It would be a fun exercise to replace social media with alcohol in this article so that it argues we shouldn't ban children from drinking because drinking is bad for adults too.
The article doesn't say, "we shouldn't ban for children because it's bad for adults as well", it says, "we shouldn't regulate for the non-voting pouplation only". Alcohol is regulated for adults, not as much as for children of course, but it's nevertheless regulated (and taxed), and from the same people arguing that we should raise the drinking age (in europe, where it's indeed lower than health expert suggests), we hear argument on increased regulations for adults as well. The social media ban, on the other hand, is for children and children only
Socialism... you probably mean communism, but OK. I agree.
The wild corruption... no. That wasn't externally imposed on you/us. Estonia, Letonia, Poland, Czechoslovakia started the race to improve themselves at the same time, and they're far ahead now.
In which case your original question doesn't make sense. The annual alcohol consumption in those countries is around 11 litres of pure alcohol per person. The only Balkan country coming close to that is Bulgaria.
Banning children from drinking never really made much sense. A glass of wine or beer for kids in their early teens was very normal in Europe until recently (and still unofficially is) and we have not turned into hellhole. The temperance movement is/was uniquely American stupidity.
Or things like cigarettes, guns, driver’s licenses, junk food, etc.
Even for those though, opinions are all over the place: Everything from "no rules" to "kids should be allowed to own drink alcohol under the supervision of their parents" to “it’s fine for adults to drink, but not kids” to “alcohol should obviously be banned for everyone."
For most of these we settled into a happy medium that generally everyone feels is acceptable, but we still change our opinions semi-frequently: Cigarettes being a great example in our lifetime.
I get the argument that social media is probably closer to junk food than to firearms, but:
a) Plenty of people argue that junk food should be banned for kids too! Or at least tightly regulated.
b) It’s definitely not consensus opinion that social media is more like junk food than, say, cigarettes. People will vehemently argue either side of that.
True, but misleading. There are practical blocks to children drinking alcohol: they can't buy it from shops or bars. In the UK, you can buy it from 18, and you can consume it in a pub/restaurant from 16 but only with a meal and supervised by an adult. In France, you can buy it in bars from 16.
An analogy would be that social media consumed by children is surely less harmful when it's a parent holding their own phone towards a child to show them a few selected photos from their Instagram feed. I doubt most people would object to that, even those that want to ban social media from children.
> In the UK, you can buy it from 18, and you can consume it in a pub/restaurant from 16 but only with a meal and supervised by an adult. In France, you can buy it in bars from 16.
This sounds really strict because of how it's phrase but the legal limit for drinking alcohol in a private space in the UK is 5.
Yeah, but that pedantry did not add much. Yes, we do not ban children from drinking but there are still limits on their ability to buy and consume. A responsible adult needs to be present when children consume alcohol in many countries.
My son had no problem getting a beer with his meal at 15 in Munich. We were there, though, so it was supervised. It was also Radlers, so half beer, half soda.
But they can't legally purchase/access it without the involvement of an adult, unlike social media. You could argue that the parents sanction social media use by giving their kids a phone/computer without any sort of parental controls, but most parents probably have neither the resources nor proper knowledge of how to sufficiently provide a safe platform for their children.
You are aware that pay as you go sims are available from literally every store in the United Kindom, and any child can just buy one within minutes if they are so inclined?
Not to mention that using social media does not require a phone number, and wifi is practically ubiquitous.
>> (Since brexit, that might be different in UK, but I very much doubt it.)
It's crazy that in 2026 when we literally have the knowledge of the entire world at our fingertips it's still easier to just say "I doubt it" instead of looking it up.
To save you those 5 seconds of googling - no, you don't need to present any ID to buy a sim card in the UK.
I think this is a good point. What differentiates alcohol and social media? Well, social media is not physically addictive, but it's pretty clearly psychologically addictive. Along those lines it would be hard to argue that children should have unfettered access to social media. Social media is also _not_ like TV in that there's psychologists and algorithmic engineers working hard to make these types of apps as addictive as possible. Not to mention the fact that children obviously can't consent to having their data harvested, most ADULTS don't understand the ramifications of that, much less children.
All of this also applies to adults, I don't like how corporate profit-seeeking algorithms dictate public discourse and I think it's perfectly reasonable to combat this. The great question is how to do so without trampling on people's right to freedom. The EU tends to combat "misinformation", but this has loads of problems, and I think it misses the mark of what the problem truly is. In my opinions it's the algorithms that maximize fear responses and lead people down rabbit holes that's the true problem.
I think the best way to combat it is by supporting federation and decentralization of the internet and attacking the advertising industry that maximizes eyeballs and time spent on the platform, rather than providing service to paying users. It also has the beneficial side-effect of increasing freedom of thought and speech rather than limiting it.
I know some people see the fragmentation of communities as the leading cause of echo-chambers, but this is not my impression. Actually, the smaller internet communities are often less extreme than algorithmically dominated central-hubs. Pseudonymous small communities function more like the local village that tends to mitigate extremism as the loudest, more extremist, community members can be challenged, without those challengers drowning in potential oppressive moderation and hive-mind mentality.
That is the real issue. The problem is that the things that cause the addiction and harm are the same things that are useful for generating profit and spreading propaganda. I'm not sure I see a viable solution that doesn't involve some people willingly giving up a very large amount of wealth or power.
We shouldn't ban children from drinking. It doesn't even help, because kids drink anyway, just illegally and largely unsupervised by adults. I certainly drank like a fish when I was underage.
Let me make a parallel argument: We shouldn’t ban drinking and driving. It doesn’t even help, because people do it anyway.
You seem to be setting the bar at “if anyone violates the law then the law is a failure and should be revoked.” But that’s why we have court systems. They don’t just determine if someone broke the law, but also what to do when people inevitably do. You’re operating in a world where the only restrictive laws we should have are ones where it eradicates certain behaviors 100%.
You’re basically arguing against having laws rather than the merits of the law and its efficacy. Also “drinking like a a fish” when you were a kid was terrible for your development even if you turned out ok. Many people do not. It’s not even debatable, we know the numbers on this.
> We shouldn’t ban drinking and driving. It doesn’t even help, because people do it anyway.
> Do you see the trouble with the logic here?
I think you misunderstood my comment. The second sentence was not intended to be an argument or justification for the first sentence. The first sentence stands alone: I think it's unprincipled to ban children from drinking. The second sentence is merely a corollary. Also, I think that legalization and the introduction of adult supervision would ameliorate some of the problems associated with youth drinking, would "moderate" it to some extent.
My view is that the government should not try to be a parent, should not restrict personal freedom, not even of kids, except in so far as one's exercise of freedom harms others, and even there it has to be significant harm, e.g., you can ban violence but not hurting someone else's feelings. The drunk driving laws, which apply to all ages, may be justified by the known role of drunk driving in car crashes. The same principle apples to public smoking bans: the issue is not the first-hand smoke, which is your own business, but rather the second-hand smoke, affecting people who choose not to smoke.
Preventing children from smoking has entirely to do with the very well established and understood health impacts on children as they develop, same as alcohol. It is not because of secondhand smoke. The latter informs where we can smoke, such as (not) around a hospital.
> Preventing children from smoking has entirely to do with the very well established and understood health impacts on children as they develop, same as alcohol.
There are very well established and understood health impacts on adults too, for both smoking and alcohol.
> It is not because of secondhand smoke. The latter informs where we can smoke, such as (not) around a hospital.
Duh? I mentioned second-hand smoke in the context of "public smoking bans," by which I meant smoking in buildings and other public areas. That has nothing specifically to do with children. So it appears that once again you misunderstood my comment.
The point is the enforcement/adherence part. They are saying “people do it anyway, therefore we shouldn’t have the law.“ What you are arguing is actually more valid than their argument.
That’s how it read. Which is what my previous comment responded to. This is getting kind of silly and the tone is not necessary. I think maybe it’s better for us both to move on.