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The recent announcement of age restrictions for social media use raises questions regarding the Government’s true motives, writes Davey Heller.
THE ALBANESE LABOR Government and the Australian state premiers have come together in a rare moment of unity, to announce they will ban all young people and children under 16 from social media.
Albanese declared:
“Social media is doing harm to our kids and I’m calling time on it.”
The fact that protecting children on social media is an important issue is beyond question. However, is it possible that the proposed ban is also designed to protect politicians from young people on social media?
Politicians and the mainstream press in the build-up to the ban announcement have carried stories on the poisonous reactionary ideologies that children are exposed to on social media. Particular attention has rightfully been paid to the misogynist Andrew Tate for example. However, research shows that the first generations to grow up on social media are overwhelmingly becoming more Left-wing, not more reactionary compared to older generations.
The Right-wing Institute of Public Affairs reported on a survey of young people’s attitudes towards socialism conducted in late 2022 in Australia, the U.S., Canada and the UK which showed support for socialism as the ideal economic system was strongest among those aged 18-34, ranging from 43% in the U.S. to 53% in the UK, to 61% in Australia. Only 30% of young Australians agreed that capitalism is the ideal economic system. This reflects a trend that has been recorded consistently over recent years in polling of young people.
Perhaps this underlying trend and what it means for the major parties electorally is what at least partly drives the bipartisan support for getting young people off social media. The Right-wing Centre For Independent Studies published a report entitled ‘Generation Left’ warning the Liberals faced a difficult electoral future due to the swing to the Left amongst Gen Z.
Report author and director of the centre’s Intergenerational Program Matthew Taylor said:
“Gen Z have entered the electorate at historically low levels of support for the Coalition and are drifting further and further away from it as they move into their mid-20s.”
The Labor Party has nothing to celebrate, though, with fewer than two out of five young people voting for Federal Labor in 2022.
The issue of social media shaping public opinion has come into focus over the last 12 months of the horrific Israeli genocide in Gaza. Seemingly endless footage of war crimes and atrocities in a genocide live broadcast onto social media by its Palestinian victims has left its mark on the consciousness of young people.
In the U.S., the overwhelming tide of youth support for Palestine in the months after 7 October was blamed by many U.S. congressmen on the Chinese-owned TikTok app, with one U.S. Congressman labelling it ‘digital fentanyl made by China. And it is brainwashing our youth against the country and our allies’.
Despite TikTok pointing out that it was not its algorithm that was flooding the app with pro-Palestine content, it was just that young people supported Palestine more than Israel, the successful groundwork was laid to pass legislation in Congress to ban TikTok.
Australian press and politicians have also blamed social media for so many young people organising strikes, protests, encampments and direct actions over the last 12 months in solidarity with Palestine.
Julia Gillard, former ALP Prime Minister, stated in a Sky News documentary on the alleged rise in anti-Semitism in Australia:
“A lot of what is going on today is a distortion of history from social media. It’s a misunderstanding about the nature of the conflict. Particularly young people are developing views about this which are unbalanced and really not informed by the history in any way.”
Her message is clear: if people had to rely on the corporate-owned press and the Government’s state-owned mouthpiece, the ABC, the footage of dead and bloodied children would not have confused them so much.
If many young people have turned against supporting a pillar of Western imperialism in the form of the Zionist state because of access to information on social media, what might happen as we enter a period of “great power conflict”?
Talk of direct war against adversaries such as Iran, Russia and China is openly discussed within the halls of power. In any war, control of information is crucial to all sides, not least to ensure your own fighters, who are always drawn from the ranks of the young, stay ideologically motivated. It cost the U.S. dearly when the youth rebellion in the late ’60s bled into their own armed forces and made continuing the Vietnam War untenable.
The ban on children using social media also takes on a new light when seen in the context of a little-reported outburst by Albanese last year.
When asked the bizarre question by 3AW shock jock Neil Mitchell on Melbourne radio what he would do if he was “dictator for five years”, Albo replied without hesitating:
Ban social media would be handy.
Keyboard warriors who can anonymously say anything at all and without any fear; the sort of things they would never say to you face-to-face, they can just assert as fact and it worries me.
Given that bringing in age verification for minors will likely mean that Australians of all ages will need to provide ID and give up their anonymity when using social media platforms, perhaps there are other political benefits to the Government beyond controlling what young people see.
Davey Heller is a writer and campaigner. You can follow him on Twitter @socialist_davey.
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