France Notifies Brussels of Revised Under-15 Social-Media Ban After Constitutional Setback

States periodically clamp down on novel media they fear harm minors—see the U.S. 1934 Communications Act’s restrictions on “indecent” radio or the 1996 Communications Decency Act aimed at the early internet. France’s move fits a century-long arc of child-protection statutes (from 19th-century child-labour bans to 21st-century GDPR’s digital-consent age) that simultaneously expand state guardianship and test civil-liberty boundaries. By hard-coding an age bar and tying it to EU-level harmonisation, Paris is prodding Europe toward direct platform regulation rather than the self-certification model Silicon Valley built on. If adopted Union-wide, it would mark the first major Western jurisdiction to impose an outright social-media prohibition by age, potentially shaping global standards much as the 2018 GDPR exported privacy norms. Over a 100-year horizon, this episode may be remembered less for the immediate ban than for signalling Europe’s steady shift from liberal laissez-faire toward paternalistic digital sovereignty—a trajectory that could recalibrate how future generations experience free expression online.