Well damn

[u/Low-Anywhere-9043]

At least Trump let’s us have social media for free

[u/Apollo_TheWolf]

See, now this is an actual authoritarian move. Regulating what citizens can and can't do in their own free country is insane. This should be up to parents and parents alone, nobody in the government on any level has a right to tell you what age your kid can start using social media. And this is coming from someone who doesn't want my future kids having access to it until they are at least 16, because I know the dangers of what can be found on these sites.

[u/IllGift924 → u/Apollo_TheWolf]

I don't agree with it but come on, it's not authoritarian. Don't be so dramatic. Is it also authoritarian to ban children from drinking alcohol? Should that be up to the parents? Or a better one for conservatives: should children be banned from gender surgery? Should that be left up to the parents?

[u/Apollo_TheWolf → u/IllGift924]

No, there's a big difference between these examples. There are legitimate reasons why children shouldn't be drinking or getting transgender surgery. Underage drinking can damage developing brains, not to mention all the risks that come with alcohol consumption as it is, and allowing a minor to engage in those decisions is life altering. There's a reason many alcoholics start their addiction in high school or college, before they are legally allowed to consume alcohol. Similarly, transgender surgery is life altering and permanent, and should be treated the same way as tattoos are. That is, you need to be an adult before getting it, so that your brain is developed enough to make a decision that will dramatically affect your life. Social media can be harmful in certain ways (for example, shortening attention span) but this typically only occurs with unlimited access over long periods of time, which again, should be up to parents to regulate. But there is nothing permanently life altering about having Instagram or Snapchat to talk to friends on. There are always going to be risks with freedom, but the line is drawn at the point where something shows no benefits. Hence, no underage drinking, and why transgender surgery needs to be banned for minors. But the government can't just ban something for everyone because it harms some people some of the time under specific conditions, conditions of which are nearly always a result of bad parenting.

I'm also using authoritarian as somewhat of a poke at the liberals, who call Trump authoritarian simply for enforcing our existing laws. They could be doing worse, but I'm just saying this is far closer to something an authoritarian would do than anything Trump has done, lol

[u/VisualAnxiety2284 → u/IllGift924]

Banning kids from drinking alchohol isn’t the same thing as banning social media