I am a technology optimist and a liberal, but we need to talk more about the dark side of digitalisation. We have become digital junkies, prisoners of the algorithms. We use apps that are free to use, without realizing that we are paying through our data, our lives and our lost time. We are fed news we tend to agree with, music, movies and series we tend to like. Social media leads to more polarization and a poorer public exchange of words, and makes it possible to influence elections of the undemocratic variety. We check our mobile before saying good morning to our children or the partner next to us. The ability to concentrate is impaired. We can’t sit through even short meetings without having our mobile phone in front of us. Our digital tools and the apps we surround ourselves with are designed to make us addicted. As Netflix puts it; sleep is our main competitor. And many have become dependent on confirmation via social media. We unintentionally check how many people have “liked” our posts. A better dinner is not successful until it is documented and posted; “look how nice we are!”. We stage our lives. As a friend put it; on Facebook, the couple’s relationship never looks better than right before a divorce. Fortunately, recently there has been more debate about mobile phone use – and especially among young people. A teacher recently told of findings from his own students. Average mobile phone use was around 45 hours a week. Over 6 hours per day! What does this mobile phone use do to us, to the young? We know something. Social media provides confirmation, but also the opposite. Mental disorders, exclusion, digital bullying and impaired ability to concentrate are some of the side effects. Children are exposed to content adapted for adults. The booze taxi, the langer on the corner, pedophiles – they can all be found on social media. Children as young as eight or ten take nude pictures of themselves and sell them on Snapchat, without their parents discovering anything. news recently published a thought-provoking article about the vulnerability of young exercise-loving boys in the face of TikTok’s algorithms. Boys as young as nine, who are quickly led to protein shakes and anabolic steroids – and megarexia. There are thus more challenges with TikTok than the data being sent to China. Some will object that there are many good things about social media. And it undoubtedly is. The question is whether children down to the age of seven or eight are ready for the world they encounter in social media? Whether it is positive that many children spend more than 6 hours on their mobile every day? If the mindless scrolling adds more than it takes away from them? Whether the content enriches their life or steals their time? I am basically a liberal. But children’s self-regulation of mobile phone use and social media does not work in practice. Parents are also unable to agree on a reasonable path. Once someone starts, it becomes too difficult to hold back. To be the one who says no, when the others say yes. A few years ago I stated that no child needs a smartphone. I got no applause from my children for that move. The need for a telephone is triggered by the parents’ urge to get in touch with their children. My two eldest children have both had Nokia phones, but in the face of reality I had to crawl to the cross. When social life is organized on WhatsApp, it is no use with Nokia phone. And when most people migrated over to Snapchat, that principle was also on fire. I am not alone in these dilemmas. The time has therefore come to talk about regulations. Firstly, it should be obvious that school time and free time should be a mobile phone-free zone. Whether it is regulated by the school, the municipality or the state is secondary. There is no reason for the mobile phone to be in front of the class or during school hours. Secondly, a higher age limit should be set for the use of social media, and requirements for registration and logging in with BankID or similar solutions. Today, the age limit is usually 13 years, but it is easy to lie about your age to create such an account. Let’s raise the age limit to 16, and introduce real age verification. With real personal control, it will also be impossible for Norwegian users to create fake accounts. Thirdly: We adults must become better role models. It cannot be regulated, but it must start with a recognition: We are dependent on mobile phones, and some of us also on social media. I deleted my personal Facebook profile in 2012. It is quite possible to live a good life without it. If we do this, we may be on the trail of lost time. That time we will never get back.
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