Facebook harms kids' mental health. Don't expect Zuck to admit it.

[View in browser]( [Mother Jones Daily Newsletter]( September 28, 2021 Instagram Kids is no-go—for now. [Facebook](, which owns Instagram, announced today that it was pausing development of a version of the photo-sharing app for [children ages 13 and younger]( amid criticism that the service could negatively affect young people's mental health. Gee, ya think? The decision comes weeks after the Wall Street Journal published documents full of data showing that Instagram harms people's mental health, especially teen girls'—and that Facebook knew it. These internal Facebook documents describe Instagram as the "perfect storm" for social comparison, exacerbating body image issues for one in three teen girls and increasing rates of anxiety and depression across the board. But publicly, Mark Zuckerberg and Instagram head Adam Mosseri continue to downplay the app's harm while searching for ways to expand their user base. (Facebook's head of global safety is set to testify at a [Senate Commerce subcommittee hearing]( on the issue this Thursday.) In the [announcement]( of the pause on Instagram Kids, Mosseri stands by the concept of the app but insists that more time is needed to do it right. "Critics of 'Instagram Kids' will see this as an acknowledgement that the project is a bad idea," he writes. "That’s not the case. The reality is that kids are already online, and we believe that developing age-appropriate experiences designed specifically for them is far better for parents than where we are today." Anything would be! —Abigail Weinberg Advertisement [UC Press - Schwarzer]( [Top Story] [Top Story]( [Gen. Milley Defends China Calls, Says He Was “Not Qualified” to Determine Trump’s Mental Health]( The top military official said he told Nancy Pelosi there was "no chance" of a rogue nuclear launch. BY DAN SPINELLI [Trending] [The secret to successful rewilding isn't trees—it's people]( BY PHOEBE WESTON [There's a flurry of studies trashing the Democrats' tax agenda. They have corporate and GOP dark money ties.]( BY KARA VOGHT [DHS secretary says what we've all been thinking: The immigration system is "completely broken"]( BY NINA LISS-SCHULTZ [The "most important question" on Earth: How soon will China quit coal?]( BY VINCENT NI Advertisement [UC Press - Schwarzer]( [Food] [Special Feature]( [In California's Water Wars, Nuts Are Edging Out People]( Agriculture's voracious appetite is sucking residential wells dry. BY TOM PHILPOTT [Fiercely Independent] Support from readers allows Mother Jones to do journalism that doesn't just follow the pack. [Donate]( [Recharge] SOME GOOD NEWS, FOR ONCE [Barack Obama’s Library, the First Digital-Driven Presidential Archives in History, Breaks Ground Today]( After a series of starts and stops and a lengthy legal battle over construction clearance, Barack Obama’s presidential library is pressing ahead today. A [livestream]( ceremony is underway at the site of the future archives. One catch: “The center,” as the New York Times [reports](, “won’t actually be a presidential library. In a break with precedent, there will be no research library on site, and none of Mr. Obama’s official presidential records. Instead, the Obama Foundation will pay to digitize the roughly 30 million pages of unclassified paper records from the administration so they can be made available online.” Alongside the center will sit a museum, a sports space, a test kitchen, an art plaza, a kids’ area, and a new branch of the Chicago Public Library. The breaking of ground hits bedrock on levels deeper than just the framing of a foundation. It comes on the heels of four years of Donald Trump’s damage to democracy and a still-going pandemic that’s scrambled all conventions of civic life. Obama’s center is the first in history without a physical archives room, making it a cementing of contrasts; a wager about what transparency looks like. Historians are still wrestling with [just how transparent]( any digital archive can be, as Obama himself pondered in his memoir A Promised Land. His library puts to the test the promise of a promise, or as the philosopher Daniel Dennett intones on other contexts, belief in belief; if Obama’s legacy rests on his hypothesis of good governance as a way to broaden civic participation, his library runs that test through. Presidential libraries got their start with FDR’s during World War II, when defending democracy against authoritarianism was tested again. Every library since then has busied itself with enshrining a namesake’s legacy by tightly guarding a narrative. See Mother Jones’ [2013 classic]( “8 Things You Won’t See at the George W. Bush Presidential Library.” But as a culmination of historical firsts, Obama’s center is thoroughly “cause for celebration,” as CNN rightly [rejoices](. [Catch the livestream here](. —Daniel King Did you enjoy this newsletter? Help us out by [forwarding]( it to a friend or sharing it on [Facebook]( and [Twitter](. [Mother Jones]( [Donate]( [Subscribe]( This message was sent to {EMAIL}. To change the messages you receive from us, you can [edit your email preferences]( or [unsubscribe from all mailings.]( For advertising opportunities see our online [media kit.]( Were you forwarded this email? [Sign up for Mother Jones' newsletters today.]( [www.MotherJones.com]( PO Box 8539, Big Sandy, TX 75755