Killing Community, Killing Privacy, Killing Truth

Banning queer content with KOSA does not solve a youth mental health crisis. It amplifies it.

I was a teenage writer. That is both a stated fact and the name of an America Online forum I volunteered for while in my freshman and sophomore years of high school, wherein I met my now-husband and continue to retain decades-long friendships.

I Was A Teenage Writer (IWTW) brought together teen writers of every stripe, letting us free write across forums, participate in themed writing exercises, and encourage creativity among other people in our own age demographic. It was where I learned to argue and cite evidence, where I learned to engage with people who were completely different from me, and where I had the opportunity to attempt really publishing my work. While I did not win any of the contests for publication, adults who oversaw IWTW did compile and share some of the most brave, bold, and boundary-pushing work in collections like Kristine Wright’s A Teen Writer’s Dream: Poetically Correct. I vividly remember competing against my fellow teen volunteer Jimmy for days trying to win a signed copy of the book. We were seeing who could send the most hits to a specific page on the IWTW forum. I won, and I cherished my copy of the collection.

It was a community that changed my life.

But that online space crumbled the summer after my sophomore year of high school. Thanks to the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), which passed through the US legislature in April 2000, IWTW’s parent forum realized that having a teen forum put them in a dangerous position. We were all let go without much information other than the decision was made because of COPPA to shut it all down, as the law would require too much on their part to be in compliance.

Several of us tried to build a new home on LiveJournal, but it was not the same. Those of us who saw IWTW as one space where we could truly be ourselves were now left without such a community. Without the opportunity to connect with, share with, and engage with writing among other people our own age. To connect with people of varying races, sexualities, and locales across the country.

IWTW remained something I would include on resumes and college applications when that time came because it was an experience I knew few others had.

IWTW was a place that I could be myself and be safe. It was a third space.

*

It is now past the half-way point of 2023, and a new bill aimed at protecting children online continues to make its way through legislature. The Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA) is deeply concerning, and it’s one that pulls the power of parents to monitor their children’s use of the internet away from them and into the hands of legislators who went to school before the internet existed. KOSA would task each states attorney with enforcement of the law, which demands that platforms would need to install filters for minors against “inappropriate content” and increases the use of age verification and parental monitoring for young people on the internet. It’s aimed at social media in particular.

Both pieces of the bill encourage censorship, and both, put into the hands of states attorneys, ensure that access to the internet will depend upon the political whims of that particular individual. For instance, we can take a guess what the Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry would consider “inappropriate,” given his platform of seeking out books in libraries across the state and demanding that librarians and educators see prosecution for what they include in their collections. KOSA is a bill that would give tremendous power to folks like Landry to eliminate access to information on the internet they deem unsafe for kids, including suicide prevention information, information about Black history in America, resources for safe sex, LGBTQ+ websites and information, teen pregnancy help–especially related to abortion–and more.

We have already seen such censorship emerge in places like Katy Independent School District. The district elected to block access at the schools to information they deemed inappropriate, socking the kids who need access to it the worst. Resources like LGBTQ+ support groups and resources for young people thinking about suicide were banned.

KOSA will do this, but on a nationwide scale.

Politicians on the right and on the left have championed this bill, calling it a victory for the protection of children and for the rights of parents. But is it? Or is this a way to offload the responsibility of parents to the government and create barriers to crucial information for kids?

Kids who need to escape abusive situations, queer kids who are fearful of coming out, kids facing mental health crises, and more will be subject to the whims of whoever has power in their state.

*

One of the early and long-standing champions of this bill is Common Sense Media founder James P. Steyer. Common Sense Media has fallen out of the conversation around media censorship and shifted to a place where even professionals fail to look into its history or connection to book banning and morality policing. However, those behind the website are among those pushing to ban access to social media to people under 16.

Steyer goes as far as to say that KOSA is going to improve the mental health of young people in a statement following its passage in the House. “KOSA and COPPA 2.0 would finally hold social media platforms accountable for how they impact young users and contribute to a worsening youth mental health crisis. We applaud Senators Blumenthal, Blackburn, Markey, and Cassidy, Chairwoman Cantwell and Ranking Member Cruz, and the other members of the Commerce Committee, for prioritizing the kids' online safety and doing their part to bring tech policy into the 21st century. We look forward to seeing these bills on the Senate floor later this year so that all senators can join together to make the internet healthier and safer for America's children."

This statement, and the belief surrounding the power of KOSA to protect children, reads as a series of right-wing dogwhistles for removing the ability for young people to learn about sexuality and discover their own identities. Like many right-wing agendas now, though, too many on the left are being sucked in by language that sounds good–we want young people’s mental health to improve!–but when you peel back what the words mean, something else entirely. Big companies like Dove are creating entire webpages dedicated to pushing for KOSA’s passage.

If we’re going to address the mental health of young people, would websites about guns, murder, and violence be blocked, too?

*

According to CDC data from their 2021 Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance Survey, 25% of teenagers identify as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. Note that this is teens who openly identify. It does not include the teens who may not be out or may not feel safe enough to indicate they are out.

Today's teens are the most diverse generation in America so far. PEW Research notes that only slightly more than half of today's teenagers are non-Hispanic white. One in four of today's teens are Hispanic, 14% are Black, 6% are Asian, and 5% are bi- or multi- racial. Nearly 1/4 of Generation Z are the children of immigrants and 66% live in a household with married parents. This generation sees diversity and inclusion as assets to their generation. They are more open to a range of gender and sexuality experiences, with over half of Gen Z believing that society is not accepting enough of trans and gender non-conforming individuals.

There has been a lot of research about LGBTQ+ teens and their mental health. Identifying as queer is associated with several increased risk factors for mental health challenges, which are even greater for trans and gender non-confirming teens. Among the salient challenges and risks include:

• 55% of gay, lesbian, and bisexual teens rating their mental health as mostly "not good" and 46% queer and questioning teens who have not yet found a label which resonates report mostly "not good" mental health.

• 46% of gay, lesbian, and bisexual teens seriously considered suicide in the previous year. This number is even higher for trans and gender nonconforming teens.

• We also know that LGBTQ+ teens are more likely to experience harassment or assault at school–86% report this experience. This data is prior to 2023, meaning that the incidents have likely increased since.

• Trans and nonbinary teens are also 2-4x more likely than their cisgender peers to develop eating disorders.*

• LGBTQ+ teens are more likely to abuse substances and significantly more likely to use illicit drugs than their cisgender, heterosexual peers.

• LGBTQ+ teens risk homelessness at significantly higher rates than their straight teens.

For LGBTQ+ teens of color, the above risks increase substantially. Intersectionality matters when we discuss teens, and the more intersections at which a teen identifies, the higher the risks for depression and suicide.

Today’s teenage girls are, according to a 2023 CDC Report, in a mental health crisis. The four girls interviewed for this Associated Press piece share what they believe contributes to their depression and anxiety and–surprise!–social media and the internet do not get top billing. If anything, access to these tools has normalized open conversations about mental health.

Social media platforms contribute, with their focus on superficial appearances and making perfectionism seem attainable. Girls say they’re just part of the problem.

“Social media has completely shifted the way we think and feel about ourselves” in good and bad ways, Makena said.

She’s felt pressure to be perfect when comparing herself with others online. But she also follows social media influencers who talk about their own mental health challenges and who make it seem “OK for me to feel sad and vulnerable,” she said.

Given how many states have legislated teen identity, banning trans and queer teens from being who they are, why do any of these statistics continue to surprise? The developmental tasks of adolescents center on identity formation. Take away the right to do just that, young people of all stripes are unable to resolve a fundamental part of their psychosocial development.

That is a mental health crisis.

*

Tennessee Republican Marsha Blackburn showed her cards, though. The cosponsor of the bill was seen talking on video about how KOSA would protect children from transgender influence in our culture. Indeed, there’s no hidden agenda here. The agenda is to erase queer people and to groom young people into straightness in such a way that their access to information by and about queer people is choked out at every turn.

KOSA has been championed by several anti-LGBTQ+ groups, who believe it empowers parents and helps children’s mental health.

But you don’t protect anyone’s mental health by not talking about the thing you fear is impacting it. Much as can be legislated, the reality is queer people are here and have always been here. There is no crisis except for the one being manufactured by right-wing christofascists, propagated through a media landscape which either purposefully or neglectfully fails to do their research, then packaged in such a way legislators can repeat meaningless buzzwords to constituents who don’t quite grasp what the bill means for them. Kids Online Safety Act sounds great, doesn’t it?

So, too, did Iowa’s State File 496, which required that any name not on a student’s birth record be approved by parents before it can be used in the school. The aim was to eliminate trans people amid the fake trans panic, and now, the average William needs to get Mommy’s permission to be called Liam by his teacher.**

Liam–I mean William–can, however, register with the military recruiters sitting in his lunchroom without Mommy’s permission.

KOSA’s agenda is no longer hidden, but the average person does not know what this will actually mean. Even politicians who otherwise have their finger on the pulse are falling for it, including Tammy Duckworth.

How do we ever parse misinformation and disinformation if those who run and who keep tabs on our democracy fail us over and over again?

We just put a filter on it and call it safety.

Those of us who’ve been yelling about the underpinnings of book bans have seen how this plays out now for years. KOSA will go the same way, and in two years, the advocates calling it a win now will realize they messed up or worse, make excuses for why we need to keep waiting and trust things will work out.

Been there, done that.

*

What KOSA does is precisely what COPPA did: it robs young people of the opportunity to build, find, and cultivate lives outside of the two sets of four walls to which they’ve been relegated in our society, school and home. Protection, when used to describe what should be done for children, too often means removing places and spaces where they can be safe. Where they are free to be young, to explore, to learn, to grow, and yes, to make mistakes.

Children are a convenient political pawn. They don’t have the right to vote, and yet, so much of their lives are legislated outside of the household. Their voices don’t have weight, so it’s easy to tune them out. To refuse to listen.

They also don’t directly contribute to capitalism, don’t work jobs, don’t spend their own money. Why do they need spaces to be, anyway, if they don’t contribute anything real or tangible to our society?

KOSA will kill far more young people than it will save. KOSA is yet another gateway toward eliminating the presence of young people in our public spaces, as well as a tool to eradicate their right to private spaces, too. It will be the reason why incredible online resources, particularly those tight-knit, tight-lipped social networks and networkers shut down or be forced to shut down. They will self-censor, hide, remove youth advocacy and activism from their roster of vital work.

We need to open the closet doors, not lock them. We’ve already seen what happens there.

Notes:

• You can sign an anti-KOSA petition here and learn more about the bill and its potential ramifications as well.

• If only we’d listened about Common Sense Media a decade ago. If only we were giving it any attention now. KOSA will allow CSM and similar content-labeling sites to thrive and encourage conservative power over information access to all. An ignorant population is one they can better mold.

*Gordon, A. R., Moore, L. B., & Guss, C. (2021). Eating disorders among transgender and non-binary people. In J. M. Nagata, T. A. Brown, S. B. Murray, & J. M. Lavender (Eds.), Eating Disorders in Boys and Men (pp. 265–281). Springer.

**May this catalyze the parents who’ve not cared, who’ve not seen the impact of anti-trans and anti-LGBTQ legislation in their personal lives. It does impact them.