Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Patrick Usmar: AUT Communications Professor on Australia's social media ban

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Patrick Usmar: AUT Communications Professor on Australia's social media ban · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, they're all notice. If they don't clear
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: out the kids, they're looking at fines of fifty million dollars.
• 0:05
  Speaker 1: Aut Communication Studies academic Patrick Ozma joins me. Now, Hali, Patrick,
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Hi there, how are you? How would this? How do
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: you think this is going down? Because I've played some
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: kids and I just played elbow talking about the whole thing,
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: and the whole thing feels like, ah, yes, kids, you're
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: misbehaving and just go out there and have a run.
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: And I feel, you know, it's not going to be
• 0:26
  Speaker 1: popular amongst a whole generation.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: It's not that turkeys don't vote for Christmas, so to
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: you imagine that most young people are very much into
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: social media, many of them, dare I say, we throw
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: this word around easily addicted, but my research actually tells
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: us that some of them might be quietly welcoming it.
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: I did some research last year with some high school students,
• 0:51
  Speaker 2: and you know, one of the things they are is
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: actually terrified of making the first move when it comes
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: to real life. They actually do want to socialize. The
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: prevalence of social media has potentially eroded those skills. And
• 1:05
  Speaker 2: no one's saying that all social media use is harmful.
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: And the way I try to divine it up is
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: we consume social media, we create social media, we connect,
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: and we act on what we see and most harmful
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: part is the most popular. So the passive scrolling, the
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: consuming social media has very well documented harms. I don't
• 1:26
  Speaker 2: think it's really.
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: I agree, but Patrick, we all live in the world,
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: and I totally agree. And I would actually have to say,
• 1:32
  Speaker 1: if you're worried about scrolling, you should actually stop the
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: old people doing it as well, because I've just seen
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: so many old people who are going, look at this, Barbara,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: it's like a television station. He look as Jimmy Kerr. Look,
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: Jimmy Kerrer is talking on there's an oh love. That's
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: an amazing picture of something blowing up and not well.
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: And you look at old people and they're scrolling as well.
• 1:49
  Speaker 2: Well, that's the good you know, that's the good role modeling. Right,
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: If you're going to be a parent that tells your
• 1:53
  Speaker 2: kid to get off social media, then you need to
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: do the same thing, not for getting thirteen to fifteen
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: year olds have very different, not as advanced cognitive skills,
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: and if we can change law, it might mean that
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: the culture kind of follows because sometimes you know, changing
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: the law and lock of cultural change, the Marriage Amendment Act,
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: you know, and this is also don't forget, this isn't
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: a ban, This is a delay always saying it's people
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: under a certain age. So we're not saying young people
• 2:21
  Speaker 2: can never ever use social media. It's a bit like
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: alcohol or tobacco or drive.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: How yeah, I get this, I get this. How how
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: how compliant and how behind it other organizations that that
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: actually provide the platforms, because I know that they've been
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: slowly sort of briefing everybody. You know, this is going
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: to happen from this day and if you're under sixteen,
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: you're going to have to stop watching the old TikTok.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: So are they behind this or are they going to
• 2:49
  Speaker 1: try and look for loopholes and look, you.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: Know, yeah, enforcement is going to be really really difficult.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: Imagine that the amount of advertising revenue that they're about
• 2:58
  Speaker 2: to lose. So they're already releasing things like jupe apps.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: There will be ways that young people get around it.
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: You can get VPNs fake accounts. But it's going to
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: help both teachers, parents and other people to kind of
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: combat the and if you heard of the idea of
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: the broccoli argument. So if you're a parent, you might
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: tell your you might tell your kids how many times
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: a week to eat their broccoli. You might get to
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: say that three or four times a day. But social
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: media can expose young people to advertising messages thousands of
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: times a week. So rather than it being a persuasing
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: game persuading my young person to do something, or teachers
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: having to monitor it, they can just say, look, this
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: is actually the law now, so it makes easier. But no,
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: of course, the social media platforms are very invested in
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: not losing this audience. They'll try and find ways around it.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: But it is a line in the sand, and you know,
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: there's never going to be a silver bullet, right, We're
• 3:51
  Speaker 2: never going to solve these problems overnight. It's a really subtle,
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: nuanced problem.
• 3:55
  Speaker 1: Patrick, communications studies from academic. You're quite good at talking.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: And so we're now late, and I thank you so
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: much for your time today.
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, listen live
• 4:06
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• 4:09
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