Social media is a place for creativity, entertainment, connecting communities, and engaging conversations. This allows people of all ages, races, and communities to join social media websites. However, not all content on social media is suitable for children with access to these websites. Most of the content we see on social media involves dangers for children, such as cyberbullying, misinformation, inappropriate content, unrealistic beauty standards, and much more. These issues severely impact children when exposed to social media, which can be used either long- or short-term.
After examining the bill H.R.6149, "Protecting Kids on Social Media Act," I am in full agreement with the precautionary ideas. This bill would make it so children under the age of thirteen do not have access to social media websites, and children under the age of eighteen need parental or guardian permission to create an account. Children will only be able to create an account with their parent or guardian using government IDs or their social security numbers. When children do create an account with permission, they are prohibited from seeing algorithmic recommendations. This further protects children from viewing promoted or advertised information on their accounts.
Although this bill helps protect children on social media, there could be some improvements to the bill. For example, children who have accounts on social media should not be allowed to message or interact with anyone over the age of eighteen. This would further protect against cases of cyberbullying, interactions with predators, etc. However, the bill already allows for a great amount of protection with children using social media. If we were to pass this bill, I believe children would be much safer on social media sites.
