You mention free will, but it would be an interesting conversation to discuss how much free will there is when people fight, without knowing it, against psychological manipulation, addition creation, all crafted with plenty of money and research. Especially when this people are young ones. Can the behavior still be called free will when you get hooked to mechanisms specifically designed to exploit humans in this way?

Your rebuttal is based on the assumption that social media is uniquely manipulative, addictive and designed by a secret evil cabal of geniuses with top hats.

This is a media narrative and a popular meme, but it is not reality when looking at the actual studies:

[1] Effects of reducing social media use are small and inconsistent: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S266656032...

[2] Belief in "Social media addiction" is wholly explained by media framing and not an actual addiction: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-025-27053-2

[3] No causal link between time spent on social media and mental health harm: https://www.theguardian.com/media/2026/jan/14/social-media-t...

The idea that social media is uniquely bad is simply the same moral panic that comes up every time we encounter something new. The truth is every person, company and government engages in "psychological manipulation" when trying to get what they want, including the children themselves!

Since other children engage in psychological manipulation with each other at school, should we ban schools to protect kids from it? Since the government engages in psychological manipulation with its policies and agendas (all backed by billions of dollars!), should we ban it?