64% of Teenagers Would Trade Voting for TikTok

The following is excerpted from an online article posted by Washington Examiner.

They can’t vote yet, so maybe there’s time to get them interested in the most basic American right.

A new look at younger social media users, ages 13-17, finds they are not just obsessed with the social media platforms but that 64% would give up their right to vote just to keep access to apps such as TikTok.

Think that’s bad? Among a larger group of the so-called “TikTok generation,” 13-24, 61% would trade voting for a year to stay on social media.

To those who focus on critical thinking and fighting disinformation on the internet, that’s an “alarming” finding.

“I think our children’s way of gathering information is actually being altered,” Helen Lee Bouygues, president of the Reboot Foundation, told Secrets.

Just the idea of trading voting to watch videos on social media is shocking to her, especially when so many elections are won and lost by a handful of votes. “Giving up the ‘right to vote’ for the ‘right to post’ is an alarming admission at a time when the populace is politically fractured, culturally splintered, and distrustful of American institutions,” the Reboot survey analysis stated.

Then, there is the time younger people spend on the apps. Nearly a quarter of those studied are watching or posting for four hours a day, with the majority viewing social media for 2-3 hours a day.

“We’re not providing the tools, neither to the teachers nor to the students, to actually be able to do critical thinking,” she said.

Source: Washington Examiner
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/washington-secrets/alarming-reality-64-of-teenagers-would-trade-voting-for-tiktok