That’s how Jay Martin, a retired law enforcement officer, described artificial intelligence, social media algorithms and platform manipulation and their impact on the mental health and behavioral development of today’s youth.
He cautioned that throwing kids into the digital world without training “is like jumping into a pool without swimming lessons.”
Martin, director of School Safety & Security for the Nebraska Department of Education, offered some of that training when he spoke to parents Tuesday evening at Kearney High School.
He spoke at Kearney middle and high schools earlier this week. Tuesday evening, he aimed to empower their parents to help them navigate the digital world safely and wisely.
“Teens who can ‘look up’ from their phones gain the most understanding of what it means to be digitally fit, but before they can look up, we need adults to understand what they’re looking down at,” he said.
'THEY DON'T REALLY CRY'
One expert has recommended no smartphones before high school, no social media before age 16, phone-free schools and more unsupervised, off-the-phone time for kids, but society isn’t there yet.
Martin said youth between 9 and 14 years old are especially subject to becoming addicted easily and losing the ability to show and deal with their emotions.
He said many can type “I’m sad” or “I’m mad,” but “they don’t really cry. They type everything. They need to actually experience emotions,” he said.
He said past generations learned cultural norms from parents or their peers, but today, social media is doing the teaching, and that digital framework exploits a child’s emotion, among other things.
He talked about the addictive image-response-reward effect of video games. “The brain says life is boring if they’re not playing games,” he said. Many teens spend at least five hours a day online.
Martin illustrated the power of visual media by noting the 1960 televised presidential campaign debate between then-Sen. John F. Kennedy and Vice President Richard Nixon. Those who listened to the debate thought Nixon had won, but those who watched it and viewed the attractive, carefully-made-up Kennedy vs. the lackluster Nixon proclaimed Kennedy as the winner.
'KIDS CAN SEE ANYTHING'
“Kids can now see anything, and Open AI is moving so fast we can’t keep up,” he said.
“Kids on phones are rewarded 100 percent of the time, like a dopamine hit, a small sense of pleasure. They react like they’re on a drug,” he said. They want that pleasure again and again, he said.
The digital world is changing so fast that few can keep up with it, Jay Martin told Kearney parents Tuesday evening.
Anything is available on the Internet, he said. Children can open pornographic sites, and “by the time they’re in high school, nudity is no big deal. Kids can see hard-core porn on the Internet, too,” he said.
All this turns into a gold mine for companies like Meta, which projects a profit of $1.4 trillion from generative AI by 2035. Generative AI is a type of artificial intelligence that creates new, original content — such as text, images, music, and videos — by learning from vast datasets of existing content.
“That’s their goal, Martin said. “This e-influence influences millions of people. These algorithms are constructing our future.”
Every time a user of any age clicks on something, “he or she creates a data point, and it’s recorded somewhere. They are controlling us by learning what we do, and kids are being dragged into it,” he said.
He added, “Stealing mail is a federal crime, but digital data is not.”
TikTok has 6.31 million users. Much of its content deals with depression because that topic gets more users, but results can be deadly.
He told the story of a young man who fell in love with a woman created by A.I. “When that character told him to leave the real world, he killed himself,” he said.
“AI was deliberately engineered to do this. We need to put a stop to this,” he said.
FALSE INFORMATION
He also warned that AI is spreading vast amounts of false information. “Misleading information is 70 percent more likely to be shared than true information. The Harvard Business Journal did a study and showed that false news travels faster than real news,” he said.
“Seventy percent of what we see online is not true. It’s based on perception, but few people are willing to take time to find out the truth,” he said.
Even more sobering, he said strangers can now take just three seconds of your voice, and a picture from face-mapping technology, and “become you” online, also with sinister consequences.
He noted how millions of youth believe they are ugly or not likeable due to what’s presented online. He showed a brief clip about a 16-year-old girl who, after repeated online messages of “everyone hates you,” tried to commit suicide. She survived, but she is now a quadriplegic. The only part of her body she can move is her eyes.
DIGITAL DETOX
It’s time for digital detox, he said. “By the age of 74, today’s kids will have wasted about nine years of life on a diet of TV and social media,” he said. He urged parents to be good role models and to take digital breaks.
“Get devices out of the bedroom. Teens need nine to 10 hours of sleep a night, but most kids get seven hours or less, partly due to devices,” he said. He urged turning off notifications, too.
Martin told parents to “make sure kids value themselves,” but also urged parents to stop coddling kids and let them learn from their mistakes.
Martin, a grandfather, said, “‘You’re all dealing with stuff I’m really scared of. Remember, it’s all about people making lots and lots of money off you and your kids.”
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