By Gene Mills, special to the Baptist Message
BATON ROUGE, La. (LBM) — Big Tech is not your friend and does not share your family values.
Now that I’ve said the impolite part out loud, let’s circle back to why that matters and what must be done about it.
There are two significant and converging stories in the emerging technology arena. The first is the explosion of artificial intelligence (AI)
and the legitimate motivation for the United States to win the AI innovation race against China.
The second is the reality that Big Tech has knowingly used its social media platforms to monetize ‘childhood attention and affection’ for over two decades, and it is planning to do the same with AI platforms.
One current example: A New Mexico jury recently levied $375 million in civil penalties on Meta for misleading consumers about the potential dangers to children interacting with its platforms, namely Meta subsidiaries, Facebook and Instagram. Parents have known this instinctively for years, but the ruling confirms that Meta also understood long ago that its platform was exploitive and addictive to minors, and they continued to market it to children anyway. In fact, that was the goal – design the platforms to capture kids' attention and maximize the commercial value of their harvested data.
Meta is not the only questioned capitalist! There is a wave of over 1,600 pending lawsuits against Big Tech, alleging disregard for child safety.
Here’s why that matters in the AI discussion: Those same social media companies are now trying to convince federal and state policymakers to give them an unsupervised green light on how to roll out AI technology, including how it is designed, marketed, and used by children. In light of being found culpable for endangering children via social media, they are now asking for a federal moratorium on any state protections for children using AI.
Talk about the fox guarding the henhouse!
We know a little bit about this in Louisiana. There is strong and bipartisan support here for enforceable protections for kids when it comes to known digital threats like online gambling, porn, and AI chatbots. Most Louisianans want age-verification for interaction with this type of child online activity, and nearly every elected official says the correct thing: “Kids come first.”
But when Big Tech deploys its lobbyists, meaningful child protections simply go away.
The same thing happens federally. All the politicians say protecting kids is their top priority. But then Big Tech’s army of lobbyists winds up writing the legislation which moves forward.
We’re coming up on a critical moment in this narrative. Currently, many states, both red and blue, are leading the way in enacting common-sense guidelines for AI and social media platforms. So Big Tech is taking its case to Congress, where there is some very sound legislation pending – such as Sen. Marsha Blackburn’s Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA). Big Tech’s goal is to use its deep pockets to convince lawmakers they are putting kids first while erasing meaningful protections for kids, including those in KOSA.
AI is a double-edged sword. When used responsibly, it carries the potential to do an immense amount of good with lightning efficiency. When used for nefarious purposes, it makes ordinary devices – phones, laptops, and tablets – the most dangerous playground in America for children.
We must wake up to the threats inherent in this emerging technology before it’s too late. It’s no accident that China already protects its children from known digital harms, and it’s no coincidence that many Big Tech billionaires keep their own children from accessing the social platforms they design. It’s because they understand the inherent danger and are not willing to expose their children to their own products. But your kids? That’s another story!
Big Tech is formidable and they understand the question long before it is generally asked. That’s why they would love to punt this conversation for another decade or two. Louisiana families must stand shoulder to shoulder with families across this nation and insist that children come first! Big Tech’s values are not our values, and we expect our
government to hold Big Tech accountable and responsible for its platform design decisions and any fallout which may ensue.
Gene Mills is president of the Louisiana Family Forum, a pro-life and pro-family public policy think tank.
