• sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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    1 day ago

    ? I’ve never used TikTok…

    But yes, kids die all the time for various reasons. When talking about individual causes, it’s important to look at the impact on trends. Are more kids dying due to TikTok, or is TikTok merely replacing another cause?

    Obviously no death is acceptable, but death will happen. The role of public policy isn’t to prevent all death, but to address the bulk of it with the least invasive policy possible.

    • SpaceCowboy@lemmy.ca
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      23 hours ago

      Do you think lemmy sets public policy? The only thing that happens here is people comment on shit. So you’re bothered by comments to the effect of “influencers tell kids to do stupid shit and sometimes kids die because of it, and this is bad.”

      Why do you think that freedom of speech means no one is allowed to criticize speech? Criticism is also speech.

      • sugar_in_your_tea@sh.itjust.works
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        17 hours ago

        I absolutely agree that criticism is speech and should absolutely be protected, even if the take doesn’t have merit. And that’s basically what I’m doing here, I’m criticizing the FUD against social media platforms like TikTok; yes they’re bad, but not bad enough to curtail speech.

        And yes, Lemmy doesn’t set policy, but voters elect reps who do, and there are a lot of voters here. That’s why I bother discussing politics at all, in the hope that maybe someone will consider what I have to say the next time they cast their ballot. Who knows, maybe I’ll persuade someone that freedom is worth more than protectionism, probably not, but I’m not doing much else while sitting on the toilet.