Wisconsin tribe files lawsuit against social media companies for Native youth mental health crisis

 

MILWAUKEE (CBS 58) --- A Wisconsin tribe says social media is negatively impacting Native American youth.

The Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin is one of the first to take action on the matter with a new lawsuit filed last week.

The Menominee Indian Tribe of Wisconsin filed a lawsuit out of Los Angeles County court against the companies that own Facebook, Instagram, Tik Tok, Youtube and Google. The lawsuit is seeking damages and a jury trial. 

The tribe says the social media apps have created a youth mental health crisis and accuses the defendants of "targeting children as a core market, hooking kids on their addictive social media platforms."

The lawsuit also alleges that the named social media companies design their apps to attract and addict youth and says they're not doing enough to protect kids from harmful effects of using their platforms.

"The youth mental health crisis is devastating Indian Country," the lawsuit states. Data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) cited in the court document says American Indian/Alaska Native youth and young adults have the highest suicide rates of any racial/ethnic group in the U.S.

It also states that tribal teen suicide rates are 3.5 to 4 times higher than the national average.

"The problem with social media that I see, and I think it's been shown as well in the science is that it tends to focus people inward, rather than outward," said Mary Owen, associate dean of Native American Health at the University of Minnesota.

Dr. Owen is a member of the Auk Kwaan Tribe of the Tlingit people. She says a light needs to be shined on tribal health and more.

"Our data is not known in general ...for one we are so small. We're always told that we don't represent enough to be in the data which is dumb," she said.

Heather Kirkorian studies the effects social media has on child development at UW-Madison. She says the research shows that social media can have both negative and positive effects on kids and when you look at certain groups, the impact can sometimes be deeper.

"Kids who have marginalized identities, whether that's minoritized racial or ethnic identity, gender sexual minority youth...they tend to be what we call differentially susceptible...so they're more susceptible to the effects of media in both positive and negative ways," she said. She says those effects can vary from person to person.

Owen says she supports the Menominee Tribe's decision to file the lawsuit. "I would never disagree with what tribal leaders are doing for their communities. They're sovereign nations so that's up to their leadership. Science shows the problems with social media," she said.

Spirit Lake Tribe in North Dakota also filed a similar lawsuit. These are the first of what is expected to be many tribes looking to hold social media companies responsible.