Do Australian-style social media bans have a place in Canada? Four teens weigh in | Canada Voices

It’s been just over three months since Australia became the first country in the world to ban social media for youth under 16, deactivating millions of accounts and spurring other governments to consider similar restrictions.

The law, which targets TikTok, Instagram, X, Snapchat, YouTube, Facebook, Reddit, Twitch, Threads and Kick, aims to reduce the negative impact of social media on adolescents. (Though personal accounts are banned, kids under 16 are still able to see public content on YouTube, TikTok and Facebook.)

Over the past few years, lawmakers, parents, teachers and some teens have increasingly raised the alarm about the dangers of social media: increasing rates of anxiety and depression, body image issues, exposure to violent content and cyberbullying.

Despite Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese boasting that millions of teens have already been booted from the platforms, young people have found ways to circumvent the law by using AI-generated images to fool age verification checks, VPNs (virtual private networks) to appear as if they’re accessing the internet from other countries or fabricating new accounts with fake birthdays.

But the landmark bill has reverberated around the world, as more countries and jurisdictions are now debating if they should adopt their own age limits. Some countries, including France, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam, have already passed similar laws that will soon be in effect.

Is social media negatively affecting kids and teens? We answered your questions

In Canada, the federal government is considering a ban on social media for youth under 14, as part of a forthcoming Online Harms bill. Currently, Canadian privacy law requires kids under 13 to get parental consent to access social media.

Yet as lawmakers, child safety advocates and Big Tech companies argue over what a future with strict age limits on social media could look like, Canadian teens themselves have been largely left out of the conversation.

The Globe and Mail spoke over video with four teenagers – 17-year-old Logan Cyr in Calgary; 14-year-old Hargun Kaur in Oakville, Ont.; 17-year-old Nour Alzoubi in Charlottetown and 16-year-old Theo Wright in Toronto – to get their thoughts on the current state of social media.

They all joined social media platforms as tweens and young teens, at first to mainly keep in touch with friends on Snapchat, the messaging service Discord, and Instagram.

As they got older, they started posting their own content, following influencers and using the sites to stay connected to cultural communities. And they’ve also felt the harmful side effects of social media, from doomscrolling to misinformation.

How do you mostly use social media? To talk with friends, other people you don’t know personally, or to follow celebrities and brands?

Hargun

It’s kind of all three things. I follow my friends and talk to them. I follow celebrities and certain brands on it. In my [school] district, we have a heavy online presence. Everyone has Instagram. So even if you don’t know them, and they go to a high school that you know, you’d probably still follow them back.

Theo

Kind of similar for me. I have people I follow on Instagram that I’ve never met in real life – like a lot of people – to the point where I can’t really keep track of all of them. I do follow some joke pages or meme pages, but I don’t really follow celebrities or brands, because why would I?

Nour

I basically just started using it to text my friends. But then it got to a point where I was like, “Oh my god, FOMO. What am I missing out on?” because everybody would be talking about these trends, and I wasn’t really a person who really engaged in social media in Grade 6 when everybody had all these other apps.

Hargun

I agree with Nour. I did have huge FOMO in Grade 6 when I saw everyone who had Snapchat and Instagram, I definitely was like, “What am I missing out on?” Because I just was on Discord and Google Chat, so I wasn’t that online. And once I got on the internet, it took me a while to be like, “This is a waste of time,” but I still need to know what’s happening, to be in the “it group” of the school.

Logan

I used to use social media exclusively for messaging. Then I started using it for posting, and then I started scrolling because if the people you follow look at your post, you’re presumably gonna look at theirs in return.

Then eventually you get brands or something else that are shoved your way, even if you don’t follow them. It’s quite pervasive. For me, it’s bodybuilding-related things because I purchase supplements. Then you get the targeted advertisements, and all of a sudden, you have bodybuilding in your feed when you don’t care whatsoever.

Does it feel like algorithms really dictate what you see? Do you feel their influence?

Logan

The way [misinformation] spreads, it’s like nobody cares enough to correct it, even if they know it’s not true. The algorithm’s biggest problem is that it doesn’t know what to prioritize. It’s trying to feed you 1,000 things at once, and you don’t care about any of them.

Nour

And it’s in such short form. My brain’s just processing it all at once, and it’s, like, do I really care? I was just watching a video about cats, and now I’m watching a video about World War III potentially coming. So yes, it’s the algorithm, but it’s also the short form. People don’t care. Especially like young kids, they’re not going to care. They’re just going to see it: Okay, nice next. Let’s see what’s next. What does it have for me next? It feels very unhealthy.

Hargun

The short form makes you feel like you aren’t watching that much content, but when I look at my screen time at the end of the day, I’m like, how did I spend one hour and 30 minutes on Instagram? Short content makes you feel like you aren’t watching a lot, when you’re, like, wasting minutes in your life.

What kind of misinformation do you see?

Theo

It’s always related to news events, and it’s usually meant to garner sympathy. When Charlie Kirk died, there was a rumour going around that his kids were there and they saw their dad die. But that didn’t happen. That’s just something that someone made up in a TikTok comment section. People are making fan fiction of news events. It’s ridiculous. Like, I don’t know, I believed it. Why wouldn’t I? It sounds like something that could happen.

Nour

We were the first Syrian family to come to Prince Edward Island as refugees. I use social media to connect with people from my culture because I was very disconnected from them. But there was a lot of misinformation about my country, about the region I lived in. And I was like, “Whoa, this is the view of the world. What do I believe? What do I not believe?”

I think also what really helped me, which a lot of kids don’t have, is really good parent support. My parents would always talk to me: What are you seeing? What do you think? They were always very talkative with me about what to believe and what not to believe.

One of the reasons the Australian government cited for the ban is social media’s affect on young people’s mental health. What do you make of that reasoning?

Hargun

Whenever you post, some random accounts put comments, and they usually comment rude things. It hurts for a couple of seconds, but I feel like that’s just a part of social media. It’s a part of life that I have to deal with – there are rude and bad people out there. It affects your mental health slightly, and it depends on how strong you are and how willing you are to face those problems.

Nour

Even just the guilt after [scrolling], over a long-term time, that’s going to plummet your mental health. You are not going to feel like yourself. You’re going to keep on comparing yourself to other people. I think self-image is a big one. Even kids at a young age are prone to inflict self-harm because they don’t know the beauty standard. They think the beauty standard is the millions of filters people put on their faces every single day.

Theo

I don’t know if it’s a bit of an ego thing, but I do feel kind of jealous when I see people my age do better than me, or get more involved than me. I feel like a big contributor of that is social media.

Nour

So many people are affected by social media, but they’re staying quiet. I feel like the kids who do go through a lot of stuff, they can’t talk with anyone about it. There’s not really a lot of good support. We need to be more open and honest, and just be real with each other.

Hargun

I agree with Nour. The people who have faced this, they usually aren’t that open. It’s happened to me. I wasn’t as open as I should have been. We also have to consider there’s an entire side of the internet that hasn’t faced these things. I sometimes see on my feed comments like “We should bring cyberbullying back.” Like, no, we should not. We have to educate people more.

Do you think the Canadian government should consider introducing an age limit for social media?

Hargun

I think the government thinks a ban would make it safe for children, but children are going to find a way, whether the government likes it or not. And if they’re not meant to be on these platforms anymore, but they’re still on them, they won’t be as controlled as they usually were because the platform expects no children to be on the platform.

Theo

I don’t really know if there are a lot of benefits because if someone really wants to go on social media, they’re going to do it, whether it’s allowed or not. It’s like drugs. You can ban it, but it’s still going to happen. I think there are a lot of people who only have online friends, and there are a lot of people who would be negatively affected if we did remove social media. I think if you’re younger [than 16] and you have parental permission, I think that’s probably a good solution.

Nour

I think [the government] really does have the right intentions. It’s just implemented in the wrong way. Being part of the young generation, we are of course going to be biased. We want to have social media. We want to not feel FOMO. The way [the Australian law works], they’ve banned your accounts, not necessarily the app. So you can still scroll, even if you’re not logged in. So yes, you are protecting people from predators and online dangers, but kids are still seeing that misinformation, and it’s rewiring their brains and not letting them focus.

It sounds you all think a straight-up age ban isn’t the right approach. What do you think could make social media better for teens?

Hargun

If they improved the reporting policy, that would make a huge difference on social media. The reporting policy is really weak. It takes a lot of time, to the point where you forget that you reported something. Some of the comments are really hateful, but [the platforms] will be like, “Oh, this doesn’t classify as a hateful comment” or “you can just block this person.” I feel like no human would just say, that is not a hateful comment. I feel like a bot is behind this.

Theo

The reporting thing is a big one. I’d also say seeing less pornographic and sexual content on TikTok and Instagram would be good, and less AI-generated content. AI can sometimes be funny, but most of the time it’s just annoying. The bigger issue is there’s a lot more extremist content that goes unpunished, and when it is punished, people say, “Oh, it’s our free speech.” Usually it’s right-wing extremism. I see a lot on TikTok and Twitter.

Logan

Something that would fix [social media] is if there was only a search feature. No forcing feeds in your face. There does not need to be a “For You” page. If there’s no For You page, boom, scrolling can’t exist. And that’s a solid 40 per cent of the harm of social media gone immediately.

Nour

I think, yes, it’s good that the government stepped in, but aren’t the social media apps doing what they were [designed] to do? They want as many people to come on their apps and doomscroll as long as they can. It’s more about how these tech bosses are operating their apps. They don’t really care about changing anything anytime soon, so if we were able to control the apps more and the way they’re getting to young kids, that could be a really good step towards making this problem diminish slowly.

What’s something you think adults get wrong about teens and social media?

Hargun

Personally for my parents, they don’t understand the concept of FOMO. So like, as a kid, I feel like I’m missing out on certain parts if I’m not communicating on Snapchat or Instagram. If you don’t know what things your friend group is talking about, then how are you going to be friends with them?

Theo

A lot of parents don’t understand that, most of the time, if you’re being cyberbullied on the internet, it’s usually not from people you know. If you go to school with someone and they’re making fun of you online, you can talk to them the next day about it. But if you post something and then, like, someone random in the comment section clowns on you for it, there’s not a lot you can do about that. You just have to take it, and that’s why a lot of people do it. It’s because you get a reaction.

Nour

I feel like they just think it’s all bad and dangerous for you, but there are some good components to it. It’s been a source of so many opportunities for youth to take a part of, and [social media] is one of the only ways that they can know about them.

Logan

I think adults probably misunderstand how mature their children are. As a child in the 80s, you had to learn through experience. We don’t have to learn through experience. We go into the internet, and we get blasted with all the information that would’ve taken years to learn. We get it in the span of a month. It means you are both more intelligent in your decision-making and more mature than you’re given credit for.

This conversation has been lightly edited and condensed.

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