Banning social media is the lamest option
It's too late, & we lacked the foresight, to make social media companies properly moderate their platforms. If they were mandated to employee, say, one moderator per Y users, they would have planned ahead how they would scale.
Instead, we're trying to do something about it now. At a time when big tech companies are too big to care & have too much say, too much sway, in our lives.
Stopping under sixteens from accessing the major social platforms is simply digging a hole, realising that our youth have found a way to climb out, & so we keep digging, ever deeper.
The major platforms are to be banned, but next it will have to be the VPNs. Both are vital tools for many people. One concern is that those excluded from the big platforms will seek out more underground sources, with even less moderation & oversight. We could ban those too, but we'd still be digging.
The real solution is to make tech companies make their social media platforms a healthy place to be online. Regardless of their claims. Once they have no choice, they will miraculously find solutions to what we require.
If a big tech platform had to pay a substantial fine every time a person was exposed to a beheading video, it would be a top priority for their most talented engineers to build a tool which detects these videos at the point of being uploaded & prevent anyone from seeing them. They would argue that this would require scanning every image & video, that this wouldn't be feasible, but they would do it & they'd achieve it quickly.
We should also demand interoperability: if a new social media platform springs up, those users should be able to have a conversation with, say, an Instagram user. This is completely possible with today's technology & it's purposely not implemented by the big tech platforms as a means of keeping their users locked in. If all social media interoperated with all others, the best platform for you would be what you would use, without having to leave your social circle. If a new one springs up, you can move at little cost. If none are working for you, in the age of AI, you could develop your own, or someone else might.
For now, we expect our youth to stare at blank walls.
