It is Possible to Stop the Harm Caused By Social Media

The Surgeon General tells us how

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I was tempted to ignore a recent essay by the U.S. Surgeon General Vivek H. Murthy, about the need for warning labels on social media platforms, but yesterday my 8-year-old spent part of the afternoon alone in her room making videos of herself pretending to sell products to an imaginary audience on YouTube, and I thought, “No, this one’s for me too.”

Murthy calls for a Surgeon General’s warning label, along the lines of the warnings on tobacco products, alerting users to the significant harm to young people’s mental health that’s been associated with social media use. 

We may not have all the information about the exact harms of social media platforms, but we have enough information to act. 

“In an emergency,” Murthy writes, “You don’t have the luxury to wait for perfect information. You assess the available facts, you use your best judgment, and you act quickly.”

“Adolescents who spend more than three hours a day on social media face double the risk of anxiety and depression symptoms,” Murthy writes. “The average daily use in this age group, as of the summer of 2023, was 4.8 hours.” 

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A survey by the Digital Wellness Lab, run by Boston Children’s Hospital, found that nearly half of adolescents say social media makes them feel worse about their bodies.

Do warning labels make a difference?

Murthy says yes:  A study of Latino parents (Latino kids are more likely to use social platforms than non-Latino kids) found that 76% would be more likely to monitor their kids' social media usage if it came with a Surgeon General’s warning label.

Of course, warning labels are not enough. There is plenty of direct action that Murthy has called for, including legislation that would protect kids from online harassment and exploitation, and keep sexual content and extreme violence out of kids’ social feeds. 

We should also have laws that prevent companies from collecting sensitive data from kids and restrict their use of features like autoplay and infinite scroll, which, Murthy writes, “prey on developing brains and contribute to excessive use.”

It’s complicated. Parents who need a break can hand their kids a phone or a tablet – the devices give you back your sleep, time to work, cook, clean, and have conversations with other adults. 

But parents also know these platforms, in many ways, make their lives harder. 

A 2020 study conducted by the Pew Research Center found that 66% of parents think that parenting is harder now than it was 20 years ago, and they cite navigating social media technology as among the biggest reasons.

(And this study was conducted before COVID-19 lockdowns shut us and our children into our homes).

It’s pretty clear that, as with so many other issues, parents are being asked to come up with individual solutions to what are really systemic problems. 

Remember, Murthy writes, you’re one parent “pitted against some of the best product engineers and most well-resourced companies in the world.”

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We've written before about the mental health benefits of keeping our kids off phones for as long as possible. But that’s only effective up to a point. 

Some parents are organizing. The group Mothers Against Media Addiction has laid out clear recommendations for how to keep your kids off phones, and how to advocate for state-level legislation to protect kids. 

Murthy recommends the youth-led group LogOff Movement, and Wired Human, which fights digital exploitation. 

In May, parents of the fourth graders in Uvalde, Texas filed a lawsuit against the video game “Call of Duty,” the gun manufacturer Daniel Defense and Instagram, for their part in the shooting.

The 18-year-old who killed the children and teachers spent significant time playing “Call of Duty,” which allows video game players to play with simulations of real guns – including one made by Daniel Defense – making the game “the most prolific and effective marketer of assault weapons in the United States,” according to the lawsuit.

Plus, the lawsuit argues, “Instagram allowed Daniel Defense to promote its products through its social media presence even though the platform formally bans firearms advertising.

“Refuse to be a victim,” one of the gun company’s Instagram posts read, with an image of a person taking an assault-style rifle out of the trunk of a car.”

(I recommend this interview about the lawyer behind the lawsuit, who got involved with suing gun companies after talking to a cab driver whose friend’s child was killed in the shooting at Sandy Hook, Connecticut.)

There’s so much to be overwhelmed by – no doubt.

But who benefits by not taking action? The tech companies that profit from children’s eyeballs, their data and their time. 

Murthy’s essay points to clear solutions, and reminds us that other crises have been solved. Car deaths dropped because we forced car companies to install airbags and seat belts and do crash testing. Tobacco products come with warnings and smoking has been banned throughout the country. Foods that cause disease outbreaks can get recalled within days.

The harms caused by social media use “are not a failure of willpower and parenting,” Murthy writes. 

“They are the consequence of unleashing powerful technology without adequate safety measures, transparency or accountability.”

These are solvable problems. Let’s get to it.

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