The social media industry has negatively affected the lives of nearly all minors since its creation, and its creators should be held responsible for the damage they have caused.
A high-profile Senate Judiciary Committee hearing was held on Wednesday in which CEOs from five of the most popular social media platforms were grilled intensely by senators and parents. Its primary intention was to pressure the CEOs into pledging their support for legislative proposals that are meant to stymie those who are attempting to use their platforms to sexually exploit children.
At one point, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg was pressured into apologizing to the rows of parents behind him for allowing his platform to be used to harm and even kill their children. And he should. All those CEOs should. The social media industry has done much more harm than good overall, and it can be linked to several serious crises affecting all children who partake in it.
Social media outlets have worsened the mental health of minors. It is regularly used by 95% of minors between the ages of 13 and 17, the legal age limit for minors to access it in the United States, and 40% of minors between the ages of 8 and 12 use it anyway. Being on social media for three hours a day on average doubles their likelihood of developing mental health problems.
Mental health troubles steadily increased as social media became more accessible to minors. The number of minors ages 6 to 17 who were diagnosed with either anxiety or depression in 2003 was 5.4%, 8% in 2007, and 8.4% in 2011. By 2019, before the COVID-19 lockdowns began, 10% of minors aged 3 to 17 were diagnosed with anxiety, and 37% of high schoolers reported feeling sad or hopeless.
Social media platforms distort the minds of children by showing them unrealistic expectations for beauty and sex and by regularly showing them obscene content. Youths who are enhanced by photo and video editing to look more attractive and are dressed in sexually provocative outfits dominate social media, racking up millions of followers and views and being recommended by algorithms to whatever users they can find.
This leads to pornography exposure at a young age. Twenty-nine percent of teenagers were shown pornographic content online without ever looking for it. Fifty-four percent saw it by age 13, with an astonishing 15% having seen it as early as age 11. The earlier the exposure begins, the more mentally damaging it will become later in life.
Social media outlets enable sexual exploitation and sex trafficking. Minors are easily blackmailed into doing sexual favors if nude images are acquired by a hostile party. The fear of cyberbullying and the permanent staying power of everything that is ever placed on the internet significantly increases the likelihood that minors will be too scared to seek help.
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Last year, I attended a lecture given by Joseph Sweeney, the founder and CEO of the Asservo Project, a global organization that fights human trafficking. He said that, in the modern age, “social media is the predator hunting ground” for sex traffickers. I asked him if he thought the smartphone had improved the fight against trafficking or made the problem worse. He replied, “It 100% made the problem much worse. It built a business plan for the predators.”
The social media industry is arguably one of the most destructive facets of the modern world. Not only is it incredibly damaging to the lives of all children, but it is easily exploited for the sick uses of child predators. We need to put severe restrictions on social media applications and hold Big Tech accountable for the lives it has ruined.
Parker Miller is a 2024 Washington Examiner Winter Fellow.