Parents Know Best What’s Right for Our Kids
OUR COALITION
Social media is a part of Washington families’ daily lives. The U.S. Census Bureau recently found that most children have access to some form of smart device by age 5, granting them access to various apps and social media platforms.
And while social media can be a positive tool used for creativity, entrepreneurship, connectivity, and learning – it’s up to us to ensure that our kids are accessing social media content appropriate for their age.
It’s clear: Government can do more to empower parents and promote the mental well-being of America’s children. Policymakers should be focused on passing new laws to give parents control. However, recent proposals have made major missteps that undermine parents’ own right to raise their children how they know is best.
Washington State Parents for Smart Tech supports implementing a single policy that applies across all social media apps – allowing parents to breathe easy knowing their children are not able to access social media platforms without their knowledge.
We believe Washington State should require parental controls in Google and Apple’s app stores where parents can approve or deny app downloads in one place for all social media apps – current and emerging.
This approach gives parents peace of mind that our teens aren’t using apps without our knowledge.
OUR GOAL
Our goal is to help promote policy solutions that streamline and simplify parental controls on social media so parents can ensure their kids develop healthy social media habits.
Right now, some parental controls are complicated and hard to use for parents. And, as new apps emerge (nearly 1000 per day), the burden is again put on us as parents to catch the app before our kids download and begin interacting with other users.
To address this problem, some lawmakers have proposed a complete ban on social media. However, parents – not the government – should decide what’s best for each child.
