Macron may ban screens for under-threes
Report by French experts urges tighter restrictions for children of all ages and banning TVS in creches
EMMANUEL MACRON is considering banning children under three from using screens in a move proposed in a report from experts.
The report, commissioned by the Elysée and handed in yesterday, also recommends a ban on under-11s owning mobile phones and a prohibition on children aged under 15 from using social media platforms. It warns of the perils of “hyper-connection” among children and “the consequences for their health, their development, their future”, but also for the future of “our society, our civilisation”.
The 10-strong commission, co-chaired by Servane Mouton, a neurologist, and Amine Benyamina, an addiction psychiatrist, said that it was “shaken” by content providers’ “strategies for capturing children’s attention”.
The report warned: “There was a clear consensus on the direct and indirect negative effects of screens, particularly on sleep, a sedentary lifestyle – which encourages obesity – and short-sightedness.” To “take back control”, the commission called for a blanket ban on all use of screens by children under the age of three.
This is followed by “severely limited” access between the ages of three and six, offering only “content of educational quality and accompanied by an adult”.
The experts also called for the use of mobile phones and televisions in maternity wards to be “limited as far as possible”, and recommended that computers and televisions be banned from creches and nursery classes.
They also want “reinforced action” with childminders and a ban on most connected toys before the age of six. According to the report, mobile phones should only be allowed from the age of 11, and internet access from 13. Social network access should only be granted from age 15, and then only to networks deemed “ethical”.
The report urged that French teenagers should be kept away from Tiktok, Instagram and Snapchat until they turn 18. The experts pointed to social networks as a “risk factor” for depression or anxiety, in cases of “pre-existing vulnerability”.
The amount of child exposure to pornographic and violent content “appears alarming”, they added.
“Cognitive bias is used to lock children on to their screens, control them, re-engage them and monetise them,” Mr Benyamina told Ouest-france.
“It’s an economy of capture. Parents are virtually out of the picture, faced with a market that has imposed itself on society,” he added.
Ms Mouton said: “What struck us is that the professionals’ priority is not the protection of children. Behind the rhetoric, it’s ‘business at every level’.”
France has been locked in a heated debate over how to clamp down on bullying and suicides linked to teenagers’ use of social media.
When riots erupted last July, Mr Macron warned that minors, who made up the bulk of the rioters, were egging each other on via social networks.
Earlier this month, Gabriel Attal, France’s prime minister, called for a “surge of authority” to combat “the addiction of some of our teenagers to violence” after a 15-year-old was beaten to death outside a school in Viry-chatillon.
“Attacking evil at its root also means regulating screens,” he said, describing social networks as “an accelerator of hatred” and a “catalyst of violence”.