This, in reaction to a CBC no-brainer radio show a few weeks ago in which they discussed the damages of Cellphone on young minds, specifically (although not stated) the reduction in basic and rudimentary skills - especially language and math.
Now, instead of making this the "discussion" - because it's been discussed countless times before and always to the same end - cellphone and internet use for the most part make all people stupider, not just the children, children are due to their age and development more vulnerable than adults. And this "pause" the internet occupies in their development seems to be a critical period that the internet preys upon with it's flood of easy dopamine ensuring they forever remain addicts. While there are arguments about how this is by design and shows a criminal intent on behalf of News & Social Media that is a different post with different solutions.
More of interest is the solution to this, which I would propose as thus:
Internet use is a privilege, not a right. Much like driving it should be regulated as such.
Now a brief rant about driving: Driving is not a right, it is a privilege. You need to pass a license and hold it in good standing - meaning without demerits or tickets - and perhaps, if you've been irresponsible, take additional courses. The reality of driving does not reflect this in the least. You see weekly cases of people committing heinous acts behind the wheel of the car - whether it be being impaired, driving recklessly or at great speed, road rage, etc., and these transgressions being trivially punished with 30, 90 day suspensions or in the worst of cases, involving impairment, the loss of human life, maybe a year or 5 suspension.
Rarely do you see an "appropriate" sentence - which, often as not, would involve a lifetime ban on the operation of a motor vehicle paired with substantial prison time. So - while I'm comparing the internet to driving I'm comparing the ideal, not the reality.
In an ideal world (and we make the world, so lets start there...) the Internet would be available only to adults that had passed a licensing exam. That licensing exam would involve a substantial amount of critical thinking and the ability to use the internet to collate multiple sources to find the Correct Answers about things. There would also be a caution about the addictive nature of the internet - but - I've addressed that below as well. I say adults, meaning that children should not have access. Not restricted access, no access whatsoever, and parents allowing their children online should be punished similarly to parents buying their toddlers crack cocaine, liquor and cigarettes.
Internet use as well should be limited. For everyone, period. Nobody needs 24/7 access to the internet. It should be capped at - say - an hour a day for licensees. This global easy-access 24/7 to unlimited information has not in any way improved the world.
The internet - as such, has reached it's logical endpoint. It has monetized everything, and in so doing has taken to inventing things - facts, stories, etc., that have no basis in reality but can hijack search results with more inanity and further ads. This is something that could use reinventing - a "fact" based internet - not necessarily Wikipedia - but someplace where "alternate" thought is critically examined and either flagged as being "not provable/yet proven" or "garbage" or "Facts, inconveniently arranged" or "Facts, curated by the author". The internet, far from being the curious space it started out as, has degenerated by and largely into junk. But, again I digress and this is irrelevant to my point and should be pursued in a separate post.