Protecting Children's Mental Health

Addressing the Impact of Social Media

Children today face unprecedented threats to their mental health, exacerbated by the pervasive influence of social media. The rise of deceptive and addictive designs within these platforms has led to alarming rates of sadness, poor mental health, and suicidal thoughts among our youth. HB 3 represents a critical step in combating this crisis by implementing measures to safeguard children from the harmful effects of social media.

Poll: Voters and Parents Support HB 3

Read the Poll

HB 3: A Bold Step Forward

Key Provisions and Objectives

HB 3 is a comprehensive legislative initiative designed to protect children from the detrimental impacts of social media addiction. This bill mandates age verification for account creation, prohibits minors from entering into contracts with social media platforms, and enforces strict privacy protections. By requiring platforms to terminate accounts held by minors and promoting transparency in content policies, HB 3 empowers both children and parents to navigate the digital landscape with confidence.

Advancing Children's Rights Online

Enforcing Accountability and Transparency

With the passage of HB 3, Florida is taking decisive action to uphold the rights and well-being of its youngest citizens in the digital age. By allowing legal recourse for violations and promoting accountability among social media platforms, this legislation establishes a framework for protecting children from harmful online content. HB 3 represents a commitment to ensuring that children can explore the digital world safely, with access to resources and support that prioritize their mental health and overall welfare.

  • Speaker of the House Paul Renner
    This is the legacy of social media, and it is a global problem. But it cannot be the fate of our children - we must act! We will take bold steps like age verification to rescue our children from technology that cripples their sense of self-worth and purpose.

    Speaker of the House Paul Renner

    (R-Palm Coast)
  • Speaker of the House Paul Renner
    Recent surveys of high school girls prove its devastating effects. When asked, “Have you experienced persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness within the past year?” 57%, yes. “Have you experienced poor mental health during the past 30 days?” 41%, yes. And when asked, “Have you seriously considered suicide within the last year?” 30%, yes.

    Speaker of the House Paul Renner

    (R-Palm Coast)
  • Speaker of the House Paul Renner
    And here’s the truth - the social media companies know this. They also know that they designed social media to be as addictive as possible. Before social media, those mean kids barely made a dent in our children’s mental health. But the rise of social media has hollowed out what should be a childhood of happiness and big dreams.

    Speaker of the House Paul Renner

    (R-Palm Coast)
  • Speaker of the House Paul Renner
    Fortunately, most children start life physically healthy and ready to reach their potential. Unfortunately, they face daily threats to their mental health that even the most involved parents struggle to confront. Children have always faced mean girls and boys, but social media has changed the game and causes unprecedented damage to children’s mental health.

    Speaker of the House Paul Renner

    (R-Palm Coast)
  • Sen. Erin Grall
    We are saying, no, you are not going to addict our most vulnerable by allowing them to engage. And I think that you should know that young children and young adults want to know where we’ve been. It was very interesting, there was a group of PACE girls that was up, they were asked about the bill, they were supportive of the bill, of a ban. Harking on what their world might look like without social media, I think a lot of young girls and men are okay with what that would look like. I had the Future Farmers of America in my office, they thought it was a great bill. So very different groups of children who are saying where have you all been, adults, while we’ve been exploited, while we’ve been targeted, while we’ve been commoditized?

    Sen. Erin Grall

    (R-Fort Pierce), SB 1788 Sponsor
  • Rep. Lauren Melo
    Personally, in the last five years I have met two young females under the age of 15 whose lives have been impacted greatly and their families have been devastated by inappropriate pictures of these two young women showing up on platforms and traveling through the entire school where these students had to pick up and go to a different school, and it’s heartbreaking. I also think about, again as a parent of three, the peer pressure that we’ve all had with these smart phones. And it’s not like you can buy your child a flip phone and send them to school; we talk so much about bullying today and there’s so much bullying that happens over whether another child has a smartphone, so as a parent you have to make that decision, are you going to buy your child that smartphone. The same thing extends to these social media platforms. Children are bullied and chastised if they’re not on these social media platforms, and you know what, this is a step that takes the parents off the hook of these difficult decisions of no I do not want my child to be on here, but how is Suzie going to be treated by all of the other students, and how is she going to be bullied because she doesn’t have social media. So I believe that this is a great bill, it’s long overdue.

    Rep. Lauren Melo

    (R-Naples)
  • Rep. Fiona McFarland
    Social media companies themselves know how addictive their technology is, and they’re even unable to police the bad guys,” McFarland said on the House floor before the vote. “Despite their best efforts, content about human trafficking and child pornography keep slipping into the algorithm.

    Rep. Fiona McFarland

    (R-Sarasota)
  • Rep. Michele Rayner
    In the state of Florida we’re saying enough is enough. You’re not going to build a business on the backs of our children and harming our children.

    Rep. Michele Rayner

    (D-St. Petersburg)
  • Rep. Michele Rayner
    I see the effects. I see how children are introduced to criminal offenses; I see how children are harmed. Life experiences and friends of mine who are educators have had in-depth conversations with me about how social media has affected the ability for children to learn in school, how children don’t feel like they’re even able to go to school. And I understand the concerns about the parental verification and the 16 and under, and all of those things, but at some point when is enough going to be enough, right? At some point, when are we going to put our foot down? And like I said, I’m proud of this bill, HB 1, I’m proud to co-sponsor it because this is truly one of the bills that we are hearing this year that is not a bipartisan bill, that this is a bill that this is about protecting children, making sure our children are safe, making sure that the state of Florida leads on that.

    Rep. Michele Rayner

    (D-St. Petersburg)
  • Rep. Tyler Sirois
    Freedom and security, freedom and safety are always in conflict with one another, that’s part of what we struggle with as legislators, but I want to tell you about one Floridian where they came down on this issue. I want to tell you about a middle schooler, she was described as pretty and smart by her peers, but she endured a year of taunting and bullying and just endless, endless harassment from her peers. They would ask her, ‘why are you alive, you’re ugly, can you please die?’ After a year of that, she climbed a tower and jumped to her death. That is tragic and we can’t allow it. When that is happening in the state of Florida, we have a duty and a responsibility to act and I think that this bill gets us closer to what is so desperately needed.

    Rep. Tyler Sirois

    (R-Merritt Island)
  • Rep. Tyler Sirois
    I was talking to this one young lady one morning and I said ‘Did you see in the news today the legislature wants to ban social media accounts for minors under the age of 16?’ And she says ‘yeah, I saw that.’ And I said, ‘well, what do you think of it?’ And she said, ‘I think if they had done it a long time ago I would have enjoyed being a kid.’ I want you to think about that, it doesn’t have to be that way in the state of Florida.

    Rep. Tyler Sirois

    (R-Merritt Island)
  • Rep. Tyler Sirois
    Social media and the impacts it’s having on our youth is a concern—no doubt. But we don’t allow our kids to go into casinos, we don’t allow our 11 year olds to buy alcohol. There’s no parental consent that you can sign to let your kid go into a liquor store. There are expectations, there is framework, there is guardrails, that this legislature and the ones before us have set as they deem necessary action to keep our children safe. So social media is an industry in the same regard as gaming or alcohol.

    Rep. Tyler Sirois

    (R-Merritt Island)
  • Zach Rausch
    The second thing is that parents and teens are also trapped. No teenager wants to be the only one not on their phone, not on social media, and if they are they can often feel worse than if they were on because they would be disconnected from their friends and no parents wants to see their child to feel disconnected and alone. And so one of the best ways that we can get around this is through phone free schools.

    Zach Rausch

    Associate Research Scientist, New York University
  • Zach Rausch
    This new business model and the features that have been implemented for this have extraordinary harm to young users, especially young adolescent girls…

    Zach Rausch

    Associate Research Scientist, New York University
  • Zach Rausch
    It might seem impossible today to imagine a world where smart phones and social media and the like don’t consume childhood, don’t consume our lives and our child’s lives, it just we’re in it too deep and it might feel hopeless, but it is possible. But it’s only possible if we get your help to do this—so you can help create the childhood we need in the 21st century.

    Zach Rausch

    Associate Research Scientist, New York University
  • Jean M. Twenge
    That’s the biggest change in teens’ lives over this time. They started spending a lot more time online and on social media, a lot less time with their friends face to face and less time sleeping. And that is a terrible formula for mental health.

    Jean M. Twenge

    Professor of Psychology, San Diego State University
  • Jean M. Twenge
    So we have a crisis in teen mental health, that is pretty much undisputed. And with the data that I’ve shown you today I think you can make the case that the rise of social media and smart phones, and all of the risks that come with it, are the most plausible cause for this crisis that we have in teen mental health right now.

    Jean M. Twenge

    Professor of Psychology, San Diego State University
  • Jean M. Twenge
    I’ve been doing this work on generational differences for a long time. I got used to seeing changes that were big, but they take a decade or two to get there. Then about 10 or 12 years ago, I started to notice changes that were bigger and more sudden. I had really never seen anything like it.

    Jean M. Twenge

    Professor of Psychology, San Diego State University
  • Amira Fox
    We see firsthand what happens online to children who become victims. This is the breeding ground, social media is the breeding ground where pedophiles go to look for their victims, where really bad people go to look for their victims.

    Amira Fox

    State Attorney, 20th Circuit, Florida Prosecuting Attorney’s Association

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