I think most people are better off, and have a more nuanced view of reality if the only news they get is local. Or the updates from people they know always in person.
I much prefer Youtube videos and international media from multiple viewpoints to that world.
Bring a pre-internet pre-24/7 TV person to present day and they’ll spot the problem straight away. Amusing Ourselves To Death was written in reaction to the societal changes brought by the TV. What about the impact of Internet news, and Facebook, and Tiktok?
not meant to? by whom?
We live in houses, with artificial light, heating and air conditioning, having sex without risk of pregnancy or "god-forbid" sex with people who are not capable of being pregnant. So, what exactly are we not meant to do?
There's a certain natural human nature but it's expressed through abtract virtue like justice, knowledge, safety, connection - this is the only acceptable and reasonable expression of what humans are "meant to" do.
This makes me angry because fundamentally this is an attack on average person's intelligence and capabilities. We are not beasts that need to be hearded by some illuminated masters who deem what is and what isn't human nature.
citation needed. Also there are plenty of things that make humans "generally unhappy" but we all agree are good like exercise or cleaning up your home. Even if happiness was a valid metric for human condition then blanket banning "social media for <15" - whatever that means - is not a reasonable approach in any way.
The only sound argument here is purely utilitarian "we suck at governing so let's do something easy and maybe it'll work". It has nothing to do with human nature other than that we naturally suck at organizing policy.
You mean humans are not meant to learn about the atrocities their government is funding half a world away.
The entire current human existence right now is at odds with human biology and psychology. One has to swim against the current just to be physically, mentally and spiritually healthy.
Just do a review of BBC headlines for it's coverage on the Israel-Palestine conflict. Many headlines where Israel was the aggressor were passive, never naming Israel as the aggressor, but whenever it was aggression from the Palestinian side, it was highlighted.
Even the death toll in Gaza, where for the last few years the headlines, when reorting on the death toll, often stated 'unconfirmed', or 'Hamas-provided', to cause doubt in the numbers, when historically, the numbers provided by Hamas were relatively accurate, and just the other day the IDF admits that the ~70k death toll is realistic.
If you really want to stay informed, there are plenty of newspapers, NGOs and other organizations out there reporting the truth.
And for decades before that mainstream media was used to push false narratives with absolutely no alternatives. Or have you forgotten about the Iraq War?
And they don't report on that kind of stuff because they either support it themselves or are indirectly funded by the government.