A Surgeon General Warning Label Must Appear on Social Media Apps, 42 State Attorneys General Demand 46
It's hard to get 42 states to agree on much. But a bipartisan group of attorneys general on Tuesday demanded that Congress require Surgeon General warning labels on social media apps to help curtail addiction and a mental health crisis among young adults. From a report: "As state Attorneys General, we sometimes disagree about important issues, but all of us share an abiding concern for the safety of the kids in our jurisdictions -- and algorithm-driven social media platforms threaten that safety," the 42 attorneys general said in a letter to Congress. States have taken legal action against a number of social media companies, including Meta and TikTok. But they argue more needs to be done in Washington to alert people to the dangers social media platforms present.
"In addition to the states' historic efforts, this ubiquitous problem requires federal action -- and a surgeon general's warning on social media platforms, though not sufficient to address the full scope of the problem, would be one consequential step toward mitigating the risk of harm to youth," the attorneys general said. The letter echoed much of what Surgeon General Vivek Murthy outlined in a scathing New York Times op-ed in June, that drew a direct comparison between the apps -- TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat and others -- to cancer causing cigarettes.
Murthy cited several studies, including a 2019 American Medical Association study published in JAMA that showed teens who spend three hours a day on social media double their risk of depression. Teens spend nearly five hours a day on social media apps, according to a Gallup poll.
"In addition to the states' historic efforts, this ubiquitous problem requires federal action -- and a surgeon general's warning on social media platforms, though not sufficient to address the full scope of the problem, would be one consequential step toward mitigating the risk of harm to youth," the attorneys general said. The letter echoed much of what Surgeon General Vivek Murthy outlined in a scathing New York Times op-ed in June, that drew a direct comparison between the apps -- TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Snapchat and others -- to cancer causing cigarettes.
Murthy cited several studies, including a 2019 American Medical Association study published in JAMA that showed teens who spend three hours a day on social media double their risk of depression. Teens spend nearly five hours a day on social media apps, according to a Gallup poll.
Good (Score:2)
Pushing back against this social media crap is long overdue. I suppose it took for there to be long enough to see the gross mental health effects of near-constant screen time. Unfortunately, this is only the first step in a fight that will probably be just as difficult as the fight against the tobacco companies was.
Re: (Score:3)
Maybe you want to live under a nanny state protecting you from wrongthink, but I don't. As much as I may personally disagree with some of what gets said on social media (especially X), I would never support shutting it down. History has demonstrated the power to censor will inevitably always end up being abused.
Re:Good (Score:4, Insightful)
Generally I agree with you but we restrict children from doing all sorts of things that are bad for them. Once they are 18, then they can do as they please.
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The restricting part should be up to the individual parents, beyond the existing federal age limit of 13. You might be surprised to learn this, but in some states the age of consent between similarly-aged peers is also as low as 13. Yep, we're saying 13 is mature enough to understand the consequences of producing another human life (that they're not even old enough to earn a living to support), but communicating on online social media networks is somehow a bridge too far.
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That kind of laissez-faire thinking isn't very popular. Governments are there for a reason. This is a good enough reason. Sorry, not sorry.
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Whenever the government claims to be doing something for the children, it's never really about the children, and you're not going to be pleased with the end result.
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Are you particularly displeased with the restrictions on smoking and alcohol? I sure am pleased with them.
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Are you particularly displeased with the restrictions on smoking and alcohol? I sure am pleased with them.
My parents had to buy my booze when I was a teenager, but not for the reasons you might be imagining. I was quite a bit into culinary arts as a teen, and funny thing, the liquor stores don't believe you when you say you need it for a recipe. It's certainly anecdotal, but since alcohol was never treated as something to be obsessed over or feared while I was growing up, I don't even drink as an adult. I do, however, still sometimes use it for cooking.
I've never smoked, have no intention of ever smoking, an
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So, you vehemently hated warning labels on cigarette packs?
Legacy of state attorney generals (Score:2)
Just a few of the fine 'accomplishments' state attorney generals have and times when they were protecting the public from egregious corporate activities.and putting bad companies out of business
- Wells Fargo systemically opening accounts for persons fraudulently, identify theft on a massive scale nationwide. Bank bigger than ever, not even broken up into 50 state level banks. Rewarded for illegal activity by getting even bigger.
- Credit bureau lets hackers steal corporate data, the credit reports for 10s
Warnings (Score:4, Funny)
Maybe if warning signs get posted all over indicating that killing people is bad murders will stop as well.
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Worse, this will train kids to ignore warnings.
Not been around many kids, have you? They don't need trained on how to ignore warnings. They do that by default.
It's the adults that don't ignore warnings, but instead see them as some sort of red flag and they absolutely insist on being a bull that trouble me some. Not enough to want to stop every individual, but enough to wonder what the overall effect will be on all of society if enough take that mindset.
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Worse, this will train kids to ignore warnings.
Too late. The explicit language warning on record albums already became something of a badge of honor.
We ended up with musicians putting random F-bombs in their songs just to get that little bit of extra street cred.
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Dude.. seriously?
Catholics have one of the Commandments, "Thou shall not kill." We kill prolifically. (I'm a reformed catholic. Turned atheist in my teens)
There's even laws against murder. People still kill prolifically.
You can (theoretically) take every weapon (or "arm" in the old language) from every person in the entire world -- to include military and cops.. and people will still kill prolifically. With the phone (the old-school landline phones with a real bell in them), with a chair, a hammer, a c
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Sorry, I forgot to add the sarcasm tags to my original post.
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While I agree that these warning will do nothing, Its just wasting tax payer money debating it. I disagree with people kill prolifically (outside war), I assume you are referring to killing people.
From here https://ourworldindata.org/gra... [ourworldindata.org] the murder rate is 6.81 per 100,000 people in 2021 in the USA people that is not even close to what I would call prolific. You are in fact more likely to kill yourself than someone (https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/suicide-rate-who-mdb?tab=table) at 13.1 out of 100,000
missing states (Score:3, Informative)
When there are 42 AGs listed, I wondered which states didn't sign on. Here they are:
That adds up to more than 50 owing to DC and some territorial AGs.
No you don't (Score:3, Insightful)
If you did you wouldn't have the governor of Georgia saying the best he could do is offer thoughts and prayers for those killed during the first school shooting of the new school year. Or have political candidates say school shootings are something we have to live with. Or 12 year old girls who are raped and become pregnant have to have the rapist's child.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
The Democrats buy the bullshit about social media being harmful to mental health (never mind that driving automobiles is incontrovertibly proven to take a deadly toll and we're collectively okay with that).
The Republicans are worried social media is going to turn people into Democrats.
Re: No you don't (Score:2)
Cost-benefit analysis. Republicans are always shit at that.
Children don't need access to social media. Cars have a utility and society accepts a small risk.
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I'm guessing you missed the "young adults" part in TFS. We're not talking about the children sort of kids, this is about teenagers. Funny thing is, at least here in Florida you can start learning to drive as early as 15. That's only 2 years away from the federal minimum age for an online account of 13.
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Unfortunately, people are still vulnerable to being manipulated until at least age 113.
Feel good measures are easy to get onboard with (Score:3)
Like putting warnings on packs of cigarettes, as if that ever prevented people from smoking.
I'll tell you what curbs smoking: taxing the shit out of tobacco product.
Want to protect people from social media? Tax the shit out of social media.
But with a twist: don't tax social media users. Tax social media companies. As in, levy a special "internet health hazard" tax on those companies - the rationale being, they're harmful to people's mental health, therefore they should pay up to offset the healthcare cost to society.
If each user starts costing social media companies enough money, it might force them to make users pay for the service instead of putting them under surveillance and monetizing the surveillance data, which is really how normal, non-dystopian businesses should operate. And if people pay for the service, it will force the social media company to treat them better so they don't go away.
If 42 states agree to do that, I'll be a lot more impressed than bipartian support for bullshit surgeon general warnings that do nothing.
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I don't even smoke and I find anti-smoking advocates to be obnoxious. Because you know even if they could wave a magic wand and make tobacco disappear, they still wouldn't be satisfied because it's never truly been about the smoking - it's about control. It just gets under their skin that some people are into things they aren't, and they won't be satisfied until they've forced everyone else to live in their idea of the perfect society.
If you don't want to smoke, don't smoke. If you don't like social medi
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Like putting warnings on packs of cigarettes, as if that ever prevented people from smoking.
Maybe they just help people choose which packs to buy. Several comedians have noted that they pick packs based on the warnings ... :-)
"WARNING: Tobacco smoke can harm your children."
I guess this one's okay 'cause I don't have any kids.
List of cigarette warnings: Cigarette Labeling and Health Warning Requirements [fda.gov]:
Re: (Score:3)
Im my long number of years on this earth I have never once seen a tax on a company that was not passed onto the consumer in some fashion. Every single telecom tax, fee, judicial judgment, has always been passed on to the consumer no matter how bad you want to stick it to the telcos. Thats my only problem with the mentality of fining corporations. Unless its jail time for every mis level management and higher, ithey are just laughing all the way to their private Caribbean retreats.
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I never claimed the user wasn't going to bear the brunt. Quite the contrary: I said social media companies would be forced to make them pay and that's the whole point.
Making people pay for "free" stuff has several beneficial effects:
- It drives people to get off the social media addiction - which is what this story is about.
- It empowers the users that stick around because they become true customers, not the products themselves.
- It incentivizes social media companies to treat them like customers rather tha
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It would be nice. IMO social media is a cancer on society. People are more disconnected than ever while living in an illusion they are more connected and have more friends. I just had a conversation with my sons school because he missed out on a ‘social’ event involving free popsicles and a outdoor break because to qualify you had to post a like and follow their instagram account. We wont let him have social media. Hes 14 and had CP. the last thing he needs is anonymous bullies.
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Schools absolutely should not be requiring or encouraging the use of social media. That is completely overstepping the bounds on an issue of parental rights.
Re: (Score:2)
Want to protect people from social media? Tax the shit out of social media.
But with a twist: don't tax social media users. Tax social media companies. As in, levy a special "internet health hazard" tax on those companies - the rationale being, they're harmful to people's mental health, therefore they should pay up to offset the healthcare cost to society.
If each user starts costing social media companies enough money, it might force them to make users pay for the service instead of putting them under surveillance and monetizing the surveillance data, which is really how normal, non-dystopian businesses should operate. And if people pay for the service, it will force the social media company to treat them better so they don't go away.
This I would like to see.
Re: (Score:2)
Why not put a warning label on all electronic devices ?
What about the people driving while reading warning labels, you insensitive clod? I demand warning labels for the warning labels!
Something must be done! (Score:2)
Can we just teach media literacy in schools? (Score:1)
Re: (Score:2)
What about underprivileged kids who can't afford smartphones (or the service)?
The affordable connectivity thing looks to be dead in the water, so I'm sure it's back to McDonald's WiFi for the low-income families.
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Mostly I was approaching it from the relevancy aspect of teaching something that doesn't necessarily apply to all students. Some kids aren't going to have smartphones because they're not allowed by their parents, and others won't have them because of budgetary constraints. At best maybe it could be an elective.
At any rate though, the problem with social media for teens is that teens are generally assholes towards each other. I'm not sure how you'd fix that with education, since I'd bet kids already know
Society needs a good enema (Score:2)
Social media is a societal cancer. I'm talking about degenerate platforms like Twitter, X, and Instagram. The list of positive things that have come out of it pales in comparison to the negative. Look at cancel culture bullshit for example.
That said, a warning label is obviously some feel-good measure that accomplishes absolutely nothing. On my car radio that I bought around 2014, every time I start the car I have to punch through some dumbass warning label telling me not to operate it while driving. There
Warning message (Score:4, Funny)
May contain nuts