Your kids are (and should be) doing all kinds of things you have no idea about. It’s part of becoming an adult. I’m sure you modeled all the right behaviors, and provided every advantage you could. That helps, but you’re influence is waning and their friends influence is building and it’s all manipulated by the thousands of PhD’s working for TikTok and the other social media companies. You’re outgunned.

I think you might be underestimating the level of control that an average parent, especially a working parent, has over a teenage kid. Short of taking away devices, it's tough, especially if they're going through a phase of doing precisely the opposite of what you recommend / demand.

I'm not saying that parents don't have any responsibility, but it's about practicalities. If a teenager can easily buy smokes or alcohol, many will, no matter what the parents say. If you make the goods harder to buy, usage drops. So, shops / software vendors do have some responsibility for societal outcomes.

In a libertarian utopia, anything goes, but kids are... weird in that they often try to push the boundaries of their autonomy without always knowing the risk, and it's in our collective best interest not to let them go too far.

> kids are... weird in that they often try to push the boundaries of their autonomy without always knowing the risk

I'd argue most adults are just oversized kids in a trenchcoat

*all

Regardless of how addictive it is? So the same argument applies to heroin? Shoukd heroin be legalized and allowed to be sold outside of schools?

If my kid gets addicted to fent I will get in shit, regardless that Purdue Pharma was found guilty. Point is Purdue Pharma is guilty for hooking people on an addicting substance.