Australia government implemented<\/a> in December 2025, making it so children 16-years-old and under wouldn\u2019t be able to keep or make accounts on social media platforms like TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat, X, and Facebook.<\/p>\nGreat idea or gateway to censorship? Canadians are divided<\/p>\n
Ahead of the vote, many Canadians in Toronto shared their thoughts on the potential legislation with Now Toronto.<\/p>\n
A Toronto resident who goes by Tymia said she was unsure on how to feel about the bill, noting she too grew up using social media at a young age.<\/p>\n
\u2018It\u2019s kind of difficult\u2026\u201d she told Now Toronto. \u201cI was learning a lot, but at the same time maybe too much.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tymia believes that those who grew up without social media seemed more open and more advanced in their social skills versus those who were on it from a young age, but she also said social media helped connect people in a different way than what was the norm prior to the internet.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe connect in a different way now that we\u2019re on the internet,\u201d she said. \u201cI feel like there\u2019s so many more ways to connect with people in general\u2026 like memes\u2026 different things that just bring us together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Tymia added a form of censorship was needed, despite the ban passing or not.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know if it\u2019s the best thing to censor everything entirely,\u201d Tymia said.<\/p>\n
Another Toronto resident, named Hal, said that while they support a ban, they don\u2019t think the Liberal Government would be able to take on the job.<\/p>\n
\u201cI do support putting some restrictions in place for the accessibility of certain social media for minors, I don\u2019t trust the f**king liberals to do that,\u201d they said. \u201cThey\u2019re infringing on our rights, they\u2019re taking away our privacy.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hal added that with or without social media, they still think people will not be well-adjusted unless they have the proper resources put in place for them.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhether you have [social media] or you don\u2019t, people have always been pretty equally f**ked up if they\u2019re not given the right support structures, and if they don\u2019t have good community, they don\u2019t have good mental health support,\u201d they explained. \u201cI think those should be the primary things we tackle, as opposed to reliance on social media by kids, because I think that\u2019s more of a symptom and not necessarily the cause.\u201d<\/p>\n
Another Toronto resident, who didn\u2019t provide their name, said they also agreed with the ban.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat technology is doing to young children can warp their minds, and I think it\u2019s a great idea [to ban social media],\u201d he said. \u201cI know they\u2019re trying to follow what Australia is doing. I think that kind of makes sense.\u201d<\/p>\n
The resident also added he knows firsthand the effects social media can have.<\/p>\n
\u201cSocial media 100 per cent has destroyed my mental health,\u201d he said. \u201cIt should be banned for everyone, actually throughout the world.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"What to know Prime Minister Mark Carney is expected to table an Online Harms Act proposal this week…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":79935,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[31712,17,111,2133,26784,31713,48,26945],"class_list":["post-79934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mark-carney","tag-16-years-old-and-under","tag-canada","tag-mark-carney","tag-social-media-ban","tag-teenagers","tag-teens","tag-toronto","tag-youth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79934"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79934\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}