Dan Morris: Ray of hope as Lords back under-16s social media ban

In the wake of the recent Grok outrage, where X’s in-house AI has allowed sexualised images of real women and children to be created, the House of Lords has backed a ban on under-16s using social media.

The red benches have passed an amendment to the Government's Children's Wellbeing and Schools Bill, which is currently making its way through parliament.

The House of Commons, of course, has the chance to overturn this. Yet, with the Government under pressure from opposition parties as well as Labour backbenchers, such a move is looking increasingly unlikely.

This is fantastic news for our country and our children. 

When news of Australia’s intention to institute such a ban hit the headlines, I prayed that the UK and other countries would follow suit.

Australia’s ban came into force in December, and happily we look set to be the next country to put the welfare of our young people first, and take a strong but necessary move in the fight against shielding them from online abuse. 

For decades, social media has been used in many positive ways - linking people up with far flung friends and family, and serving as a tool for the building of new relationships.

Unfortunately, it has also been a facilitator for bullying, intimidation and sexual abuse. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again - if one child has suffered psychological damage at the hands of the dregs of society wielding social media as a weapon, then the price is simply too high. 

It seems that those in power may finally be about to take firm action, and as a father, I am nothing less than elated. 

At only three years old, my daughter is currently blissfully unaware of social media, and, regardless of the Government’s decision, any conversations with her about it will not take place for a long time. 

My greatest hope, however, is that they never need to take place at all, and by the time she is ‘of age’ to use it, it is a distant memory for most of us, and something teens have long learned to live without.

The question is, what will the world for UK youngsters look like without social media? In a word, I suspect, ‘better’.

Regardless of documented instances of abhorrent abuse, in recent years I have heard countless horror stories of children and teens showing less and less interest in the real world, and becoming absorbed in the online sphere to the point of addiction.

Tales of the bedroom door closing on a Friday evening and not to be opened until a Monday morning have been unnervingly common, with said youngsters spending their entire weekend interacting with others only through online portals.

This is unhealthy, and flat-out wrong. Yet, for mums and dads, it is an incredibly difficult cycle to break.

Nobody wants to be the one parent who insists their child can’t do the same thing as other kids. Happily, if an outright ban is brought in, this won’t have to be the case.

All youngsters will be forced to ditch the digital world and get back to the real one, and to be actually social rather than glued to a smartphone or keyboard.

When I was a kid (cue Hovis theme tune), being outdoors was the default setting, with social time with other children having been spent cycling, rollerblading, tree climbing and making up games. There was no other way to socialise outside of school; technology was yet to make this ‘easier’.

These were better days, and I shudder to think what might have become of my character had I had the option of connecting with others without leaving my bedroom. Because such ‘connection’ isn’t real, and is missing so much of the vital stuff that being physically face-to-face with your peers brings in terms of social development - confidence, empathy and respect being at the top of the tree.

If someone had introduced me to the worlds of social media and online gaming when I was a youngster, I’d have lapped them up with both hands. And I suspect that now I would be worse off for having done so.

Fingers crossed that a UK ban on social media for under-16s does come into place, and that those young people who can’t comprehend a world without it quickly learn how beautiful and happy such a world can be. 

It’s time to get back to reality.