I compare this to the alcohol rules. We recognise that children drinking alcohol is not a good thing. Adults drinking alcohol is also not a good thing, but tha

I compare this to the alcohol rules. We recognise that children drinking alcohol is not a good thing. Adults drinking alcohol is also not a good thing, but that's up to them. But the countries with the best relationship to alcohol are the countries that also have flexible rules about children and alcohol; most of Europe allows children to drink alcohol in a restaurant with their parents from around 12-14, and order it themselves from around 16. Alcohol is widely available, and cheap. Generally these countries don't experience binge drinking or drunken behaviour, and while alcohol consumption is high, it's not so problematic. The Anglosphere has way more problems with binge drinking and drunken behaviour, and part of the reasons for that is that we enforce strict limits around alcohol consumption. We have strong age limits on alcohol purchases, and strong limits on who can sell alcohol and when they can sell it. There's a very authoritarian attitude to alcohol restrictions. This means that when Anglo kids hit the age limit that they're allowed to buy alcohol, they hit it hard and binge on it, with all the harms that happen because of that. Enforcing a strong authoritarian limit on social media will have the same effect, I think. Children will have no training on how to deal with social media, no exposure to social media in limited, controlled, circumstances with the support of their parents. They'll hit 16 and be given full access to the entire range of platforms, and they'll overdo it and binge on it, with all the harms that happen because of that. We need to get better at educating our kids on how to deal with harmful stuff. Banning it until they're "adult" isn't an answer because it doesn't train them on how to have an adult relationship to this stuff.