THE Child Rights Network (CRN) welcomes the latest House version of the Children’s Social Media and Online Gaming Safety Bill for prioritizing safety by design over a blanket social media ban.
This is an approach CRN and its members have consistently advocated for throughout the legislative process, alongside efforts to ensure that children’s voices are heard in an issue and policy discussion that affects them the most.
However, CRN flags two provisions in the House version that still miss the mark and may infringe on children’s rights.
We oppose a blanket parental consent requirement for children’s access to social media. For the following reasons:
Not every child has safe, non-abusive, or available parents. A blanket requirement for parental consent assumes that every child has a parent who is able or willing to provide that consent.
It could create a new barrier to children’s safety. It limits children’s access to mechanisms or platforms that could save their lives in emergencies or situations involving abuse or trafficking.
It may push children to find ways around the requirement: using a false age, borrowed accounts, or resorting to unregulated and potentially dangerous internet spaces.
Making platforms safe should be the platform’s foremost and core responsibility, not something we put primarily on parents, who can be unavailable for children in the first place.
Parental environments are not a monolith, and neither are children’s circumstances. If we believe in the fundamental nature of children’s digital rights, then there is no reason to impose an additional barrier that could unnecessarily limit their exercise and enjoyment of those rights.
We likewise oppose a ban on short-format videos or reels for children.
The problem is harmful content, not the format. Banning the format does not, by itself, address the harmful content or design features that make online spaces unsafe for children’s participation.
Children and teens use short-form videos to learn, express themselves, participate in public discussions, and advocate for issues they care about. Like any other digital format, short-form videos can be an empowering tool through which children can exercise their full range of rights.
The Child Rights Network believes that protecting children online should not come at the expense of their other rights. Solutions must address genuine risks without unnecessarily restricting the ways children learn, express themselves, participate, and connect online.
We will continue to uphold the rights and amplify the voices of children in every proceeding until this bill becomes law. We will likewise make our voices heard in the Senate and continue to oppose blanket social media bans, so that the final version of this legislation upholds the full range of children’s rights–to survival, development, protection, and participation.
