Congress Finds A Scapegoat

Parents hold up pictures of their children who died because of social media.

Go ahead, think of a brilliant and successful genius who is not hated by the general public. Take your time. Okay, now think of one who is. I'll help: Mark Zuckerberg. Steve Jobs (deceased). Elon Musk. Donald Trump. Bill Gates. Rush Limbaugh.

The ugly truth is that your everyday couch-surfing, snack-chomping, non-striving adult sees those who win, and win big, as mocking them, or proving them wrong, or as a threat aimed at them, when really they don't figure into it at all. Recognizing this fact helps to understand why all of Congress finally agreed on something and raked Mark Zuckerberg over the coals recently at a hearing that blamed him for the suicides of scores of teen and pre-teens. 

Supposedly many children were driven to their deaths by Zuckerberg's sloppy stewardship of his brainchild, Facebook (now Meta). Those poor innocents went online with trust in their hearts, then saw bad things or heard bad things and became frightened or depressed enough to end their lives. All because of Zuckerberg! And now Congress is asking just exactly what is he going to do about his invention, "a product that is killing people," in the words of South Carolina's Senator Lindsey Graham. 

The bigger question is what are today's parents of young children willing to do to keep their kids safe, healthy and aware of the potential dangers lurking on the World Wide Web. Nobody asked that. Instead, they heaped blame on the brightest guy in the room. After all, he's very rich and very successful so it must be his fault.