this post was submitted on 02 Jul 2026
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Privacy
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I would never have believed it possible that almost all politicians of ostensibly democratic countries almost simultaneously agree to prevent young people from having fun, being happy and finding meaning and fulfillment in their lives. How do these people think of themselves as the good guys?
Hasn't virtually every single study ever performed on the subject found a strong, direct link between unhappiness and social media use?
To a large degree, yes, but blanket bans on social media use for minors will fail for multiple reasons.
On the bright side, young people are learning about circumventing government censorship.
Very true, but that may make things worse down the line. Once they realize that kids are circumventing their restrictions, they won't think, "Hmm, maybe a blanket ban of social media for minors wasn't a great idea." They're just going to double down and say that there needs to be more hardcore restrictions on all internet/computer activity. More sensorship, more data harvesting, mandatory governement spyware in all devices.
Essentially the Great Firewall in China. Many governments have already expressed interest in modeling national internet access after China.
From what I've seen, the answer is it's complicated. On avg, you're right, and it prob does cause unhappiness and mental health probs. But there are unique situations where it can be helpful. Ex, people who do not fit norms of thier peers, and find healthy connections with others more like themselves. So it has no single, simple universal answer.
The algos, esp on big tech social media like FB, IG, TT, X, etc, are very much designed to make you unhappy and outraged. Even the data scientists who designed the algos have testified to that fact before the US congress. B/c anger and outrage is the most powerful way to make you engage more. TT's internal research shows the more you use TT, the more probs you have with cognitive skills like memory formation, empathy, and anxiety.
Ofc, the harms of social media doesn't mean these bills are the right way to handle that. I believe we have a prob. But this is not the right solution.
If that is so, which I do not know, the only logical explanation is that people who are already unhappy, for unrelated reasons, are more likely to need to find at least some happiness in their lives by participating in online communities.
because these are not democratic countries, these countries are the same that gave birth to fascism and pushed for years for the surveillance state you so fondly complain about in china, the same countries that kill people based on metadata, this is the logical conclusion. as always, ewwwrope is filled to the brim with the flowery phrases of rhetoric and not actual praxis on any meaningful thing that could imply the wellbeing of their citizens.