Opinion: Bill would help hold social media groups responsible

Two years ago, the unchecked dangers of the digital world hit home. My son, a 14-year-old freshman at the time, was being bullied at his old school in Texas because of his race. That afternoon, a friend texted him a link to an Instagram account targeting Black students at their high school. One of the page’s posts compared pictures of monkeys to a photo of my beautiful son.

I’ll never forget seeing the spark leave his eyes as his face dropped. As a protective mom, I acted fast, filing a report from my own account (my son didn’t even have one). I followed up with unanswered calls and emails to Instagram trying to communicate the urgency of the situation. As the hours went by, I even turned to public pleas on social media. Still, the vile post stayed up. Ultimately, the account wasn’t removed until the next day.

Of course, even after the post came down, the hurt stayed with my son. He became withdrawn and reluctant to go to school. He didn’t know which of his classmates might be one of the anonymous cyberbullies who had, as we found out, created similar racist accounts on TikTok and Snapchat.

So we moved to Portales for a fresh start – now, thankfully, he’s now in a safer and more supportive school environment.

That journey propelled me into the world of advocacy, as I found a group of dedicated parents and joined forces with them to strive for systemic change. I became especially vocal about our top priority: passing the New Mexico Kids Code in the new year to protect children and teens online.

In my career in the dairy industry, safety is paramount. Food and Drug Administration guidance tells dairy farmers that “additional statutory and regulatory requirements apply to infant formula, which is often used as the sole source of nutrition by a vulnerable population during a critical period of growth and development.”

Our legislators should apply a similar standard of care for social media companies with young users, and that’s exactly what the New Mexico Kids Code bill would do.

A tragic story from our parent group highlights the urgency of acting now: a friend’s 10-year-old daughter died attempting a dangerous online challenge. According to a forensic investigation, she saw one “choking challenge” post on her phone and went right upstairs to try it. This content was presented to her by a social media recommendation, not from her own search or being posted by a friend.

Unfortunately, tragedies like this one are often mislabeled suicide when they are in fact the direct result of reckless content promotion.

To address dangers like these, the New Mexico Kids Code legislation would task tech companies with young users to come up with a risk assessment in advance of launching new features and products, factoring in what we know about youth psychosocial development. The bill would require easy mechanisms for kids and parents to report dangerous posts and accounts like the one that targeted my son – demanding that platforms design safer products, and holding them accountable if they do not.

As I know too well, efforts parents and kids make to engage with these platforms often culminate in silence. Two years after making that first frantic phone call, I have yet to hear back from Instagram. But when several of us parents testified in Santa Fe, their lobbyists were right there in the room, trying to scare and intimidate us.

Now they’re threatening to come back in January to keep opposing common-sense protections for our kids. But I’ll be there too, fighting to pass the New Mexico Kids Code – and I hope you’ll ask your legislators to join me.

Why now? For families like mine, the damage has been done – and far too many have suffered even worse. But for so many other kids out there, we still have time.

The New Mexico Kids Code is more than just a bill: it’s a statement that we won’t allow these companies’ negligence and greed to continue threatening our children’s safety. Now is the time to hold these social media platforms to the same standards of care as any other industry that serves our children and pass this bill into law.

Contact Tracy Kemp: [email protected]