Should PA Require Parental Consent to Create Social Media Profiles?

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Navigating the digital landscape as a parent and policy expert, I'm Jesse White, and in my latest Keystone Reckoning Podcast episode, we tackle the hot-button issue of parental consent in the age of social media. As I dissect Pennsylvania's House Bill 2017 and Senate Bill 22, you'll gain invaluable insights into how these legislative measures could reshape our kids' online experiences. By scrutinizing the responsibilities these bills propose for tech giants—from securing consent to safeguarding data—I lay out the stakes for our children's digital well-being. Join me for a compelling exploration of what these potential laws mean for targeted online content and the overarching implications for privacy in young lives.

Every parent has faced the modern conundrum of managing screen time, and this episode is no exception. We'll explore the intricate dance between fostering digital savviness and guarding against the risks that come with it. From the decision to bid farewell to apps like Roblox to the double-edged sword that is YouTube Kids, I share personal stories and expert views on guiding our children through this ever-connected world. Listen in as we discuss the necessity of vigilant parenting in tandem with applauding legislative initiatives aimed at compelling social media platforms to prioritize the protection of their youngest users. This isn't just policy talk; it's about shaping a safer digital future for every child.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Should Pennsylvania require parental consent for
children opening social mediaaccounts?
I don't know, but I think it'ssomething worth talking about.
Good morning, it's Tuesday,march 19th 2024, and welcome to
the Keystone Reckoning Podcast.
I'm your host, jesse White.
So this is a pretty interestingtopic for a variety of reasons,
and the reason it's comingabout is there is a bill out

(00:24):
there that was introduced byState Representative Brian
Monroe from Bucks County.
It is House Bill 2017.
You can find it online and whatit does is it requires parental
consent for a social mediaaccount to be open for any minor
under the age of 16.
There's also a bipartisan billin the Senate which is similar

(00:47):
Senate Bill 22 from SenatorVince Hughes, but I thought we
could look at the Monroe billbecause it was just introduced
and, before we get into thediscussion about the bill itself
, let's get a couple of thingsout of the way.
First of all, I am a parent.
My wife and I have two boys,ages eight and nine, soon to be

(01:10):
nine and 10.
So this is something that I canlook at both as a parent and as
a public policy expert andpolitical operative.
I can see this from a lot ofdifferent sides, and I think
that definitely allows me tolook at the totality of the
issue and to see if this isactually a solution to a real

(01:35):
problem.
I think one of the things wesee a lot of times in
legislation is it's a solutionin search of a problem, and I'm
not quite sure that that's thesituation here.
I think there's a realdiscussion to be had Whether
this is the right approach.
I think we can debate orperhaps disagree, but I think
it's a real thing.

(01:56):
So first of all, let's talkabout the bill briefly.
It would amend Title 50 of thePA Consolidate Statutes and what
it says.
It's fairly dense, but the longand short of it is that any
minor defined as anybody underage 16 that would open a social
media account, and it defineswhat a social media platform is.

(02:18):
That's all the big ones thatthey would be required to have
parental consent before theaccount could be opened.
Additionally, a parent could atany time revoke that consent
and there are prohibitionsagainst data mining, selling
information from those minorssocial media accounts, even if

(02:41):
there was consent to open them.
So what it really is doing isputting the onus on social media
platforms to set up somesafeguards and some processes by
which they can not only limitunfettered access for minors to
their platforms, but also putsobligations on them in terms of
what they do with the data,which I think in some ways is as

(03:03):
if not more important, becausethat data that is generated
through those platforms thengoes into the algorithm, which
is then purchased by thirdparties, which is then used to
feed the information that peoplesee.
So it's really a way to craftcontent and ads and different
things right back to the kidsbased on what they're already

(03:24):
watching.
That can be difficult enough foradults to deal with when we are
victims to those algorithms andwe're aware of what they are,
but for children it could bereally really damaging, because
they don't know why they'reseeing what they're seeing and,
as we saw in recent elections,what we are fed by an algorithm

(03:46):
will help dictate ourperceptions of the world, the
way we interact with people, andfor adults, in a lot of ways it
was the way we vote.
Obviously, we're not there yetwith kids, but we're talking
about young, impressionableminds that are just starting to
figure out the world, and ifthey're being fed a biased
narrative or a targetednarrative, that will absolutely

(04:10):
have an impact on what they see.
So that's what the bill doesgenerally.
It also puts some protectionsand some implementation in place
where the social mediacompanies can be held liable for
creating accounts that are thatdid not have parental consent.
It also has liabilities inthere for the data mining and

(04:35):
things like that, and these areall actions that would be
brought by the state attorneygeneral.
They could be boughtindividually, it could be
brought for a group and thefines range from $2,500 for an
initial offense for per child,up to $5 million on the upper
end for large scale violations,and all of that money goes back

(04:58):
into a state fund that is to beused for education and
protection.
So there are real guidelineshere and it's a real onus on the
social media platforms toactually take this seriously.
Now I was curious and I did alittle research as to what other
states have actually passedlegislation like this, because

(05:18):
this is a pretty sweeping, youknow, wide reaching thing and
you could easily see where thepolitics would come into play.
There are a lot of balancinginterests here.
Right, there's the generalFirst Amendment freedom of
speech.
There is the overprotective orthe kind of thought of we need

(05:38):
to protect our children from theinternet, which could kind of
it's a common concern and avalid one, but it can a lot of
times be kind of filtered bypolitical bias in different ways
in terms of what should we beprotecting our kids from?
That then gets into contentlimitations.
You can see it's a slipperyslip right.

(05:59):
We can very easily go down aweird path.
Interestingly, the first stateto pass something like this was
Arkansas.
Just, I don't know why thatsurprised me.
It just surprised me, right.
There aren't any things thatyou're like oh, arkansas leading
the way.
The next one and it wasinteresting, it wasn't
legislation, it was actuallyfolded into their fiscal code.

(06:19):
So it's not it wasn't as easyto find was Ohio.
So you have two states that arevery conservative that have
passed.
It's not exactly the same, butit's similar.
It's not anything fundamentallydifferent.
And so the question is is thisa good idea?
And I think one of the thingsthat's crucial is there are real

(06:40):
statistics now that arestarting to come out about this,
about the young children socialmedia use and the impact that
it has.
And, for reference, I came ofage pre-social media,
pre-internet.
I'm 45 years old.
I started using social media in, like most people, 2006, 2007,.

(07:02):
To varying degrees of success.
As I think anybody that'sfamiliar with me knows, live by
the social media, die by thesocial media, but I've always
considered myself to be an earlyadopter and someone that saw
the benefit of social media, asevidenced by the fact that I'm
using social media platforms topromote this podcast.

(07:23):
Now I will say that my opinionof social media has really
changed and my use of socialmedia has really changed over
the years to where I'm much moreselective about what I share.
I'm much more selective aboutthings I talk about, and I think
some of that had to do withrecent election cycles.

(07:44):
I think some of it had to dowith COVID and the way that it
was just raw nerves stacking up.
I've gained and lostfriendships based on social
media activity and it's adifficult thing to navigate for
an adult, let alone a child, solet's talk about that for a
minute.
The statistics are real.

(08:05):
Kids who use social media formore than three hours a day are
one and a half times more likelyto develop depression.
27% of kids who spendsignificant time on social media
report experiencing anxiety.
Over 60% of teens using socialmedia extensively report poor
sleep quality and exacerbatingmental health issues.
There's huge concerns aboutbody image.

(08:28):
55% of girls, 35% of boys, age12 to 16, report that social
media makes them feel moreself-conscious about their body
image, victims of cyber bullyingor at a higher risk of
depression, anxiety and suicidalideation.
About 37% of kids under 16 havebeen reported being bullied
online.
It also increases FOMO fear ofmissing out, that they see these

(08:52):
idealized social media feeds.
They don't realize that theyare very filtered, in most cases
staged, and they think thatthat's what they should be
having their life be like andthey feel like they're missing
out on that.
There's an inverse relationshipbetween screen time and
happiness in kids.
Those who spend more than twohours a day on social media

(09:12):
report lower levels ofsatisfaction with life.
Around 60% of teens say theyoften compare themselves to
others on social media, leadingto feelings of an anacostia and
low self-esteem.
One in six young people exhibitpatterns of social media use
that are consistent withaddictive behaviors, which
obviously can impact mentalhealth, and kids who spend

(09:33):
excessive time on social mediaare more likely to report
Attention problems and symptomsrelated to ADHD.
So they're the lot there, andyou know these are things that
we are now getting into thepoint where there's enough
information Out there that wecan start to do these studies,
put it all together and get afeel for what action with the
actual impact of Social mediause is on kids.

(09:55):
You know, obviously that'ssomething that takes some time.
For my own Personal experienceas a parent, my kids again
Almost ages nine and ten theonly Social media, if you want
to call it that, that we allowthem to be on is YouTube kids,
which, I have to say, I think isa fantastic platform.
The parental controls areamazing.

(10:17):
The ability to really you know,kind of screen the content is
fantastic.
One of the subscriptions Idon't even hesitate for is
YouTube premium, because ittakes all the ads out.
My kids don't see those ads,which is great.
Neither do I on my YouTube,which is also great.
So you know, it's a good 10bucks a month to so I don't have

(10:39):
to worry about those kinds ofthings.
So but that's it.
That's all we allow them to do.
You know they have iPads.
You know that was a COVID thing.
You know we got to the pointwhere it was like well, you know
, we're stuck in a house for,you know, the foreseeable future
.
We got to figure out a way tolet these kids do something, and
the other part of that is iskind of a realization.

(11:00):
It is something we've come torealize as parents is this is
the future.
Right, kids are going to be onscreens for the rest of their
lives, just like adults were allon screens.
Right, I'm looking at screensright now as I'm doing this.
That just because that isn'tthe experience we had as
children Doesn't mean that it'snecessarily a bad thing.
Kids use iPads in school all thetime and it's amazing, you know

(11:22):
, if you see, especially youngkids now, it's super intuitive,
right, they just know how to usethese devices.
It's crazy, and you know theyplay games and you know, and
that's what they do on there.
The one I could say there's onegame you know, because I check
everything that they're on andyou know we have it said they
can't download or do anythingwithout parental authorization,

(11:43):
which is a nice thing that theApple ecosystem does.
I will say the one app, thatgame that we did get rid of was
Roblox, because it allowed forlike games within the game, so
it allowed for these, and therewere so many of them that were
Garbage, really, right, justkind of like knockoffs of

(12:05):
popular content, and you knowthey were like all from these,
like Chinese vendors, and sothere were data concerns.
But it also, you know, thegolden rule in our house is, if
it allows you to talk to anybodyoutside of our house, it's a no
go, no bueno, that's it andthat's the line that we've drawn
, and anytime they want to get agame or whatever, you know, I

(12:29):
check it out first and make surethere's no chat function,
something you know there havebeen a couple instances where
there have been chat functionsthat I disable or you can make
it so they can only talk to,like you know, their cousins or
something like that.
So the good news is thosecontrol mechanisms, mechanisms
are there and but even with allthose mechanisms in place, you

(12:51):
know social media.
You know Social media, thecontent they see, even on just
YouTube kids, and now what theyhear in school for people and
stuff like that it really has asubstantial impact on their
development, both positive andnegative.
I mean my youngest son, gus.
I mean the things he comes upwith in terms of random facts

(13:12):
and pieces of knowledge areamazing, and we don't even ask
anymore like, oh, youtube kids,right, you know they don't watch
pure garbage, they watch somegarbage, but we all do right.
But they also watch sciencevideos and they watch, you know,
instructional videos and myyoungest loves to watch cooking
videos.
And the other thing that I cameto realize is during COVID,

(13:35):
especially when they couldn'thave that socialization with
anybody these YouTubers, youknow, or these content creators
they became their friends.
I know that sounds really cornyor whatever, but it's the truth.
They it was someone they couldhear from every day and that
wasn't terrible, you know.

(13:55):
And our house wasn't as bad.
I have two kids that are alittle over a year apart.
They had each other right andthey get along and they're
basically best friends.
But I can't even imagine forparents that you know had only
you know, an only child or kidsthat were way far apart in age,
the socialization concerns thereduring that period of time have
real impacts.
So it's not all negative.

(14:16):
But as they start to get olderand yeah, this is something in
our house as they start to getolder, we know there's just
gonna come a point where they'regonna wanna be on those
platforms and how that's gonnalook and what.
That's how we're gonna navigate.
That is something that is gonnabe really difficult Because,
well, everybody in class isdoing it, okay, well, that
doesn't mean you're doing it,but you can't keep them off of

(14:39):
it forever, right?
And the question then becomeswell, what's the fine line of
what are you?
How do you expose them to thisin a way that they can
understand what they're lookingat and navigate it as best they
can, as compared to saying, no,you can't see any of it?
Then, once they're old enoughthat I can't stop what they do

(15:00):
or monitor what they do, theycan get real trouble because
they're not familiar with whatto look for.
Those are tough, tough calls forevery parent to make, and our
biggest fear is the cyberbullying.
I am quite certain we're gonnahave to have a very difficult

(15:21):
conversation about selfies andwhat kind of pictures you send
to people online, even yourfriends, and what can happen
with those, because the storiesare out there, right?
Kids are dumb.
They're kids, just like adults.
We're dumb, we make mistakes inthe heat of a moment, and that
can be used to extort you,embarrass you and, if you don't

(15:44):
understand that, the results canbe devastating.
Right, I mean, these kids arekilling themselves.
So it's not nothing, and it'sinteresting that this is one
issue where I feel like it kindof it actually goes above
politics right, like yourpolitics could influence what
you might think about it andkind of where the limit should

(16:05):
be, but it's one of those rareissues where it's a real present
danger that needs to bediscussed.
That kind of impacts everybodyacross the board, so I applaud
it.
I think the Monroe bill andagain you can check it out
yourself at House Bill 2017.

(16:25):
And I think it's a good start,and I think there's no reason
why these social media companiesthat are making ungodly amounts
of money and have ungodlyamounts of technical ability
shouldn't be accountable forhelping to curb some of the
problems that their content hascreated and will continue to

(16:49):
create as we go forward.
So I applaud it.
Is there room for debate,discussion?
Sure, but I think that the timehas come to look at those
safeguards.
I think it's a debate we shouldbe having.
I think it's one of those oneswhere we can hopefully keep the
politics out of it as a way toactually get something done, and

(17:11):
I think it's something we'redefinitely gonna revisit.
As a policy person, as apolitical person and, perhaps
most importantly, as a parent, Ithink this is something that is
definitely worth discussion andenacting in some way, shape or
form.
So this is obviously a hottopic we could talk about as we

(17:32):
go forward, but for now, let'scall it a day.
Again, thank you for listeningto the Keystone Recording
Podcast.
I'm your host, jesse White.
Have a good one, and we'll seeyou tomorrow.