Texas 2023 - 88th Regular

Texas House Bill HCR46 Compare Versions

Version 1 (Old)

Version 2 (New)

Old	New		Differences
1	1		88R11184 BPG-D
2		-	By: Patterson~~, González of El Paso~~ H.C.R. No. 46
	2	+	By: Patterson H.C.R. No. 46
3	3
4	4
5	5		CONCURRENT RESOLUTION
6	6		WHEREAS, Scores of experts have warned the U.S. Congress
7	7		about the pressing need to protect children and adolescents from
8	8		social media harms; and
9	9		WHEREAS, Over the course of five hearings, the Senate
10	10		Subcommittee on Consumer Protection, Product Safety, and Data
11	11		Security received abundant testimony about the severe impacts
12	12		social media platforms can have on brain development and mental
13	13		health; problems noted by experts include hazardous substance use,
14	14		eating disorders, bullying, anxiety, depression, and self-harm;
15	15		Meta whistleblower Frances Haugen provided a trove of the company's
16	16		internal research showing that its products have negative impacts
17	17		on children, especially teenage girls, and that the company
18	18		downplayed this troubling information and made but minimal efforts
19	19		to mitigate damage; she implored Congress to take action; and
20	20		WHEREAS, In a June 2022 letter, American Psychological
21	21		Association Services, Mental Health America, and more than 100
22	22		other organizations told the U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce,
23	23		Science, and Transportation that the growing mental health crisis
24	24		among America's youth is exacerbated by social media platforms
25	25		designed in ways that increase exposure to harmful content and
26	26		encourage unhealthy patterns of use; adolescence involves
27	27		neurological changes that promote cravings for social attention,
28	28		feedback, and status, the letter stated, and young users can find it
29	29		difficult to abstain from social media, even when they recognize
30	30		that it is making them feel terrible about themselves; and
31	31		WHEREAS, The internet is a comparatively new form of media,
32	32		and during its short history, Congress has struggled to understand
33	33		the full breadth of its impact and determine how best to prevent
34	34		negative consequences; though it aimed to safeguard those under the
35	35		age of 13 with the passage of the Children's Online Privacy
36	36		Protection Act of 1998, Congress has yet to address the many issues
37	37		that have arisen in the intervening quarter century; and
38	38		WHEREAS, Crafting legislation to prevent children from
39	39		accessing harmful content has proven a particularly challenging
40	40		endeavor, given the need to accommodate First Amendment concerns;
41	41		laws targeting specific categories of speech based on content are
42	42		subject to the exacting "strict scrutiny" standard of judicial
43	43		review, and the courts have previously struck down as
44	44		unconstitutional statutes seeking to criminalize the provision of
45	45		harmful internet content to minors; however, federal case law does
46	46		recognize certain circumstances in which Congress may restrict
47	47		children's access to particular types of information, depending on
48	48		such factors as existence of a demonstrable harm and assurances
49	49		that any restriction does not encumber more constitutionally
50	50		protected speech than is necessary; and
51	51		WHEREAS, When social media platforms fail to take
52	52		responsibility for the harms they cause, it is incumbent upon
53	53		lawmakers to step in, and although balancing legal protections with
54	54		First Amendment considerations will require extreme delicacy, the
55	55		health, safety, and well-being of children and adolescents are too
56	56		important to leave to the vagaries of algorithms designed to
57	57		protect profits, not children; now, therefore, be it
58	58		RESOLVED, That the 88th Legislature of the State of Texas
59	59		hereby respectfully urge the United States Congress to pass
60	60		legislation to protect children from the harms of social media;
61	61		and, be it further
62	62		RESOLVED, That the Texas secretary of state forward official
63	63		copies of this resolution to the president of the United States, to
64	64		the speaker of the House of Representatives and the president of the
65	65		Senate of the United States Congress, and to all the members of the
66	66		Texas delegation to the Congress with the request that this
67	67		resolution be officially entered in the Congressional Record as a
68	68		memorial to the Congress of the United States of America.