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LAST UPDATE | 11 Nov 2024
TRUMP’S VICTORY IN the US presidential election marked November 6th as a bad day for public health. With his lack of support for robust public health infrastructure, his trampling all over the climate, social and environmental impacts of big business, and his support of the market at any cost, the outlook for health and well-being under his leadership looks bleak.
In contrast, November 7th was a spectacularly good day for public health. Minister for Health, Stephen Donnelly announced the passing of legislation that will increase the minimum legal age of the sale of tobacco products to 21 years of age. On enactment, Ireland will become the first country in the EU to raise its age of sale to 21, helping young people avoid a lifetime of addiction and illness that tobacco smoking brings. The measure is hoped to accelerate the decline in adult smoking, which has remained at 18% for several years, and to reduce smoking prevalence among children to zero.
Minister Donnelly said that Ireland has been a world leader in tackling smoking, beginning with the workplace smoking ban in 2004 and continuing with ‘a range of measures including restrictions around the sale, advertising and packaging of smoking products to make them less attractive and less available to people.’
On the same day, a second pronouncement of major portent helped to quell some of the despair felt at the prospect of four years of Donald Trump at the helm in the US.
Australian Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese announced that before the end of 2024, legislation would be introduced to ensure that Australian teens will have to be 16 or older to use online social media. Even better, the government will hold platforms responsible and accountable to ensure compliance.
This move would finally see one government showing the political courage to protect children and young teens that could act as a template for governments across the globe, including the Irish government to follow suit. The ripple of concern about teen access to social media is gaining momentum and not a moment too soon.
The new legislation would ensure that social media platforms would be penalised for breaching the age limit, but underage children and their parents would not.
‘Social media is doing harm to our kids and I’m calling time on it,’ the Prime Minister said, adding that the legislation would take effect 12 months after the law had passed.
‘The onus will be on social media platforms to demonstrate they are taking reasonable steps to prevent access. The onus won’t be on parents or young people,’ Mr Albanese said.
Head of Safety at Meta, Antigone Davis, the company behind Facebook and Instagram said its platforms would respect any age limitations the government wanted to introduce while predictably suggesting that it might be better if parents controlled the apps that their children can use, that would be a ‘simple and effective solution.’
Elon Musk’s X (formerly Twitter) did not immediately respond to a request for comment and TikTok declined to comment.
Last September, UK TV Presenter Kirstie Allsopp caused a media storm for allowing her teenage son to go inter-railing around Europe, suggesting that children are being exposed to more dangers on their mobile phones than they could ever be through travel.
In defence of her actions, she referred to Jonathan Haidt, author of the New York Times bestseller The Anxious Generation where the social psychologist suggested that the toxic combination of mobile phones and risk-averse parenting are at the root of plummeting mental health in teens and young adults.
‘Technology has created a great rewiring of childhood,’ Haidt said.
‘Think of all the exciting things you ever did. Think of all the trouble you got in. Think of all the adventures you had. Think of all the flirting, the fun. Now take 80 per cent of it and replace it with screen time. And that’s kind of what happened to people born after 1995.’
Online pornography is a real and very disturbing issue when it comes to access to social media. A paper published by the UK Children’s Commissioner last year made very clear the extent of the problem. The report does not make for easy reading, but the Commissioner said, ‘nor should it.’
The report stated; ‘I truly believe we will look back in 20 years and be shocked by the content to which children were exposed. Let me be absolutely clear: online pornography is not equivalent to a ‘top shelf’ magazine. The adult content parents may have accessed in their youth could be considered ‘quaint’ in comparison to today’s world of online pornography. Depictions of degradation, sexual coercion and aggression are commonplace and disproportionately targeted against teenage girls.’
The average age at which children first see pornography is 13. By age nine, one in ten had seen pornography. This increased to one in four (27%) by age 11 and one in two by age 13.
The majority had encountered violent pornography by age 18. Twitter (now X) was the online platform where it was most likely encountered by young people. Other mainstream platforms, Instagram and Snapchat ‘rank closely after dedicated pornography sites.’
With this type of data emerging from young people themselves, we are deluding ourselves when we listen to mainstream social media platforms suggesting that their content is not harming young teens.
Prof Haidt states that the evidence is very clear: 13, the current (and unenforced) minimum age for opening an account on social media platforms, is too low.
Apart from access to pornography, since the iPhone release in 2007, teens changed from tapping out messages to friends mainly one person at a time to ‘spending most of their waking hours consuming content from strangers as well as friends, playing mobile games, watching videos and posting on social media.’
This means losing out on all those other skills, experiences, interactions, brain connections and life lessons that are a vital part of progression into mature adulthood.
Robust age verification measures would take the very real pressure off parents to allow their kids and teens access to social media, to ensure they are not excluded from social activities that everyone else is involved in. Teens won’t feel excluded if everyone else is in the same boat.
A level playing field where no young teenagers are on social media takes the pressure off everyone – teenagers and parents alike.
Global markets are supported by governments to drive growth. But growth must be tempered by wellbeing for every age, income group and ethnicity. Prime Minister Albanese has set the ball rolling for governments across the globe to mandate social media platforms to protect teenagers from access to social media.
Our government leaders have shown leadership and political courage in taking on the impact of tobacco on the health of young teens by raising the legal age of smoking from 18 to 21.
It is time for a similar level of exuberance and political ambition to ensure that online platforms are mandated to protect young teenagers from the irrevocable harms to mental health that ensue from unrestricted access to social media.
Dr Catherine Conlon is a public health doctor and former director of human health and nutrition, safefood.
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Social media should be banned for the U18
I wouldn’t be a 100% sure on your opening statement Dr.Conlon.
Hopefully his appointment of RFK will have sweeping changes across the pharmaceutical industry bringing about legislation preventing the sales agents ,ie; some Doctors, from over prescribing some patients with medication in order to boost sales.
@martin lawlor:
The opening statement is pretty pathetic, otherwise not a bad read.
@Regular John: Fully agree John ,a good reason absolutely
@martin lawlor: good read ,sorry
@martin lawlor: yes a very ridiculous opening statement, completely embarrassing to read.
@martin lawlor: Public Health begins with the environment in which people have to live.
And continues into health care.
Trump is likely to be disastrous for both, and everything in-between.
So that first statement is apropos.
Fair play to the Australian government!
It’s great to finally see a government take responsibility and act decisively with regard to the huge negative psychological impact social media companies are having on our children. Hopefully Irish politicians will follow suit. I think it could be a hugely impactful public health measure…
TBH , alienating,insulting & besmirching your audience in open line is never a good idea or gambit…… I take it that President Trump is responsible for young uns’ having access to social media….. oh, this woke leftie meltdown isn’t going to last for 4yrs is it???
@Frank Mc Carthy: Looks like the Trump fans have been triggered by accurate criticism of The Great Leader. I hope that won’t spoil your whole day, Stephen.
@Brendan O’Brien: morning brenny, all your accounts still smarting from the pain of your great wallopping by the president of peace?? Plenty of lefty tears still to weep?? Lol, off topic here but reports coming in President Trump has ALREADY put evil dictator putin back in his box. Great the US are finally appointing a border czar
@Brendan O’Brien: Hold up B, is this the “failure of a reply, try harder” shmuck? Was wondering why I hadn’t seen him in a while.
@ecrowley ecrowley: No, it’s a different schmuck, who posts here as ‘Frank Mc Carthy’, ‘Kevvy kerrr’, and a couple of dozen others.
@Brendan O’Brien: two houses, popular vote, smashed the electoral college, who exactly is triggered lol
@Paul M Doe: ah leave brenny alone. . It’s always a bit of craic when all his accounts start replying & pretend ‘arguing’ between the accounts…. I like coming on here to see brennys latest codology, lol
@Brendan O’Brien: Ah jayziz.
Is that same clock ticking for politicians
Do you have some kind of remit, Ms Conlon? In your previous article, you slated RFK and declared your political and personal bias openly. If you are writing for a newspaper, your job is journalist, not Mammy to the nation. The two letters before your name does not mean that what you say is how it is.
@Always Question: as per footnote: Dr Catherine Conlon is a public health doctor and former director of human health and nutrition, safefood.
So much delusional thinking in a single article. This harking back to the 1990′s for the solution to all these stated problems by supposedly restricting children and teenagers access to the Internet as a whole, or to individual platforms, illustrates the complete technological illiteracy of those making these suggestions.
Anyone that wants to access anything online, can and will do so, and that includes teenagers, because Pandora’s box has been well and truly opened.
It’s also no longer a case of turning off the family computer to impose restrictions, or the prohibitive expense of a smartphone and data restricting access.
Any teenager in Ireland today, could buy a functioning smartphone, unlimited data, a vpn subscription and be online unrestricted in a few minutes for €100 or less.
@Dvsespaña: Access to the Internet is one thing.. access to social media platforms is another. These companies can be compelled to restrict access on an age basis with stringent ID regulations in place. Much the same as alcohol. Can children under 18 still access it ? Yes they can.. Is it our duty as a society to put in place safeguards restricting access ? Yes it is.This “sure, there’s nothing we can do about it now” attitude doesn’t wash with me. We are talking about social media sites.. a VPN is useless if you don’t have a legitimate age verified account to access.. and should a minority of teenagers who can afford new phones and VPN subscriptions be arsed going to the trouble of using fake IDs or trying to circumvent the stringent age restriction regulations.. the vast majority won’t.
@Brian: If they want to watch porn or violent content, there are plenty of sites. No registration required. So why would they bother with vpns?
@FlipBip: If the latest new 1990′s based understanding of how current technology works, was to implement a geographical based ban on accessibility of platforms or content, which is often a suggestion made by the uninformed then a vpn would bypass all restrictions.
Just do it already.
Our Irish World leaders are giving this a miss as well? Lol
The war on information has well and truly begun.
@Cole Palmer: Usual hyperbolic response.. lol. For the purposes of clarity.. What information specifically are you referring to? What war ? Are you one of the good guys in this war with your fake accounts trolling news sites ?
I was let travel in Europe at 16. I learnt a lot about people. It was an experience I’m glad I was let have.
Today’s children are being parented by remote control. They are like tortoises without shells.
Opening sentence of this article is a total joke.
How can you vote at 18 which means you are able to reach an adult decision on who’s going to run the country and then be told you are not adult enough to make a decision on smoking until you are 21. But you will still be able to purchase alcohol at 18. Age of consent at 17… makes no sense
A ploy to force people to use an ID to post online. Goodbye Internet anonymity, goodbye dissent, hello tyranny.
@FlipBip: Why do you feel the need to be anonymous online ? It’s no coincidence that every troll in this comments section is anonymous. Research has found that individuals with negative and unstable self-perceptions are drawn to anonymity and seek the freedom to take on different personas to satisfy various needs. Individuals struggling with self-consciousness and low self esteem also prefer to remain anonymous online. Dissent is entirely possible without anonymity.. but I suspect that’s not what you’re not really worried about.. Every anonymous troll on this platform wouldn’t dare say or speak in the manner they do in their personal interactions with people.. it’s high time cowardess of this nature was addressed.
@Brian: Don’t say I didn’t warn you, “Brian”.
@Brian: Address the cowardess huh? I thought it was all about protecting the kids..
@FlipBip: I already addressed those concerns in an earlier comment. My reply was to you and your comment about anonymity and trynany.. and online trolls and their cowardice. Of course I’m not remotely surprised you haven’t engaged in anything I said.. ‘ don’t say I didn’t warn you’ lol. FlipBib The Oracle has spoken .. lol
@Brian: Okay then, “Brian”. You can choose to believe politicians and their motives. I think you’re extremely naive to do so, but you do you.
@FlipBip: So, to surmise.. you came on an article addressing children’s access to social media platforms and the inherent danger it poses to them, to tell us that any attempt to restrict access is really a ploy to restrict your rights as an adult (I’ll assume you’re an adult) to anonymity and dissent and trynany will ensue. No wonder your so desperate to protect on line anonymity.
@Brian: Use your brain, “Brian”. To restrict children’s access, then EVERYONE must provide ID. How else could this work? Not to mention the fact that every “damaging” thing that can be seen on social media can be seen elsewhere on the Internet without the need to register an account. So it solves nothing. But you go ahead, swallow the bs that you’re being fed by people consistently lie about everything. I’m sure they just have your kids best interests at heart. Lol.
@FlipBip: Can you explain how we didn’t devolve into tyranny before the Internet, but will if we have to provide ID to access *certain* sites on the Internet?
@ItWasLikeThatWhenIGotHere: Sorry but I don’t engage with anonymous people. Please provide me with your full name to continue the conversation. Throw in your home address, for good measure.
China have been trying out some interesting ideas. Not sure if they have made any progress
TikTok is nothing more than a Chinese propaganda machine which deliberately boosts anti-West videos to show to users in Europe and America which tells them that Western society is unfair, racist, colonialist, evil etc. and that there are 100 “genders”, police should be abolished, Communism/Socialism is brilliant, it’s normal to hate your life/be depressed and Hamas are a great bunch of lads. The fact that this app hasn’t been banned already is outrageous. It has no educational value and it only pumps left-wing ideology on impressionable young people. Meanwhile, TikTok in China only provides young people with educational content and viewpoints that are pro-CCP. It needs to go if we want to preserve the Western values that underpin our way of life. Young people are now warped in their views.
@Frank O’Hara: The way algorithms generally work, is to give you more of what you look at, in an attempt to personalise your content experience.
Try spending an hour looking online at something you wouldn’t normally show an interest in, and see how much what you are presented or recommend with shifts towards that, the same goes for all platforms.
It reminds me of when the internet first became generally accessible in Ireland through dial up, and I asked a man that had recently got online, about what he thought about the access to a new level of information through search engines? (albeit nothing compared to today) he said, its nothing but naked women!
I asked him, well what are you searching for? Naked women he replied…
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