Recently, in Australia, social media for anyone under the age of 16 has been banned. While this has been done for noble reasons, such as reducing cyberbullying and mental health issues, it is still overall a bad move, and doing it just doesn’t make sense in today’s world for many reasons. 

First, enforcement is a problem. As some people know, it’s not hard to make an account that is older than what you really are. For example, any teen can make an account that claims they are over 21. Another way to get around this is using VPNs. Since Australia has banned social media in its country, a teen there can just use a VPN to make it seem like they are in a different country. The only sure way to solve this problem is to make people submit pictures of their ID to verify they are of age. However, this brings up problems with privacy and security since millions of people’s IDs, and thus their information, can be leaked in one massive data breach. While this is unlikely to happen, it still can.

Secondly, while Australia doesn’t have a specific government rule about freedom of speech like the United States, many countries like the United States use social media to convey political information and opinions with one another. Australia banning social media prevents this, at least for younger users, and can be seen as the government trying to keep people quiet. Teens usually have the wrong idea about politics, or at least don’t understand everything that’s happening, but preventing teens from learning about these events and ways they understand, as well as preventing talk about politics, leads to these teens not learning how to look at politics in a smart and careful way. 

The third reason revolves around connectivity among teens. In today’s world of smart phones and social media, most people meet and become friends via social media platforms like Instagram and Snapchat. While older generations view these as opportunities for kids to put themselves out there and meet new people in person first, this simply just is not how it works anymore. Kids and teens alike can stay within themselves online and not have to worry about people they don’t like. 

Finally, banning social media doesn’t solve the root problems associated with it. While getting rid of social media can cut down on cyberbullying, it doesn’t get rid of it and the perpetrators will find different ways. Another issue is security and privacy. A common cause of people getting their information stolen is because they share it to someone else that they can’t see. Teaching people how to use social media properly and safely is a better solution than banning social media altogether because it will help reduce these attacks. 

Overall, banning social media to prevent issues of cyberbullying and mental health issues isn’t the solution. Social media is a very important part of the world as we know it, and getting rid of it is not necessary; instead more time needs to be spent designing solutions to these problems.

The views in this column do not necessarily reflect the views of the HiLite staff. Reach Lucas Johnson at [email protected].