Australia just fired the opening shot in what global media now calls a “world-first” attempt to ban social media for kids under 16. The new Online Safety Amendment went into effect on December 10th, forcing platforms like TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube to block all accounts suspected of belonging to minors or face massive penalties. Advocates are celebrating. Bureaucrats are thrilled. And governments in Europe and Asia are already eyeing their own versions of this approach.
Let me be perfectly clear: I do not believe children should be on social media. Middle schoolers are still trying to figure out who they are—before they ever have to face the psychological warfare of filters, likes, cancel culture, and anonymous cruelty. Childhood is too short to waste in an algorithm’s dopamine maze.
But here’s the part the bureaucrats can’t stand: It is not the government’s job to raise your children.
This new law is based on the ridiculous assumption that politicians somehow know better than parents do what’s good for every single kid, in every home, across every circumstance. Children are not widgets. Families are not identical. Some 14-year-olds are responsible, thoughtful, and supported. Others are not ready even at 40. The government doesn’t have the slightest clue which is which—and it never will.
Yet Australia now gives the government the final say on whether a child is “allowed” to connect online. Not mom. Not dad. A bureaucrat. Even officials involved in promoting the law concede kids will dodge the rules—by lying about their age, borrowing someone else’s account, or migrating to platforms that are even less regulated. So the very children who are most vulnerable will simply move out of sight… and out of reach.
That’s not a success story. That’s negligence wrapped in a press release.
Every time the government steps in as a substitute parent, families get weaker. The state doesn’t teach values. It doesn’t shape character. It doesn’t sacrifice sleep, comfort and sanity to protect a child. Parents do that. When a parent is engaged. When a parent is present. If a child wanders into danger online, it’s almost always because there was no parent watching, no conversation happening, no guardrails being set, no accountability on the device that was handed over far too soon. Social media doesn’t stalk your kids. TikTok doesn’t break into their room at midnight and make them post videos. It was the parent who handed over a thousand-dollar smartphone with unlimited access to the world—and then walked away.
We have a parenting crisis long before we have a social media crisis.
Yes, online platforms can warp kids’ sense of identity. Yes, bullying online is real. Yes, there are toxic corners of the web that no child should ever visit. That’s why parenting takes work—showing up daily, checking devices, enforcing limits, being the “bad guy” when necessary. You can pass a law, but you can’t legislate parental engagement. You can fine companies, but you can’t manufacture love, attention, communication, or boundaries.
A ban sounds like a quick and easy fix. But it creates its own damage. Take away every legitimate avenue for teens to connect online, and many will simply disappear into unsupervised channels—places with zero safety protocols, zero community moderation, and zero adult oversight. For some kids—especially the lonely or the bullied—online community can be one of the few lifelines they have. Bureaucrats don’t think about that. They only know how to block, restrict, and punish.
Politicians thrive on fear. They market panic. They sell us the idea that they—and only they—can save our kids from danger. But once you let them take that job, they never give it back. And families pay the price. Banning kids from social media doesn’t merely inconvenience tech companies. It normalizes the belief that the government owns childhood.
That is a threat to every free society.
You want a safer generation? Strengthen the family. Don’t replace it. Restore parental responsibility. Don’t outsource it. Teach kids discipline, self-respect, and how to handle the world—including its online version—when they’re ready. There is no ban, no bureaucratic rule, no regulatory agency that can do that work better than a loving, attentive parent.
So let’s be honest: the true danger isn’t Instagram or YouTube or Snap. The real danger is when parents abdicate their God-given role—then beg the government to do it for them.
Social media isn’t the enemy.
Lazy parenting is.
If we continue to surrender the raising of our children to politicians, then eventually those politicians will believe our children belong to them. And once that idea takes hold, the damage will be far worse than anything found on a teenager’s feed.
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