Major Big Tech companies declined an invitation to testify at a Capitol hearing.
By Nolan D. McCaskill
https://www.dallasnews.com/
AUSTIN — Texas lawmakers vowed Tuesday to hold Big Tech accountable for failing to protect minors from harm on social media, including exposure to pornography and sex trafficking.
“There’s been no significant change to protect minors from the harms we continue to see on social media,” said Rep. Jared Patterson, R-Frisco, co-chair of the Joint Committee to Study the Effects of Media on Minors, which met Tuesday at the state Capitol.
“Study after study shows an increase in self-harm, an increase in body dysmorphia in our girls, an increase in porn addiction and aggression in our boys and the steady increase in suicide for all youth,” Patterson said.
Patterson called it “a slap in the face to every Texan” that no social media company made a representative available to testify at the committee’s hearing.
Meta, X, TikTok and Snap declined the panel’s invitation to testify.
Patterson filed legislation in the 2023 legislative session to bar children between 13 and 18 from using any social media platforms. His proposal was referred to the Select Committee on Youth Health and Safety in March but no action was taken.
He filed a similar bill in November to restrict children younger than 18 from using social media.
“I refuse to sit idly by and allow our children to be present on social media platforms when the very same social media companies will not show up for a study committee addressing the concerns expressed by Texans and others across the nation,” Patterson said.
The hearing came a week before Texas’ biennial legislative session begins and weeks after the 118th Congress left Washington without passing a pair of children’s online safety bills that overwhelmingly passed the U.S. Senate in July.
Committee members and witnesses highlighted the dangers Texas youth face from platforms they argued are addictive by design, such as access to porn that later contributes to divorce, single-parent households, emulation of violent acts children think are normal, sexual assaults, erectile dysfunction and unhealthy standards for relationships. They also said such platforms leave children susceptible to peer pressure and bullying and limits their attention spans.
Proposals discussed included teaching students about digital literacy, limiting screen time on school-issued devices, taking students’ phones during instructional time, requiring users to opt in to data collection rather than having to opt out and strengthening Texas Education Association guidelines for school districts to force compliance.
Robert Epstein, a senior research psychologist at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology, said internet addiction is becoming more harmful to the nation’s youth than smoking, drinking or substance abuse.
“Software engineers now work closely with behavioral engineers to design and optimize online content that keeps young people glued to their computers and mobile devices during all their waking hours,” Epstein said.
Joshua Broome, a former porn actor turned pastor, called himself an “anomaly” for getting healthy after overcoming a porn addiction at age 13. He lamented that people “care more about what we have the freedom to watch than the harm that it causes.”
Deasia Wiggins — a youth peer counselor at the Harris Center for Mental Health IDD, an acronym for intellectual development disabilities, who grew up in foster and group homes — told the committee her friends have been “choked, slapped, spanked and raped because that’s what people using pornography think sex is about.”
Wiggins advocated for passage of a Senate bill introduced last session by Sens. Angela Paxton, R-McKinney; Bob Hall, R-Edgewood; and Mayes Middleton, R-Galveston. That proposal would have required manufacturers to automatically enable a filter to prevent minors from accessing, downloading or displaying explicit material.
“Today’s parents weren’t parented through this,” Paxton said. “Parents are really in a tough spot because they’re having to parent their children through very difficult, challenging, confusing, complex issues in a way that they haven’t seen modeled for themselves.”
Lindy McGee, a Houston pediatrician, said social media is “a danger to the fabric of our society.”
“It’s just staying alone in your room and not having friends. We know that social interaction is such a huge part of being human,” she told the committee. “And this isn’t social interaction. The kids think it is, and it’s not. All of us who are old enough to have this experience with healthy relationships know that this isn’t the same thing.”
Rep. Lacey Hull, R-Houston, framed the issue as “a massive public safety crisis” the government needs to figure out.
Sen. Lois Kolkhorst, R-Brenham, apologized for her naivete in not fully grasping the pervasiveness of youth online culture. But she argued Texas can be a leader on this issue.
“And Texas is big enough to move the needle and be aggressive,” she added. “So anybody out there lobbying for Big Tech or the search engines or the apps, come ready, OK? Come with a heart full of goodness so we can literally get rid of this scourge that is destroying the lives of our children and future generations.
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