December 1, 2024 • 18 mins
A few months ago we spoke about the momentum that was building for age restrictions around social media for children under 16. On Friday those laws were passed in the Australian Parliament, so we thought this was the perfect opportunity to replay this episode, as it will help your family navigate the changes that are ahead.
In Australia, children below a certain age will be banned from social media as part of a national plan to counter its negative effects on youth. We discuss the government's commitments, the challenges this new legislation may face, and what parents can do now to protect their kids in a screen-saturated world.
In this episode:
- 'National Social Media Age Limit' | A Current Affair
- Why 13+ is the current legal age
- Collecting personal data
- Politics and obstacles facing this legislation
- The impact of social media on kids
- Using screens well: with intentionality, self-regulation, limits
- Play-based childhood vs screen-based childhood
- Holding tech companies accountable
- What parents can do while waiting for legislation to pass
- Kids need smart parents not smartphones
- Building community
- Unplug Childhood - sign the pledge & join the village today!
- The Screen Smart Series: 'Unplug Childhood' & 'Tweens, Teens & Screens' (included in membership).
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
It's their Happy Families podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just
wants answers Now.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
A few months ago, on The Happy Family's podcast, we
talked about the proposed social media bands for children under
the age of sixteen. If you missed the news on Friday,
those bands were rushed through federal Parliament with bipartisan support.
The opposition joined with the government to make sure that
the bands, or the legislation for the bands would be
carried it has been. Now I want to highlight at
the outset this legislation. I think has been rushed. There
(00:36):
are definitely some concerns with it, so much so that
the National Children's Commissioner, Ann Hollands has written publicly about
those concerns. Nevertheless, nevertheless, I think that they've done the
right thing. Those other concerns can be sorted out in
the wake in the aftermath of this. I know that
there are concerns about government overreach. They've got to make
sure they get this right so that adults are not penalized.
(01:00):
We've got to be protecting children anyway. Like I said
a little while ago, we discussed the proposed social media
bands on the podcast, it's still relevant everything that I
said I still agree with and I wanted to replay
that episode for you to help you to consider how
those new laws are going to affect your family. Twelve
months till it all kicks off, but this will give
you a good idea of what we're now in for.
(01:24):
Australian kids are going to be blocked from social media
until they reach a certain age under a national plant.
It's target growing concerns around its impacts on young minds. Today,
our conversation on the Happy Families podcast is about what
the olben Ezy government is committing to in terms of
legislation on social media age limits. This stems from South
(01:45):
Australia's Peter Melanascus I hope he said said his name
correctly making a lot of noise about this recently, there's
been a lot of campaigns. I've been pushing it pretty
hard myself and today on the podcast a conversation about this.
There are some people who have compared potential restrictions on
the technology to cigarettes and alcohol, because we're seeing more
and more evidence that as social media is harmful to children.
(02:08):
I was on a Current Affair with Ali Langdon and
a bunch of other people last Tuesday night, and I
want to share with you some clips from that as
we go through this. But first off, a couple of
things around this. We already do have social media age limits.
It's supposed to be thirteen and up. The thing is
nobody's keeping it. Nobody's well, I shouldn't say nobody. The
(02:29):
overwhelming majority of people are not sticking with those age limits.
I had a dad recently who had a seven year
old on TikTok, and dad said, is that okay? Or
should I get them off? I was like, no, no, no,
they need to be off. There is a reason that
thirteen is the minimum age for access to these social platforms.
And unfortunately that reason, while it's thirteen is better than seven,
(02:50):
it's got nothing to do with your children's well being.
It's got nothing to do with your children's cognitive or
psychological or emotional capacity to deal with what's happening on
social media. If we were taking those things into consideration,
a lot of adults would not be allowed on social media.
So why the age of thirteen as it now exists.
Let's start there. Back in the late nineteen nineties, before
(03:10):
social media was a thing, the tech companies were lobbying
the United States Congress. Most of the tech companies, of course,
are based in the United States. They were lobbying Congress
because the US Congress is where the legislative requirements for
what they do are centered around what the age of
Internet maturity should be. And Congress basically said, well, what
are you asking for, And they said, well, we're going
(03:32):
to be collecting personal data about the people who are
using our products when they're using them on the Internet,
on this new world Wide Web thing that's been developed.
Congress said, well, age of a data collection for personal
private details should probably be somewhere between sixteen and eighteen.
And the lobbyists, because they have deep pockets and because
not all politicians are focused primarily on what is the
(03:52):
common good, Well, the lobbyists one and the age of
twelve was decided, so twelve and under not allowed to
collect data. Thirteen and up. Tech companies collect data. That's
the only reason at thirteen is the number that's been selected.
Of course, over time we've seen massive changes in technology
and social media is at the very core of this conversation.
(04:14):
What's cure is to me around this is that we've decided,
thanks to people like Jonathan Hate who wrote The Anxious Generation,
and many other people who have been waving the flag
and saying this is bad for our kids. We've decided
that that age needs to be lifted, but we don't
really have great information, We don't have great evidence for
what it should be. The federal government has bipartisan support
(04:34):
on raising the age. That is Anthony Alberenzi and the
Labor Party have Peter Dutton and the Liberal Party on board.
That's fantastic, right. It means that whoever gets voted in
next year, we're going to start to see some changes
around this regardless. And on an issue like this, this
shouldn't come down to politics. This should come down to
the safety of our children. So well done to both
the major parties on this particular issue. The issue though,
(04:58):
becomes what a is going to be the legal requirement,
and that has not been identified. Neither the opposition nor
the government have told us that, but the whispers are
that it's going to be somewhere around about sixteen. Now.
Our experience in our happy families family with me and
Kylie and our six daughters has told us that this
is a thing. We can look at data all day
(05:21):
long and darted certainly points in the direction that some
children really do struggle and suffer as a result of
social media. But when we've watched what happens with our children,
I think that's been the big thing. I said this
on a current affair. The American thinker and writer and
academic Jonathan Hayite wrote a book called The Anxious Generation,
(05:42):
and in that book he talks about how, over the
last couple of decades, we've moved from what you would
call a play based childhood to a screen based childhood,
and what, unfortunately we see across our young people is
a decline in well being because they really truly believe
that they're getting their needs met by being on that screen.
(06:04):
It's a hollow imitation, but it makes them feel so
good in the moment, and so any parent who's trying
to have some sort of boundaries and limits around this
will come up against tremendous opposition because to the kids,
it just feels so so good. What we've seen in
our family and in the families of those that we're
close to, is that kids get less sleep. They're sleep deprived,
(06:26):
so they're more moody and irritable. They're more likely to
be withdrawn. They're less likely to be social and engaged
with the family or even with their friends. The connections
that they have online are shallow and hollow relative to
the connections that we have face to face and in
real life rather than in the virtual world. There's academic outcomes,
there's an academic slide when kids are focused on their screen.
(06:47):
And every parent that I talk to, literally every parent says, yeah,
attitude changes when the kids have been on screens too long.
When they go outside and they get some nature into
their lives, they suddenly become nicer people. I think that
I would sum it up by saying, there is an
urgency around protecting young minds, and that's why this legislation matters.
(07:07):
I feel like we've lost the generation. Does it discriminate
or is everybody affected you there's a huge amount of discrimination.
What research seems to show, and it's fairly fledgling research,
it's quite nascent, but research seems to show that kids
who have a really strong, positive, healthy life outside the
screen seem to do reasonably well when they're on screens
(07:29):
as well. But kids who have any kinds of offscreen struggles,
they retreat to their screens and that only amplifies and
exacerbates the offscreen struggles, but it also invites a whole
lot of other challenges because they're so embedded in their
screen life, their social media life. Yeah, a lot of people,
and this was one of the things that came up
on a current affair. I want to play you this snippet. Well,
(07:50):
I'd love to bring in Gabby and Matilda here. I
want you to explain to me your relationship with social
media and your phone.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I think, honestly, I'm pretty good relationship with social media
on my phone. Obviously, it is a big part of
my life, as it is a lot of other young people.
But I think the main use that I use it
for is connecting with my friends and family, and I
think that it allows me to have that connection even
if I'm not physically there with them.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
So, Gabby, do you think you have a healthy relationship
with social media.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
I think it's fairly healthy. I do use my phone
quite a bit, but I do set limits on there
as well, because I know I need to try to
regulate myself. I mean, every now and then I do
find myself in that dreaded doom scroll and just scrolling
and only just that, but I think it's mostly healthy. Yeah,
I'm mostly just talking to friends having a good time.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Now.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
When I listen to those two wonderful girls, what I
hear stories of self regulation. I hear examples of self
awareness and a willingness to pause, think about the way
that these tools and technologies are being used, and then
be intentional moving forward. They're really good examples of why
this ban or why this change might be problematic. And
(09:06):
I want to, like, I'm really upfront about it. I
don't think that this is necessary for everybody, in the
same way that I don't think that gambling laws are
necessary for everybody, or alcohol laws are necessary for everybody.
Why because there's plenty of people that honestly, they love
to gamble. I mean, I think gambling it's not for me.
(09:27):
I've never even put a dollar into the Poky's or
had a punt on the Melbourne Cup. I'm not a gambler.
I've got other things that I would rather do with
my cash. But I know several people who gamble. They
love it, and they don't have a problem with it.
There's no there's no hiding, there's no huge financial loss.
They really they set aside some money and they go
to the casino or they go to the races and
(09:49):
they have fun and it makes it more fun for them.
I get that. I don't endorse it, I don't encourage it,
but I get it. And it's the same with alcohol.
In spite of that, though, we still have laws around that.
Why because we know that harm is done to too
great a percentage of the population if we don't have laws.
An obstacle to the laws is that many people can
(10:09):
do it safely and it's unfair for them. I get
that when it's well used, it makes sense, but we've
got to draw a line in the sand. And when
we draw that line in the sand, it gives parents
the power to say to their kids, I know you
want this, I know it matters to you, but guess
what the government said, No, it's actually against the law.
(10:37):
Another obstacle is that big tech are probably going to
mount legal challenges to it. The technology is everywhere, it's pervasive,
so it's going to be really hard to get people off.
It's to be it's going to be one of those
things that's a really big challenge, and parents are going
to have to be responsible, I mean, enforceability on this
is going to be very, very tricky. I believe that
what's really going to be necessary is that technology will
(10:59):
need to be developed once the legislation is passed, where
there's some sort of neutral third party so that we're
not giving our personal details to the tech platforms, but
there's a government built technology third party platform that communicates
with the tech platforms. So we prove our identity through
the government platform, and then the government sends through the
(11:20):
little blue tick or the little green tick to the
tech platform that says this person is who they say
they are and they are of age to me. That's
what I think the tech will needs to be. That's
going to take years to develop, which means that we
still have to deal with this stuff at home in
our living rooms with our kids until this gets sorted out.
The thing is this matters. I mean, this really matters
(11:43):
for the well being of our children and young people.
This matters. Social media is the new smoking, and just
like it took decades for all the data to be
collected so that we could really look at this and
say smoking is killing people, this is bad for you,
It's going to take a while yet before we have
all the data that we need to move in this direction,
but I throw a big haymaker on a current affair.
(12:03):
This is what I had to say about what the
tech company is responsible for. I can't help but think
that Zuckerberg and the CEOs, the titans of social media industry,
are responsible for more human suffering among our young people
today than pretty much at any point in human history.
I just don't think that there's been any kind of
technology that's created this level of suffering in our youth.
(12:25):
It's absolutely abysmal. And if I can say this a
little bit directly, our feckless politicians who have allowed this
to happen at a global level have got a lot
of it, a lot to answer for as well the
lack of legislation around this. We're just going to introduce
this thing and will find proof of harm later. I
think that we need to be able to prove that
(12:45):
there's a good here before we let people just go
for it. And these stories, especially Kim's story, highlight what
so many parents are telling me, and that is that
social media as a general issue is absolutely at the
heart out of so much sleep deprivation, so much conflict,
so much school avoidance, so much bullying, so much mental
(13:06):
health challenge, and the list goes on and on and on.
Jonathan Hate says this best when he describes in his
book The Anxious Generation that we've moved from a play
based childhood to a screen based childhood, and obviously I
emphasize that on a current affair as well. Beyond this, though,
there are a couple of other things that we need
to consider, and I really hope the government are going
(13:28):
to do this. They've indicated that they want to hold
tech companies accountable for the full spectrum of harm that
happens on social media platforms because they facilitate and allow
scams and fake news and body shaming and other harmful
practices that I won't go into in this podcast. I
want to keep it reasonably light. I know it's a
(13:49):
very policy discussion today. It's a bit wonky from a
policy perspective, but the government is doing the right thing here.
I don't really like government interference. Really think that people
should be left to make up their own mind about
most things and make their own decisions as much as possible.
But I also recognize that there is a need for
government intervention and if companies cannot adhere to appropriate practices,
(14:14):
that consider the well being of our population. We need
to make sure that there are rules for those who
are going to conduct business in Australia. They're going to
take responsibility for the social and the commercial damage that
they cause, the emotional, the psychological damage that they cause.
I just think this matters so much. So what do
we do right now? Is there anything else that I
need to bring up and talk about? Just two things
(14:36):
beyond those age limits, which is what I've just talked about.
What I would encourage you to do as a parent
is to jump online and send an email, like literally
a three line email to your government representative and just
say I heard this on a podcast, I read it
in the news. I just want to say I'm right
behind this. I want to see this happen for the
safety of my kids and for the safety of our
(14:58):
society's kids. If you just send them that email, it
will take you about two minutes to do it. Just
that will make a difference. Why because it raises their
awareness of what their constituency wants. In addition, though, because
this will take a while, it's got to be legislated.
The legislation has got to be built, it's got to
be put together. Well, there's going to be challenges to it.
(15:19):
Once it finally gets through, technology is going to have
to be developed. This will not be a quick thing.
This is going to take a few years a few
years to get off the ground. In the meantime, we've
got to protect our kids, which means that while we
need government to do the heavy lifting around the legislative challenges,
we've actually got to put it into place in our homes.
That tells me that if you've got a seven year
(15:40):
old that wants to be on TikTok, you need to
say no, or if you've got a twelve year old,
say no. I've got a website where I'm not trying
to sell you anything. It's literally just a website that
says we need to unplugged childhood. The website's called Unplugged
Childhood dot org. I'll link to it in the show notes.
Unplug childhood dot org. A couple of really simple principles
(16:00):
that are there. Number One, we want to remember that
kids don't need smart phones, they need smart parents, and
smart parents give their kids dumb phones. Your children don't
need to be on social media, they don't need to
have all of the functionality and accessibility of a supercomputer
in their pocket. They just need a dumb phone if
you're concerned for their safety or you want them to
be able to contact you if something's going on and
(16:21):
they're not going to be in your presence. Number two,
keep kids off social media for as long as you can.
I would recommend that you just practice the delayed principle.
Talk to them about the things that I've talked about
on the podcast today and let them know you want
them to wait until they're at least thirteen, but you
prefer it to be fourteen or fifteen or sixteen, and
you might even come up with some incentives in some
(16:43):
ways that you can help them to do that and
still feel like they're not missing out, because that fear
of missing out is massive, Which brings me to the
third and final point. The easiest way to do that
is to build a great community with the other parents
that are involved, the parents who are the parents of
kids You're children are friends with. Gee I said that
in a challenging way. Let me try that again. Your kids' friends.
(17:05):
Talk to their parents, create some community, get to know them,
send them texts, arrange for the kids to get together,
send them down to the park, make sure that everybody
knows where they are, give them some freedom, let them
go back to a play based childhood for as long
as possible. That's what I was trying to say. More
information is available at Unplugged childhood dot org. Look, this
is a good news story. It's going to take a while.
(17:26):
I don't think anything's going to happen in a hurry.
But we've got a government who is finally saying we
will stand up to technology companies. We will legislate, We're
going to stop being feckless. We're going to stop cow
telling to the big tech and start doing something to
protect children and young people. There will be people who
are opposed to it, and they'll make good arguments, many
of which I'm sympathetic to. But ultimately I think that
(17:46):
the greater good, the common good of our children, needs
to come first. And that's where we're up to right now.
In terms of this news. Tomorrow on the Pod school
Readiness how to prep your kids for big school if
you've got a little one who is off for their
first year of school next year, we're talking with Zoe Rag.
Zoe Rags, an educator who specializes in this very thing.
(18:08):
That's on the Happy Families podcast, which is produced by
Justin Rulin from Bridge Media.
It's their Happy Families podcast.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just
wants answers Now.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
A few months ago, on The Happy Family's podcast, we
talked about the proposed social media bands for children under
the age of sixteen. If you missed the news on Friday,
those bands were rushed through federal Parliament with bipartisan support.
The opposition joined with the government to make sure that
the bands, or the legislation for the bands would be
carried it has been. Now I want to highlight at
the outset this legislation. I think has been rushed. There
(00:36):
are definitely some concerns with it, so much so that
the National Children's Commissioner, Ann Hollands has written publicly about
those concerns. Nevertheless, nevertheless, I think that they've done the
right thing. Those other concerns can be sorted out in
the wake in the aftermath of this. I know that
there are concerns about government overreach. They've got to make
sure they get this right so that adults are not penalized.
(01:00):
We've got to be protecting children anyway. Like I said
a little while ago, we discussed the proposed social media
bands on the podcast, it's still relevant everything that I
said I still agree with and I wanted to replay
that episode for you to help you to consider how
those new laws are going to affect your family. Twelve
months till it all kicks off, but this will give
you a good idea of what we're now in for.
(01:24):
Australian kids are going to be blocked from social media
until they reach a certain age under a national plant.
It's target growing concerns around its impacts on young minds. Today,
our conversation on the Happy Families podcast is about what
the olben Ezy government is committing to in terms of
legislation on social media age limits. This stems from South
(01:45):
Australia's Peter Melanascus I hope he said said his name
correctly making a lot of noise about this recently, there's
been a lot of campaigns. I've been pushing it pretty
hard myself and today on the podcast a conversation about this.
There are some people who have compared potential restrictions on
the technology to cigarettes and alcohol, because we're seeing more
and more evidence that as social media is harmful to children.
(02:08):
I was on a Current Affair with Ali Langdon and
a bunch of other people last Tuesday night, and I
want to share with you some clips from that as
we go through this. But first off, a couple of
things around this. We already do have social media age limits.
It's supposed to be thirteen and up. The thing is
nobody's keeping it. Nobody's well, I shouldn't say nobody. The
(02:29):
overwhelming majority of people are not sticking with those age limits.
I had a dad recently who had a seven year
old on TikTok, and dad said, is that okay? Or
should I get them off? I was like, no, no, no,
they need to be off. There is a reason that
thirteen is the minimum age for access to these social platforms.
And unfortunately that reason, while it's thirteen is better than seven,
(02:50):
it's got nothing to do with your children's well being.
It's got nothing to do with your children's cognitive or
psychological or emotional capacity to deal with what's happening on
social media. If we were taking those things into consideration,
a lot of adults would not be allowed on social media.
So why the age of thirteen as it now exists.
Let's start there. Back in the late nineteen nineties, before
(03:10):
social media was a thing, the tech companies were lobbying
the United States Congress. Most of the tech companies, of course,
are based in the United States. They were lobbying Congress
because the US Congress is where the legislative requirements for
what they do are centered around what the age of
Internet maturity should be. And Congress basically said, well, what
are you asking for, And they said, well, we're going
(03:32):
to be collecting personal data about the people who are
using our products when they're using them on the Internet,
on this new world Wide Web thing that's been developed.
Congress said, well, age of a data collection for personal
private details should probably be somewhere between sixteen and eighteen.
And the lobbyists, because they have deep pockets and because
not all politicians are focused primarily on what is the
(03:52):
common good, Well, the lobbyists one and the age of
twelve was decided, so twelve and under not allowed to
collect data. Thirteen and up. Tech companies collect data. That's
the only reason at thirteen is the number that's been selected.
Of course, over time we've seen massive changes in technology
and social media is at the very core of this conversation.
(04:14):
What's cure is to me around this is that we've decided,
thanks to people like Jonathan Hate who wrote The Anxious Generation,
and many other people who have been waving the flag
and saying this is bad for our kids. We've decided
that that age needs to be lifted, but we don't
really have great information, We don't have great evidence for
what it should be. The federal government has bipartisan support
(04:34):
on raising the age. That is Anthony Alberenzi and the
Labor Party have Peter Dutton and the Liberal Party on board.
That's fantastic, right. It means that whoever gets voted in
next year, we're going to start to see some changes
around this regardless. And on an issue like this, this
shouldn't come down to politics. This should come down to
the safety of our children. So well done to both
the major parties on this particular issue. The issue though,
(04:58):
becomes what a is going to be the legal requirement,
and that has not been identified. Neither the opposition nor
the government have told us that, but the whispers are
that it's going to be somewhere around about sixteen. Now.
Our experience in our happy families family with me and
Kylie and our six daughters has told us that this
is a thing. We can look at data all day
(05:21):
long and darted certainly points in the direction that some
children really do struggle and suffer as a result of
social media. But when we've watched what happens with our children,
I think that's been the big thing. I said this
on a current affair. The American thinker and writer and
academic Jonathan Hayite wrote a book called The Anxious Generation,
(05:42):
and in that book he talks about how, over the
last couple of decades, we've moved from what you would
call a play based childhood to a screen based childhood,
and what, unfortunately we see across our young people is
a decline in well being because they really truly believe
that they're getting their needs met by being on that screen.
(06:04):
It's a hollow imitation, but it makes them feel so
good in the moment, and so any parent who's trying
to have some sort of boundaries and limits around this
will come up against tremendous opposition because to the kids,
it just feels so so good. What we've seen in
our family and in the families of those that we're
close to, is that kids get less sleep. They're sleep deprived,
(06:26):
so they're more moody and irritable. They're more likely to
be withdrawn. They're less likely to be social and engaged
with the family or even with their friends. The connections
that they have online are shallow and hollow relative to
the connections that we have face to face and in
real life rather than in the virtual world. There's academic outcomes,
there's an academic slide when kids are focused on their screen.
(06:47):
And every parent that I talk to, literally every parent says, yeah,
attitude changes when the kids have been on screens too long.
When they go outside and they get some nature into
their lives, they suddenly become nicer people. I think that
I would sum it up by saying, there is an
urgency around protecting young minds, and that's why this legislation matters.
(07:07):
I feel like we've lost the generation. Does it discriminate
or is everybody affected you there's a huge amount of discrimination.
What research seems to show, and it's fairly fledgling research,
it's quite nascent, but research seems to show that kids
who have a really strong, positive, healthy life outside the
screen seem to do reasonably well when they're on screens
(07:29):
as well. But kids who have any kinds of offscreen struggles,
they retreat to their screens and that only amplifies and
exacerbates the offscreen struggles, but it also invites a whole
lot of other challenges because they're so embedded in their
screen life, their social media life. Yeah, a lot of people,
and this was one of the things that came up
on a current affair. I want to play you this snippet. Well,
(07:50):
I'd love to bring in Gabby and Matilda here. I
want you to explain to me your relationship with social
media and your phone.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
I think, honestly, I'm pretty good relationship with social media
on my phone. Obviously, it is a big part of
my life, as it is a lot of other young people.
But I think the main use that I use it
for is connecting with my friends and family, and I
think that it allows me to have that connection even
if I'm not physically there with them.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
So, Gabby, do you think you have a healthy relationship
with social media.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
I think it's fairly healthy. I do use my phone
quite a bit, but I do set limits on there
as well, because I know I need to try to
regulate myself. I mean, every now and then I do
find myself in that dreaded doom scroll and just scrolling
and only just that, but I think it's mostly healthy. Yeah,
I'm mostly just talking to friends having a good time.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
Now.
Speaker 1 (08:43):
When I listen to those two wonderful girls, what I
hear stories of self regulation. I hear examples of self
awareness and a willingness to pause, think about the way
that these tools and technologies are being used, and then
be intentional moving forward. They're really good examples of why
this ban or why this change might be problematic. And
(09:06):
I want to, like, I'm really upfront about it. I
don't think that this is necessary for everybody, in the
same way that I don't think that gambling laws are
necessary for everybody, or alcohol laws are necessary for everybody.
Why because there's plenty of people that honestly, they love
to gamble. I mean, I think gambling it's not for me.
(09:27):
I've never even put a dollar into the Poky's or
had a punt on the Melbourne Cup. I'm not a gambler.
I've got other things that I would rather do with
my cash. But I know several people who gamble. They
love it, and they don't have a problem with it.
There's no there's no hiding, there's no huge financial loss.
They really they set aside some money and they go
to the casino or they go to the races and
(09:49):
they have fun and it makes it more fun for them.
I get that. I don't endorse it, I don't encourage it,
but I get it. And it's the same with alcohol.
In spite of that, though, we still have laws around that.
Why because we know that harm is done to too
great a percentage of the population if we don't have laws.
An obstacle to the laws is that many people can
(10:09):
do it safely and it's unfair for them. I get
that when it's well used, it makes sense, but we've
got to draw a line in the sand. And when
we draw that line in the sand, it gives parents
the power to say to their kids, I know you
want this, I know it matters to you, but guess
what the government said, No, it's actually against the law.
(10:37):
Another obstacle is that big tech are probably going to
mount legal challenges to it. The technology is everywhere, it's pervasive,
so it's going to be really hard to get people off.
It's to be it's going to be one of those
things that's a really big challenge, and parents are going
to have to be responsible, I mean, enforceability on this
is going to be very, very tricky. I believe that
what's really going to be necessary is that technology will
(10:59):
need to be developed once the legislation is passed, where
there's some sort of neutral third party so that we're
not giving our personal details to the tech platforms, but
there's a government built technology third party platform that communicates
with the tech platforms. So we prove our identity through
the government platform, and then the government sends through the
(11:20):
little blue tick or the little green tick to the
tech platform that says this person is who they say
they are and they are of age to me. That's
what I think the tech will needs to be. That's
going to take years to develop, which means that we
still have to deal with this stuff at home in
our living rooms with our kids until this gets sorted out.
The thing is this matters. I mean, this really matters
(11:43):
for the well being of our children and young people.
This matters. Social media is the new smoking, and just
like it took decades for all the data to be
collected so that we could really look at this and
say smoking is killing people, this is bad for you,
It's going to take a while yet before we have
all the data that we need to move in this direction,
but I throw a big haymaker on a current affair.
(12:03):
This is what I had to say about what the
tech company is responsible for. I can't help but think
that Zuckerberg and the CEOs, the titans of social media industry,
are responsible for more human suffering among our young people
today than pretty much at any point in human history.
I just don't think that there's been any kind of
technology that's created this level of suffering in our youth.
(12:25):
It's absolutely abysmal. And if I can say this a
little bit directly, our feckless politicians who have allowed this
to happen at a global level have got a lot
of it, a lot to answer for as well the
lack of legislation around this. We're just going to introduce
this thing and will find proof of harm later. I
think that we need to be able to prove that
(12:45):
there's a good here before we let people just go
for it. And these stories, especially Kim's story, highlight what
so many parents are telling me, and that is that
social media as a general issue is absolutely at the
heart out of so much sleep deprivation, so much conflict,
so much school avoidance, so much bullying, so much mental
(13:06):
health challenge, and the list goes on and on and on.
Jonathan Hate says this best when he describes in his
book The Anxious Generation that we've moved from a play
based childhood to a screen based childhood, and obviously I
emphasize that on a current affair as well. Beyond this, though,
there are a couple of other things that we need
to consider, and I really hope the government are going
(13:28):
to do this. They've indicated that they want to hold
tech companies accountable for the full spectrum of harm that
happens on social media platforms because they facilitate and allow
scams and fake news and body shaming and other harmful
practices that I won't go into in this podcast. I
want to keep it reasonably light. I know it's a
(13:49):
very policy discussion today. It's a bit wonky from a
policy perspective, but the government is doing the right thing here.
I don't really like government interference. Really think that people
should be left to make up their own mind about
most things and make their own decisions as much as possible.
But I also recognize that there is a need for
government intervention and if companies cannot adhere to appropriate practices,
(14:14):
that consider the well being of our population. We need
to make sure that there are rules for those who
are going to conduct business in Australia. They're going to
take responsibility for the social and the commercial damage that
they cause, the emotional, the psychological damage that they cause.
I just think this matters so much. So what do
we do right now? Is there anything else that I
need to bring up and talk about? Just two things
(14:36):
beyond those age limits, which is what I've just talked about.
What I would encourage you to do as a parent
is to jump online and send an email, like literally
a three line email to your government representative and just
say I heard this on a podcast, I read it
in the news. I just want to say I'm right
behind this. I want to see this happen for the
safety of my kids and for the safety of our
(14:58):
society's kids. If you just send them that email, it
will take you about two minutes to do it. Just
that will make a difference. Why because it raises their
awareness of what their constituency wants. In addition, though, because
this will take a while, it's got to be legislated.
The legislation has got to be built, it's got to
be put together. Well, there's going to be challenges to it.
(15:19):
Once it finally gets through, technology is going to have
to be developed. This will not be a quick thing.
This is going to take a few years a few
years to get off the ground. In the meantime, we've
got to protect our kids, which means that while we
need government to do the heavy lifting around the legislative challenges,
we've actually got to put it into place in our homes.
That tells me that if you've got a seven year
(15:40):
old that wants to be on TikTok, you need to
say no, or if you've got a twelve year old,
say no. I've got a website where I'm not trying
to sell you anything. It's literally just a website that
says we need to unplugged childhood. The website's called Unplugged
Childhood dot org. I'll link to it in the show notes.
Unplug childhood dot org. A couple of really simple principles
(16:00):
that are there. Number One, we want to remember that
kids don't need smart phones, they need smart parents, and
smart parents give their kids dumb phones. Your children don't
need to be on social media, they don't need to
have all of the functionality and accessibility of a supercomputer
in their pocket. They just need a dumb phone if
you're concerned for their safety or you want them to
be able to contact you if something's going on and
(16:21):
they're not going to be in your presence. Number two,
keep kids off social media for as long as you can.
I would recommend that you just practice the delayed principle.
Talk to them about the things that I've talked about
on the podcast today and let them know you want
them to wait until they're at least thirteen, but you
prefer it to be fourteen or fifteen or sixteen, and
you might even come up with some incentives in some
(16:43):
ways that you can help them to do that and
still feel like they're not missing out, because that fear
of missing out is massive, Which brings me to the
third and final point. The easiest way to do that
is to build a great community with the other parents
that are involved, the parents who are the parents of
kids You're children are friends with. Gee I said that
in a challenging way. Let me try that again. Your kids' friends.
(17:05):
Talk to their parents, create some community, get to know them,
send them texts, arrange for the kids to get together,
send them down to the park, make sure that everybody
knows where they are, give them some freedom, let them
go back to a play based childhood for as long
as possible. That's what I was trying to say. More
information is available at Unplugged childhood dot org. Look, this
is a good news story. It's going to take a while.
(17:26):
I don't think anything's going to happen in a hurry.
But we've got a government who is finally saying we
will stand up to technology companies. We will legislate, We're
going to stop being feckless. We're going to stop cow
telling to the big tech and start doing something to
protect children and young people. There will be people who
are opposed to it, and they'll make good arguments, many
of which I'm sympathetic to. But ultimately I think that
(17:46):
the greater good, the common good of our children, needs
to come first. And that's where we're up to right now.
In terms of this news. Tomorrow on the Pod school
Readiness how to prep your kids for big school if
you've got a little one who is off for their
first year of school next year, we're talking with Zoe Rag.
Zoe Rags, an educator who specializes in this very thing.
(18:08):
That's on the Happy Families podcast, which is produced by
Justin Rulin from Bridge Media.
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