Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0818 715 815. This is LiveLine on RTE Radio 1. Sponsored by Harry Currie. Revamp your home this May with our fresh new curtain and bedding designs. Discover comfort and style for every room.
Good afternoon. You are very welcome to LiveLine. 51551 is the text number. If you want to get in touch, you can email LiveLine at rte.ie or as always, give me a call on 0818 715 815. As you might have heard on the news at one, Patrick O'Donovan, the media minister, has been speaking in the Dáil today about plans to ban social media.
for under-16s and specifically what he will do here and what the government will do here if there is no EU agreement to do this. Take a listen.
But if I feel that having taken the chair of the Council of Ministers that this is something that's been pushed back against by the Commission, been reluctant to be moved forward or whatever, then I will bring forward proposals that Ireland will deal with this unilaterally in our own jurisdiction like other countries have done and that we will move for a digital age of majority which other countries have done.
In other words, it's happening here. Either it happens here because it's happening all over the EU or there's no EU agreement and it's going to happen here anyway. So what do you think? Do you think it's right to ban those under the age of 16s from Snapchat, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, you name it? 0818 715 815 or drop me a text on 515 51. Leo Galvin is on the line.
Leo, do you think we should ban these?
No, I completely oppose it. I don't think this is a measure we should be implemented at all. It's not in the interest of young people. I don't know whose interest it's in, to be honest, because it's certainly not for young people.
So in what sense is it not for young people? Because I'm sure the minister and others would, you know, point to things like, you know, anxiety and isolation and suicidal ideation and self-harm and studies that would link this to prolonged use of social media.
Yeah. And those studies are really incredible and they give us some really amazing data. Well, I think what this ban is doing is it's unfairly putting all of the blame for the harms of social media on young people.
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Chapter 2: What is the government's plan regarding social media for under 16s?
Like, it's a way for young people to kind of reach out and experience the world in a completely different way that we didn't have access to before. Like, I can chat to somebody from France or from Belgium or from even a couple of towns over in Mayo or over in Cork. Like, all over Ireland, I can have conversations with young people. Usually, I wouldn't be able to otherwise.
Like, I can make friends from anywhere who more share my interests and I'm not kind of... stuck with people who I wouldn't agree with. They're stuck in an environment where it might be closed off and shut down from any kind of support.
What do you think the impact would be on 14 and 15-year-olds out there who are on these platforms? Were all of those opportunities taken away from them?
Yeah. For them, I think it would be detrimental. Because... To start off, like, they've grown up in a world with social media. They've grown up in a place where this is how you connect with people. This is normal. This is a way of going at it. And what you do if you ban social media, I think, in that instance, is you'll have young people who turn around and decide...
This is the only way I can connect with my friends. This is the only way I can connect with people who understand me. And they'll end up going to illegal platforms. They'll end up finding ways around things. It's not going to go away. But what a ban is going to do is it's going to shut down conversation.
Because if it's banned and that young person goes looking for somewhere illegal to connect with people, to find one of those really positive elements, they're just going to find themselves on the end of some kind of trouble of being persecuted or being told that you're bad and internalising it, or some kind of really detrimental effect that's much, much worse on their health.
And so you're not going to have conversations about how to go online safely. You're going to have situations where they end up in even worse cases, where they're going to end up being the subject of something awful or finding something terrible on the internet, and they won't have anyone to talk to, because then they'll just be told, well, the ban was against you.
and you turned around and did it anyway, so it's kind of your fault for going online. Like, that's the situation we're going to end up with. And already, I think in Australia, we've seen cases of young people trying to access the internet anyway. Like, they're accessing social media anyway.
So instead of coming at this saying, oh, we'll ban social media from under-16s, well, we should be saying these platforms should be regulating it better. And we should be talking to our young people about solutions.
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Chapter 3: What are the arguments against banning social media for young people?
It's not that, you know, they're saying mental health problems didn't exist for young people and they were caused by social media, but that they're worse now, that there's increased anxiety because of it and loneliness and isolation and suicidal ideation and self-harm.
you know, you know, the youth club example, you know, the youth club that provided you with those supports wasn't also damaging your mental health at the same time. But these studies would suggest social media is.
It's about anything, I suppose, that you have to have it in moderation. And I suppose the big challenge that young people have with social media nowadays is that it's designed in a way that's really addictive for young people.
Like even myself, like people I grew up with or have been in college with, you know, you could log on to a social media platform, like only trying to be on there for 30 minutes.
and you end up on there for two or three hours because that's the way that the platform is designed because that's how they make their profits so if we have more regulation and restrictions on these social media platforms um so that young people can't go over certain amounts of hours of usage a day
then there's not as much harm done on their mental health or they're not kind of isolating themselves within a digital space. But they need other spaces to go. Young people need other spaces to connect with each other outside of the digital world. And that just doesn't exist. They don't have third spaces outside of their homes or outside of school.
There isn't enough spaces for young people just to get together and be with each other.
So because I've heard this argument made in the Australian context that they shouldn't have done this, they should have actually gone after the companies and and the algorithm, as it were, so that you're not funneled when you look for, I don't know, get fit content, that you're not going to funnel down some thinspo rabbit hole and you end up with kind of extreme fasting content and body dysmorphia and what have you that that actually if you.
dismantle those algorithms, that that would be a better way of protecting young people. Is that it?
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Chapter 4: How does social media impact young people's mental health?
087 484 888. And I know we've heard from one Leo. There's another Leo actually on the line as well after getting in touch. Leo, do you think the Minister is on the right track here and that we should ban social media for under-16s?
Absolutely, Ciarán. I think I got onto social media at a very young age, about 12, 13. It was... immensely harmful for me. And it's not just because of the practices of the individual platforms, the algorithms. It's when you have people who are essentially wearing an anonymous mask, they will post anything they can and impressionable young people will just get sucked into that.
Even on like a non algorithm based platform, that still happens. And you just get exposed to all kinds of really unhealthy content. I got sucked into a really negative way of thinking and I had to break myself out of that. And it's just a really harmful thing and there's no real benefit to it.
It's like if we're thinking about the benefit of having children, having social media, it's I can post stuff to whatever platform and then my friends can heart me or they can message me, but they can message on other platforms. And then the negatives are you get sucked into really negative ways of thinking.
Sinspo, as you said yourself, political radicalisation is another one I think is very, very bad for young people. And I think they absolutely just need to ban it. The only kind of bit where I'd be a little concerned is if they're bringing in age verification, they're essentially going to say, can you please upload a photo of your ID?
And then it's like, well, if you have to upload a photo of your ID to post on social media, then essentially the platforms know whoever's posting. They know your ID. And then maybe if you want to say something a little politically objectionable, they'll know exactly who you are. And I think that's a danger.
I think there was talk of tying it in Ireland to your PPS and there would be a separate piece of software, like a kind of a digital vault, if you'd imagine it, where things would be sourced. Yeah, something like that, essentially. So the platforms wouldn't actually have access to it, but there'd be a separate piece of software that would be able to verify it through that.
Now, listen, people would find ways of working around it like they do anything, but that's a separate argument we might get into in a moment. Do you mind me asking, though, Leo, the nature of the issue you had when you said it kind of led you down some negative holes?
Oh, absolutely. Because I got on social media around 12, 13, 14. I got even more into it during COVID when I was about 15 and 16. You'd kind of spend hours a day looking at, and it starts, like with any of these things, it starts out with jokes. Like, oh, this guy's talking about how great of a lifter he is, but he's really skinny. Or jokes that are a bit risque. And then you start
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Chapter 5: What positive aspects of social media are being overlooked?
And online, you do find your community, you find representation, which you might not find at home, which you might not find in your local community, that you do need to be able to go on and thrive. And that's what you can have on social media. There are positives there. Young people go out and find, actually, there's somebody who looks like me in a better position.
This person is kind of where I think I want to be in some day. And we'd hope that they'd be a good role model. And in a lot of cases, some of them really are and some of them aren't.
And I think it's about weeding out those who aren't through moderation, through regulating these social media companies, and not by saying these young people shouldn't have access to it all, they shouldn't be online, and we should leave them the way they are. I don't think that's a good way. And on Aisling's point as well,
They are isolated as it is, whether it be because of a rural location or because of their community they're surrounded in doesn't really represent them, doesn't show who they are. We're just further isolating young people. We're saying, well, you don't have a physical space to be, so we're going to take away your online space as well. And then where are they supposed to be?
Yeah. Leo, too. What do you say to that argument?
And the point I made earlier with Leo as well, that I've heard this in the context of Australia, that we're going about this the wrong way, that we actually should be tackling the companies, the addictive nature of the algorithm, the fact that when you go on and you look up GetFit videos, you end up with inspiration or you look up breakup content, you end up with...
suicidal ideation or dating brings it to sexualized material and then you're bombarded with it. You dismantle all of that and actually you'd solve a lot of the problems. What do you say to that?
I actually, I don't think that, I think you might be incorrect in framing it around the kind of problem of algorithms and of content moderation. I think the problem is that people go on to social media subconsciously looking for that stuff and And I don't think, I think maybe with AI we'll get there to where that kind of stopgap measure of content moderation is actually feasible.
But I don't think that, like if people want to find something, they're going to find it. And ultimately, a complete ban is going to be a much stronger measure of stopping them from getting that ban.
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Chapter 6: What alternatives to a ban are suggested for protecting youth online?
By putting a ban, I suppose, we're still giving the power back to the techs. We are still giving that. People will find their ways around a ban, as we know, and could end up in darker places than that. The meta cases in the LA in the last month or so, if anyone has been following them or if any listeners have been following them,
You know, they were they were landmark cases, but their products are not safe by design.
This is March decision in March. A jury said they were addictive by design is what they they concluded. This was one particular young woman's mental health, they said, had been damaged by the algorithm which was designed to be addictive, I think was.
Absolutely.
The landmark nature of the judgment. Sorry, Eimear, stay with us because I just want to bring in David. People feel really strongly about this. David, do you think a much more robust approach, including a ban, is the way to do this?
No, I don't think so. I think there are a lot of things in society that are banned and people still get access to them, such as hash, heroin, illegal firearms. I'm on TikTok. I'm on Instagram. I have a drink. I drive a car. I smoke the odd cigarette. I can go and buy a shotgun. All of that good stuff. I'm in my early 60s. Yeah. So I believe that it is not the job of government.
I agree with the lady somewhat, I believe, who just spoke. It is not the job of a government to parent children. It is the job of parents responsibly to bring their children up, protect them, look after them, educate them. and shepherd them through childhood, adolescence, and then let them loose into adulthood.
And if they're balanced and reared in the right way, I hate to use that word because it's a bit old-fashioned, then they should be able to deal with the trials and tribulations of modern life and everything that lies out there to tempt them in a certain direction. It is not the job of government. And I don't really want to say anything else.
And I can't for the life of me see how you could enforce a ban. The only way I could imagine is that everyone in the country would have to be fingerprinted. And then that would have to be in some way... I think your PPS number might be attached to it.
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Chapter 7: How do parents feel about the government's proposed ban?
Is it not mental that we allow kids on them?
I think the part that's mental, which some of them really came in with Facebook, was having someone's real life identity tied to their online account. I think the safest thing for children is would be a complete separation of real-life identification and online accounts.
So things like... That makes everyone a potential bot, doesn't it? You know, like... Everyone becomes an anonymous troll overnight then in that world.
I think the best thing to do is have that separation because if you have the separation, that means that... you can teach children, and then education obviously would go with it, where they'd be educated how to keep themselves safe, how to keep them separated. Because the old advice from early on was don't tell your real name, don't say where you're from, don't post pictures of yourself.
But in the background, if there's a complete separation between the online profile and who the person is, the person can post anything they want with impunity. They can say, I can go online and I can say, Matthew, I'm going to come to your house tonight and I know your address. Here it is. And I'm going to murder you and your family.
And there's nothing you can you go into the guards and the guards say, well, you know, because of Matthew's law, we can't identify who that person is. There's a complete separation now.
Well, for one thing, obviously, the platform wouldn't be completely unregulated. There would still be moderation.
The moderation, though, you know, the posts get past the moderation all of the time. You know what I mean? There's a playing catch-up element to it. There'll always be that element. Sorry, I'm not having a go. I just... I can think of so many... My brain has been flooded with just so many examples of how people being anonymous online has been harmful.
And I just find it interesting your suggestion is we all should be anonymous online.
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Chapter 8: What are the potential consequences of banning social media?
And do you think that we are right when it comes to those teenage years to ban social media use?
It'll be the best thing ever. My kids are 16 and 17. My 16-year-old She has no interest at all in phones. I got her a phone five years ago when she was starting to secondary. She's now moving schools because she's moving from a school that uses a screen, that uses a tablet for all her books. She's moving to a school that uses books.
And she's so excited that she's actually going to be using physical books and physical biros and paper to do her homework. She can't wait for that. When she uses her phone with her, when she's working at the writing school, I have to ring the man that owns the riding school to see when she's ready to go home because she has the phone thrown in the bag. She has no interest in the phone.
She plays rugby. She's a great social being that she doesn't have any interest at all in gadgets. And if she's on her laptop in the evening, she'll watch David Attenborough or something like that. She really loves that. Whereas my 17-year-old... He plays on the Xbox with the boys that he had since baby school. They've always stayed friends and they always have been on the Xbox.
We're all allowed to have the Xbox in sixth class and to play on the Xbox. And he's now in fifth year heading into Leaving Cert and it's the same crew of friends that he's with. He has his phone five years and he's never upgraded his phone in five years. He has no interest in it at all.
the screens are a disaster and my kids both say to me, Mammy you were so lucky you grew up in the 80s where there was no camera phones, you could have a bit of crack, there was no phones You're relying on someone shopping at the back of the house. Dinner's ready.
But Alba, what then? What do you say? Because I know you were listening to the conversation to some of the younger people we spoke to earlier, to Leo and Aisling and others who said that, yeah, listen, there are negative things, but it's great. It's a social outlet. It allows us a platform to express ourselves, to get to know ourselves, to find like-minded people. If you're in a...
slightly minority group or fringe group in your school you'll find people who think the same way you do or are into the same things as you online much more easily but it shouldn't be it's actually so sad that it's come to that where people can't actually meet face to face without having to do a social network and to find somebody that's like minded I mean join a club join rugby you'll always find somebody who's like minded in rugby because it doesn't matter what colour you are what breed you are what shape size it doesn't matter in rugby because
there's a position for everybody with every build and every stamina and every colour and taste. It's like a bag of licorice all sorts. There's everything in it. And you don't need a social event on a calendar, on a phone, on an app to introduce these people. I suppose a certain amount came from maybe lazy parenting over the years where it was easy for the parents to allow their child to do that.
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