The existence of them, yeah. I don't think it's so clear cut that it'd be a net increase in harm. Advertising I'm not so sure about, but as for the mere existence of them:

Group A is going to smoke regardless, having a healthier product reduces harm

Group B is never going to smoke no matter what's on offer

▲

odo1242 4 hours ago | parent | next [-]

You’re missing Group C, who didn’t offer cigarettes to their kids until their kids heard of these “healthy” cigarettes that are “safe for kids”

	▲	1shooner 3 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Juul was essentially this scenario.

▲

ArcHound 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-]

Absolutely no cigarettes should be marketed to children. That doesn't mean various cigarette-adjacent products cannot exist.

▲

tripleee 10 hours ago | parent [-]

The net harm result really only changes because the scope and numbers differ. I don't think I've ever met anyone who actually allows their kids to smoke, I see a lot who give them tablets though.

If we instead imagine a world where parents allowed, even encouraged 60% of children to smoke, and there was no clear route to outright stopping them, giving them at least a better alternative that doesn't hurt them as much would be worth considering

▲

ArcHound 9 hours ago | parent [-]

I think I get what you're saying, but it's really an unfortunate example.

I think it's still better to ban these obviously harmful things and to reduce exposure to them as much as possible.

▲

tripleee 9 hours ago | parent [-]

I don't see what banning it actually accomplishes unless we totally ban tablets altogether. From the way I see it, it's the parents who are choosing to give their kids tablets in order to make their own parenting job easier. Am I wrong there? What do you ban to stop that happening?

▲

1shooner 8 hours ago | parent [-]

This is basically the needle exchange argument. Except instead of just needles, you just want to hand out the drug.

I agree that if a parent is dead-set on giving their kid endless screen time, tobacco, or heroin, they will find a way to do it. But the tobacco story demonstrates there are many interventions that can significantly decrease the net amount of abuse. If you want to take a public health argument, do it honestly.

▲

tripleee 7 hours ago | parent [-]

I don't really think looking at it through the lens of tobacco works. Parents giving their children tobacco and heroin aren't a thing. In reality many are self-motivated to give them a tablet for their own benefit, nothing much to do with the kid

Screens or tablets aren't the harmful drug in this situation, they're the needle. A needle that can contain medicine or heroin. The harm is from specific apps and social media. A device can be locked down. You can control what it's able to do and how much. I've used screens to teach myself a language to fluency, a hell of a lot about software development, and countless other things.

Would you object to a tablet that could only access Khan Academy, Openstax and Udemy? What about if we added on a 20 minute allowance of social media? I haven't looked super deep into the Amazon device much but it seems this is the direction they're heading with the parental dashboard

"Educational content has to come first. Your child completes reading or learning goals in Kids+ and educational apps before entertainment apps unlock"

I mean obviously kids are going to try to game the system to get to what they want.. but it seems like a reasonable path to test, and it doesn't require trying to turn every bad parent into a good one, or do something outlandish like ban tablets

	▲	5 hours ago \| parent [-]
		[deleted]