At a press conference announcing the federal government’s plans to ban Australians under the age of 16 from using social media earlier this month, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese thanked South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas and New South Wales Premier Chris Minns.
The pair had been responsible for organising a jointly-held social media summit, Albanese said, which was “most instructive” as part of the government’s consultation in coming up with the ban.
But far from being a frank discussion of the ban’s benefits and drawbacks or a wide canvassing of possible ways to address concerns about social media, internal emails from Malinauskas’ office and interviews with attendees suggest the event was carefully stage-managed with the explicit purpose of creating “momentum” for the social media ban.
In July, a media release put out by both states announced that their governments would co-host an event to “help inform the design and delivery of a range of policies, programs and resources to address the challenges posed by social media”.
Even though both Malinauskas and Minns had both already committed to banning teens from social media, there was hope from several attendees — who spoke to Crikey on the condition of anonymity as they have not been authorised by their organisations to speak publicly — that it would provide an opportunity for nuanced conversation about the topic.
Any hope that there would be a dialogue about the contested area of research around social media and its impacts was dispelled during Malinauskas’ opening statement.
“The results are in and the science is settled,” he reportedly said at the opening of the summit.
The event’s line-up, too, made it clear whose voices the organisers wanted people to focus on. The keynote speakers — whose remarks appeared on livestreams and had the largest audiences — were predominantly international experts and those who were in favour of a teen social media ban.
This included author of The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness Jonathan Haidt, San Diego State University Professor Dr Jean Twenge, and even Robert French, a former High Court chief justice who was commissioned to write a report about the legal basis of states banning kids from social media.
On the other hand, Australian academics who had authored research based on young Australians about the impact of social media — many of whom did not support the social media ban — were put on breakout panels.
Haidt, in particular, was given prime-time position with a recorded video played at the start of the summit. The American social psychologist has been at the centre of a recent global push to ban teens from social media after his 2024 book The Anxious Generation became a surprise hit. Its claims about an established link between social media use and mental illness and the benefits of banning social media have been contested.
But there was no equivocation when it came to Malinauskas’ support for Haidt and his ideas. Emails obtained through an FOI show that the premier, who had previously said his wife had put him onto Haidt’s book, had a video call with the author and enthusiastically thanked him for his work.
“Your book The Anxious Generation was the initial motivation for me in pursuing regulation of social media for children in the State of South Australia,” he said in a September 11 email.
Haidt provided advice to the premier about its rollout: “If it leads to mass confusion and protest, that would discourage other leaders from trying it,” he wrote. He declined an invitation to come to Australia for the summit but agreed to film a video to be played at the event.
While discussing the video, Malinauskas’ office made the purpose of the social media summit clear. The summit was being held “with the intent of building momentum and support for national legislation to enforce a minimum age for access to social media”, wrote Malinauskas’ senior advisor Cat Blaikie in an email to Haidt.
Queensland University of Technology Professor and summit attendee Axel Bruns said the emails were a “low point in the rich history of ill-informed Australian policy-making on Internet technologies”.
“The cynical way in which the premiers’ staffers have ignored the wealth of world-leading expertise on social media and society which is available in Australia — not least through the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child — in order to create a counterfactual narrative that serves their own craven political ends is deeply disturbing,” Bruns wrote in an email.
Crikey approached Malinauskas’ office with questions about the emails, what evidence supports a ban until 16 years old and if it disputes the characterisation of the summit as having prioritised international speakers and those who supported the ban. The office acknowledged receipt but did not respond to the questions.
Last night, a month or so after the summit, a group of academics met with Michelle Rowland’s office and the prime minister’s office and called for an inquiry into the bill. One source with knowledge of the meeting said they were told the government intends to work with the expert community – but only after the bill has been passed.
The bill is being introduced into Parliament today and, with the Coalition signalling their support, is expected to pass before the end of next sitting week.
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