Opinion editor’s note: Editorials represent the opinions of the Star Tribune Editorial Board, which operates independently from the newsroom.
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“The moral test of any society is how well it protects its children,” the surgeon general of the United States, Dr. Vivek H. Murthy, wrote in a New York Times commentary republished Monday by Star Tribune Opinion. That means keeping them as safe as possible, which is why governments throughout the years have acted on direct health threats to kids — something Murthy is urging with his call to require a surgeon general’s warning label on social media platforms “stating that social media is associated with significant mental health harms for adolescents.”
In a medical emergency, Murthy wrote, “you don’t have the luxury to wait for perfect information.” And yet the data driving Murthy and others alarmed about the deleterious effect of social media on young people is compelling. For instance, Murthy reports, adolescents who spend more than three hours a day on social media face twice the risk of symptoms of anxiety and depression — and as of last summer, social media time by this cohort was 4.8 hours a day. What’s more, Murthy states that nearly half of adolescents say social media makes them feel worse about their bodies. That attitude, as too many parents tragically know, can result in horrific health outcomes, including, in extreme cases, death.
“One of the worst things for a parent is to know your children are in danger yet be unable to do anything about it. That is how parents tell me they feel when it comes to social media — helpless and alone in the face of toxic content and hidden harms,” Murthy wrote, later adding: “There is no seatbelt for parents to click, no helmet to snap in place, no assurance that trusted experts have investigated and ensured that these platforms are safe for our kids. There are just parents and their children, trying to figure it out on their own, pitted against some of the best product engineers and most well-resourced companies in the world.”
So it’s appropriate to give these parents, and more profoundly their kids, some help. Which is what a warning label would be: help, but not a panacea, something Murthy seemingly acknowledges when he also calls for action not just from Congress, but companies and society, too.
But companies — especially those, as Murthy describes, as well-resourced as social media firms — are by design motivated by profit, which in their case can come from ever-more-addictive algorithms. The surgeon general, conversely, who works for the public good, is motivated by improving public health.
Congress should be, too. And it will need to be, since a warning label requires congressional approval. Concern for kids should never be a partisan issue, so Democratic and Republican lawmakers should be able to coalesce around Murthy’s request.