Opinion: Parents are right to demand Meta face lawsuits over youth safety

When critics dismiss the multistate lawsuits against Meta as a mere cash grab by ambitious politicians and trial lawyers, they miss the point. Comparing Big Tech to Big Tobacco isn't just heated political rhetoric; it is an accurate description of a business model that profits off psychological addiction while shifting the collateral damage onto families. Like Big Tobacco, the only way change will happen with these multibillion-dollar organizations is when lawsuits force change and they are hit with financial penalties. As parents, we are told every day that our children's mental health crises, sleep deprivation and compulsive scrolling are the responsibility of the parents. We are advised to turn on parental controls, set screen-time limits or take the phone away. But this places an impossible burden on parents, asking us to out-engineer multibillion-dollar algorithms specifically built by world-class data scientists to override human willpower, particularly adolescent willpower. Angelo Mitchell The defense that Meta has offered safety tools like 'take a break' nudges or optional time limits ignores a fundamental reality: Optional safety features do not neutralize inherently harmful design choices. Features like infinite scroll, autoplay media, variable reward notifications and algorithmic engagement loops are deliberate architecture choices. They exist to maximize screen time because screen time drives ad revenue. Putting the onus on a teenager or a parent to resist that system is like selling an engineered, habit-forming product and blaming the customer for getting hooked. Critics argue that these mass-tort lawsuits are a costly distraction that hurts American competitiveness in artificial intelligence. But corporate innovation cannot come at the expense of child safety. When tobacco executives were brought before federal courts decades ago, the primary goal was never just the financial settlement. It was public accountability and policy changes. Litigation forced internal documents into the light, revealing that tobacco companies understood the addictive mechanics of their product long before the public did. The current state lawsuits against Meta serve the exact same function: forcing transparency around what tech executives knew regarding youth mental health and when they knew it. To put the legal exposure in perspective, penalties in the hundreds of millions of dollars represent a tiny fraction of a company valued in the trillions. It is true that Congress has been frustratingly slow to pass comprehensive federal online safety standards for children. But a lack of legislative speed does not grant tech conglomerates immunity under existing consumer protection laws. If a corporation misrepresents the safety of its platform to the public while maintaining features that facilitate compulsive use by minors, consumer protection authorities have a duty to act. Parenting will always require boundaries, conversations and personal responsibility. But individual effort cannot fix a structural problem. Just as we required seatbelts in cars and age restrictions on harmful substances, we need systemic guardrails on digital platforms. These historic positive changes have come about because of the relentless work of trial lawyers. Legal accountability isn't about exploiting children for political profit. It is about ensuring that the digital environments where our children spend their youth are safe by design. Angelo Mitchell is a native New Mexican and the parent of two young boys.