhere in the middle that the policy should should land. But we could do so much more research in the space, and it's research that I'm doing.

But just putting together a band slap dash in the middle of a weaker parliament and saying this is a solution, it's hard to believe that a solution that simple can actually solve a problem this complex. And here's just one reason why you're not actually banning kids from the internet,

Web, and actors suggested a quality public inquiry into social media rather than a band. Do you think that would work well?

I know that there's been a lot of these sorts of inquiries already, and there's a number of experts and interest groups that have already met and continuing to meet to chat about this. I think what Act's doing is trying to appea it's voting base, and they suspect a lot of the ACT membership agree with the band, or at least. What this highlights is how complex this issue is because on one level, a lot of people want the band, but at the same time it raises issues

It's I guess the million dollar question, but like, what is the answer here? Is there a success story from anywhere in the world that we could be looking to follow their leader or anything like that.

No, I don't believe. So it's far to early days. I know there are small towns in different parts of the world. There's maybe some Albans somewhere in the UK that have no phones for young people, and they're kind of interesting case studies, but it's generally too early to be able to give any definitive answer. I don't think

I don't think this is too is going to go away for a long time.

Yeah, Just it's interesting because a lot of people are saying like, oh, well, it's too late, you know, the horse has bolted. But it's interesting you're kind of saying it's actually too early in some ways.

Right.

Well, I wonder if they're referring to you know, you can't put social media back in the box because it's out, and so if you ban it for young people, they're just going to go somewhere else. And I do largely agree with that. You know, social media has changed the way we relate to each other norms. You know, I talk to students these days and just the expectation around

Thanks for joining us, Alex.

Thank you.

That's it for this episode of the Front Page. You can read more about today's stories and extensive news coverage at inzidherld dot co, dot NZID. The Front Page is produced by Ethan Sells. I'm Richard Martin. Subscribe to the Front Page on iHeartRadio or wherever you get your podcasts, and tune in on Monday for another look behind the headlines.