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New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella continues his crusade to clean up social media, signing on to a letter this week calling for new health warning labels on social media apps.

“New Hampshire children and their families deserve to know about the harms that social media platforms can cause. Congress should require these platforms to clearly tell their users about those harms as one step to help protect kids from the predatory practices of social media,” Formella said.

Formella and a bipartisan coalition of 41 other attorneys general sent the letter to Washington D.C. lawmakers pushing them to pass a law requiring a U.S. Surgeon General warning on all algorithm-driven social media platforms. The letter comes amidst growing scrutiny of social media companies for their role in generational harm to young people’s mental health.

The attorneys general say in their letter that more action is necessary because “social media platforms have demonstrated an unwillingness to fix the problem on their own.”

They cited growing bodies of research that link young people’s use of these platforms to psychological harm, including depression, anxiety, and even suicidal thoughts in kids and teens. They also note how platforms feature irresistible algorithmic recommendations, infinite scrolling, and a constant stream of notifications designed to keep kids relentlessly engaged on the platforms, even at the expense of taking breaks, engaging in other activities, or sleeping.

In June 2023, the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office solicited stories from parents, teachers, and coaches about the negative impacts of social media. At the same time, Gov. Chris Sununu issued an executive order for state agencies to develop curricula addressing these harms, highlighted by the GoPlayNH initiative.

Around that same time, U. S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy published an op ed in The New York Times supporting the idea of warning labels for social media.

“It is time to require a surgeon general’s warning label on social media platforms, stating that social media is associated with significant mental health harms for adolescents,” Murthy wrote.

“The moral test of any society is how well it protects its children. Now is the time to summon the will to act. Our children’s well-being is at stake.”

In October 2023, the New Hampshire Attorney General’s Office filed a lawsuit against Meta alongside 44 other states. In June of this year, New Hampshire became one of the first states in the country to file a lawsuit against TikTok to stop the harmful impacts that the platform has on kids.

“While our investigation into social media companies is ongoing, our findings confirm that these companies have exploited children’s vulnerabilities and misled those responsible for their safety,” Formella said. “We remain committed to holding these companies accountable and ensuring a safer online environment for our children.”

Gov. Chris Sununu likes to tout his pro-business bona fides, but they aren’t stopping him from targeting the wildly popular social media platform TikTok with a lawsuit accusing the company of putting profits ahead of children.

“Our lawsuit alleges that TikTok has shamelessly exploited young users through deceptive design features that foster addiction and endanger mental health. We contend that TikTok knowingly deceived New Hampshire families with false assurances of safety while profiting from the vulnerabilities of its youngest users,” Sununu’s Attorney General John Formella said in a statement announcing the lawsuit, filed in Merrimack Superior Court.

The suit attacks TikTok for allegedly violating the state’s consumer protection statute and other laws.

According to the lawsuit, TikTok uses addictive features to exploit young users’ naivete and ongoing brain development and maximize the time they spend on the platform in the interest of profit. TikTok’s addictive design features make it hard for children to disengage from the platform and lead to a cycle of excessive use, the lawsuit states.

The complaint alleges the company knows excessive use results in profound harm to its young users, including depression, anxiety, and isolation from friends and family. As the company deployed those features, it also lied to parents about the platform’s safety, downplaying the risks posed while touting supposed safety measures that the company knows are ineffective. 

“New Hampshire puts our kids first,” Sununu said. “This lawsuit, combined with our earlier executive order investigating the harms of social media on New Hampshire’s youth is another wakeup call for parents on the dangers that social media presents to our kids.”

New Hampshire filed a similar lawsuit against Meta last year, the company behind Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. That lawsuit is currently pending.

“This action underscores our commitment to holding social media platforms accountable for their harmful actions to youth. We will vigorously pursue this case to ensure that TikTok is held responsible and that meaningful changes are made to protect our children’s well-being. This lawsuit is just the latest step in our ongoing efforts to ensure that platforms like TikTok operate responsibly and transparently in our state,” Formella said.

 The lawsuit contends TikTok knew it was deploying potentially harmful features on its platform, gathering data on children under 13, exploiting them for money, and even exposing them to online predators.

“New Hampshire’s children are spending increasingly alarming amounts of time on screens. In 2021, over 37 percent of New Hampshire high schoolers reported 5 hours or more of screen time on an average school day. The U.S. Surgeon General has warned that unchecked use of applications like TikTok has ‘a profound risk of harm to the mental health and well-being of children and adolescents,’” the lawsuit states.

As more of their hours are taken by TikTok, New Hampshire children are being exposed to child sex abuse images and videos, content that promotes self harm, extreme violent content, and even online social interactions with pedophiles, according to the lawsuit. All this despite assurance the company is doing everything it can to keep kids safe.

“TikTok has long been a haven to incredibly disturbing, gruesome videos, including beheadings, mass shootings, and videos of both suicide and eating disorders. TikTok also knows sexual predators use the App to solicit nude photographs and other photographs from/of children,” the lawsuit states.

Formella wants the Court to enter an injunction requiring substantive changes in how the company operates. He’s also seeking penalties and other monetary relief to address the harms that these practices have caused. 

The attorney general’s investigation of other social media platforms for related practices continues.

TikTok, the controversial social media giant is making billions by trapping New Hampshire kids in a psychologically harmful and potentially dangerous web of endless scrolling, according to the lawsuit filed Tuesday by New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella.

When the Northwood School Board meets Wednesday night, it won’t be to cover the “three R’s.” Instead, they’ll be dealing with the “N-word” and other racial and obscene comments from one of their own members: outspoken progressive Gary Caron.

Caron has a history of using obscene and sexually explicit language to attack conservatives and Republicans in social posts, and the newest member of Northwood’s School Board hasn’t slowed down since taking office.

When a conservative commentator posted a meme with the message that former U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) ought to be sent to the Guantanamo Bay Detention Camp last week, Caron responded with a sexual threat.

“I’d love to see you in GTMO after I [explicit] your ass red raw,” Caron posted.

When another conservative account posted a photo of controversial Republican political candidate Kari Lake around that same time, Caron was quick with a misogynistic response.

“Gfyself lying c—t,” Caron wrote.

Caron posted dozens of obscene, angry, and violent messages on Twitter/X over the past few years, mostly directed at conservative and Republican figures. One post about Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) from January includes an implied racial slur targeting African Americans.

“F**king house N—a sellout coward c***suvker gfyself,” Caron wrote.

After a flurry of complaints over the Presidents Day weekend, Caron’s fellow board members had had enough. Northwood Superintendent Nathaniel Byrne told NHJournal that the board will be addressing Caron’s behavior at the upcoming meeting.

The board will discuss “racist, graphic, and violent social media posts from a current school board member.” Caron plans to be at the meeting, according to Byrne.

Caron was elected to a three-year term on the board last March when he ran unopposed for the seat. The retired engineer worked for the United States Navy on submarine modernization and weapons systems, according to his resume posted on LinkedIn. As part of his work, Caron held a security clearance.

Caron could not be reached for comment as the several phone numbers publicly associated with him, including the cell phone number on his resume, were disconnected or are no longer in service.

According to a questionnaire he filled out prior to last year’s school board election, Caron is concerned with how children are taught history in school.

“Issues of importance are teaching truth, American history, civics, democracy, civil rights, and civil liberties,” Caron wrote.

There is a noticeable lack of advocacy for civil rights — or civility in general — in Caron’s public postings. And he’s made no secret of his partisan leanings, declaring his “hate” for “Trump, his supporters, White men, Christians and Conservatives.”

“This is vile and disgusting. This man makes decisions regarding the materials that will be in the hands of children and public policy,” wrote Manchester politico Victoria Sullivan, one of the Granite Staters who brought Caron’s posts to the school board’s attention.

It’s not clear what Caron will do next or what the board can do about his posts. Byrne has spoken to Caron and told NHJournal he doesn’t know if Caron plans to resign his seat, though the possibility was mentioned.

“I’m not aware of his decision. I do know he will be at the meeting this week,” Byrne said.

Wednesday’s meeting could prove frustrating for anyone hoping the board takes action. Northwood’s school board does not have a policy dealing with social media use by members, Byrne said.

“The board is not allowed to infringe on any other members’ First Amendment rights,” Byrne said.

The board does have a code of ethics policy, however, and Byrne said that will guide Wednesday’s discussion about Caron’s social media posts. But that policy, last updated in 2015, mostly concerns board member interactions with other board members. It does not address how board members conduct themselves with members of the general public.

New Hampshire Attorney General John Formella is out to stop social media giant Meta, which he says built its empire by targeting children and hurting their mental health.

“We will not tolerate the pursuit of profit at the expense of the mental health and well-being of New Hampshire’s kids and America’s kids,” Formella said.

Formella filed a lawsuit Tuesday in Merrimack Superior Court alleging Meta, the company behind Facebook and Instagram, has been hiding the fact its social media platforms cause mental health problems for teens and children.

“Meta knows the harm it’s causing, and it’s lulled parents into a false sense of security,” Formella said.

The New Hampshire lawsuit is part of a larger battle against social media involving 41 other state attorneys general. A federal lawsuit filed in California has 34 state attorneys general accusing Meta of using its data to exploit children. New Hampshire is not part of the federal lawsuit; it is one of eight states filing lawsuits on their own.

Formella said New Hampshire’s strong consumer protection and product liability laws give the state effort a good chance of succeeding against Meta. 

According to Formella, Meta has known for years that children and their developing minds are particularly vulnerable to manipulative design techniques that keep them mindlessly scrolling on social media. Instead of working to institute safeguards, Meta instead knowingly manipulates children to stay logged on for as long as possible so that the company can extract their data and profits by serving them endless advertisements. 

“Meta’s design strategy exploits their vulnerabilities: from a dopamine-inducing personalization algorithm that gives kids the same feeling as gambling to consistent alerts that interfere with their schoolwork and sleep. Meta content capitalizes on children’s fear of missing out and urges them to constantly engage with the platforms,” Formnella said.

The result this social media saturation has on children is chilling and awful, according to the lawsuit. 

“In 2021, almost half (44.2 percent) of New Hampshire’s high school students self-reported feeling persistently sad or hopeless––a 75 percent increase from 2011. Similarly, from 2011 to 2021, the percentage of New Hampshire high school students who reported seriously considering suicide increased by 72 percent–– from 14.3 percent to 24.7 percent. Alarmingly, the percentage of New Hampshire high school students who self-reported actually attempting suicide jumped from 6.1 percent to 9.8 percent––a 60 percent increase,” the lawsuit states.

Formella said the company is lying about the safety of Facebook and Instagram, as well as its own safety measures. The company continues to push features that lure kids into endless scrolling. The result is anxiety, depression, and serious body image issues.

“Meta’s decision to do so despite its knowledge of significant links between excessive use of social media and increased instances of serious health problems such as depression, anxiety, and insomnia is unacceptable and unlawful. Not unlike Big Tobacco a generation ago, Meta has chosen profits over public health, particularly the health of the youngest among us,” Formella said.

Meta is even launching an ad campaign that targets children under age 13, the supposed limit for getting an account, he said.

“Meta does all of this to expand its user base and its profit,” Formella said.

The company issued a statement Tuesday complaining Formella and the 41 other attorneys general could have simply asked for changes to the social media platforms rather than filing the lawsuits.

“We’re disappointed that instead of working productively with companies across the industry to create clear, age-appropriate standards for the many apps teens use, the attorneys general have chosen this path,” the statement read.

Formellas’s lawsuit seeks an injunction to force Meta to make real changes to its systems, and it wants the company held liable for damages and breaking consumer protection laws. All of this could result in a large monetary judgment against the company, just in New Hampshire.

Gov. Chris Sununu is telling kids to put down their phones and go touch grass.

Sununu issued an executive order Wednesday aimed at getting New Hampshire children off social media and into the outdoors. At the same time, the state is investigating the harm apps like TikTok and Instagram are doing to children.

Sununu’s order comes following extensive meetings with Attorney General John Formella about the dangers posed by sites like TikTok and Instagram.

“New Hampshire’s children are the future of our state and our nation, and we are making every effort to ensure necessary changes are made to prevent harm by these platforms. New Hampshire will look at all necessary options to protect our children – including spending more time off screens and outdoors.”

The state’s ongoing investigation into the numerous harms to children posed by social media platforms started in November 2021. The new executive order is based on some of those findings. Formella said social media is disastrous for youth mental health and is creating a crisis among children and teens.

“Extensive social media use has been tied to profound risks of harm in youth. Indeed, there has been an increased focus on the correlation between the development of serious mental health disorders by minors and time spent on social media. My office is actively considering how it can best protect New Hampshire’s youth from the harm these platforms cause and promote,” Formella said. “Eliminating the harmful effects of social media on New Hampshire’s youth and holding social media platforms accountable for their actions is a top priority for me.”

Sununu also wants to use the classroom to fight harmful social media habits. His order gives the Department of Education and the Department of Health and Human Services 90 days to develop guidelines for a social media curriculum to be submitted to the State Board of Education. This curriculum for all K-12 health classes will teach the potentially negative impacts of social media use.

Sununu’s order came one day before the House is expected to vote on a Democrat-backed bill to give kids more access to social media in classrooms. Under SB213, schools will use social media accounts for instruction as long as it is connected to a particular study area. The bill also requires that parents provide written permission for that social media use.

Sununu’s office did not respond to NH Journal when asked about SB213.

Under Sununu’s plan, state agencies will also promote a new GoPlayNH Initiative to encourage kids and families to spend more time off their screens and outdoors. The initiative will highlight the various recreation opportunities available across the Granite State.

“Teaching our children how to engage with society in a healthy, fulfilling way is a core component to providing a holistic education that prepares the next generation for success in every way,” said Department of Education Commissioner Frank Edelblut. “I am thankful that Governor Sununu is taking action to address the societal impact of social media and look forward to hearing directly from parents and students so that we may work side by side to support the needs of the community.”

More details on the rollout of the GoPlayNH Initiative are expected in the coming weeks.

This isn’t Sununu’s first foray into the social media fight. Last December, he banned the Chinese-owned Tik Tok app from state-issued electronic devices. TikTok gathers data from users’ phones that is unrelated to using the app, and the company makes that data available upon request to the Chinese Communist Party, according to multiple media accounts.

And Formella joined 46 other state attorneys general in March, asking a Tennessee judge to order the company to open up its internal communications for review.

New Hampshire middle schoolers have free access to books containing pornographic images of sex acts through their school libraries and through school-hosted library apps, a NHJournal investigation has found.

Books like “Gender Queer,” “This Book is Gay,” and “Flamer,” all of which contain explicit, graphic content, can be found in public middle school libraries across the state. They can also be accessed through school district websites that host apps like Sora, where students can get e-books from multiple sources.

While media coverage of the conversation about parental rights and school education content has focused on claims of censorship or alleged anti-gay sentiment, there has been relatively little coverage of the actual content in question. One reason, as Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) recently demonstrated, is that the books are so graphic, their images can’t be broadcast on television or published in a community newspaper.

A DeSantis press conference on his state’s new law included a video with images from the books in question. The school library books depict “explicit language or pictures depicting male and female genitalia, different sexual acts and, in one case, instruction on masturbation.” Television stations had to cut away from the press conference during that video.

An edited version of art from the book Gender Queer

NH Journal was able to find many of the same books through school district library websites, including “This Book is Gay,” which contains instructions on how to perform gay sex.

Hanover SAU 70, where many of the books can be found, did not respond to a request for comment. 

State Rep. Glenn Cordelli (R-Tuftonboro) is sponsoring a bill to require school boards to adopt complaint policies that would allow parents to file objections to specific books. Currently, such policies are voluntary in New Hampshire.

Cordelli’s attempt to give parents the power to keep pornographic books out of their local school libraries is already getting pushback from teachers unions. Deb Howes, president of the New Hampshire chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, opposes the bill.

“What we don’t want is for one parent who objects to a book in the library or in the classroom to be able to decide for all children in that school what your child is able to read,” Howes told the New Hampshire Bulletin.

New Hampshire’s Department of Education is already fielding complaints about many of these books and said the matter can be taken to court. New Hampshire has had RSA 571-B Exposing Minors to Harmful Materials and RSA 650 Obscene Matter for decades. The laws allow either the Attorney General’s Office or any county attorney’s office to pursue obscenity cases in court. It is not known if any such cases are being brought before a judge.

A book with instructions on how to have gay sex is available to Hanover middle schoolers through the public library.

Progressives who want to control public school curricula and limit the influence of parents use the phrase “book ban” to paint conservatives as anti-literate haters who want to stamp out learning, says Shannon McGinley, executive director at Cornerstone Action of New Hampshire.

The issue is not literature, McGinley said. It’s porn.

“The problem with books like “Genderqueer” isn’t that they’re offensive. It’s that these books are graphic, illustrated pornography,” McGinley said. She wants to see New Hampshire Republicans focus on the content of these books, which are being accessed by children as young as 10 or 11.

“Any time Republicans talk in general terms about ‘obscene’ books, they help Democrats promote the fantasy that people are going after Huckleberry Finn and Harry Potter.

“Use the word ‘pornography,’” she said.

I’m used to being suspended by social media. I have a fairly colorful way of expressing myself, which is attributable to my Irish-Italian pit bull lineage. But I’m also a lawyer, which means I have some passing understanding of how to carefully parse words and phrases so that I can insult you without actually insulting you, I can attack without visibly drawing blood, I can tread that filament of space between cheeky and defamatory.

But these days, we don’t deal in nuance. In fact, social media has become so obsessed with politically correct expression and sanitized thought that if there is even the suspicion of someone saying something that goes against conventional wisdom or accepted societal rules, they are virtually arrested, virtually charged, virtually tried and virtually convicted before you can upload a new profile picture.

This is what happened to me the other day when I posted something that I thought was funny and fairly innocuous in terms of its social impact. I’d been involved the night before in an unpleasant exchange with a woman in a pizza shop. She had a mask on and was choosing which slice of upscale designer focaccia she wanted to bring home to her Rittenhouse Square penthouse. At the end of the counter was a man, mask dangling from his ear, waiting for his own order to be warmed up and sipping on an espresso.  Here is how I described what happened next:

“From the right of me I hear, “Put on your mask.” I knew the comment wasn’t directed at me because I was already wearing the ineffective, butterfly-wing-thin piece of paper on my nose and mouth, something I call my Bocca Burqa, so that I could access the restaurant.

I looked around and realized that the woman was talking to the man who was waiting for his order, his own mask dangling from one ear as he sipped an espresso at the bar. He was more than 6 feet away from her.

The man said “Mind your own business, lady.” I would have been even less polite, so I gave him points. The woman, blessed with the flaming red hair her ancestors never had and struggling to mobilize cryogenically-frozen mouth muscles screamed (and I mean screamed) “Put your mask on you fat ass.”

The man was overweight, but I was always taught that you can only safely criticize the weight of blood relatives and Rosie O’Donnell, so I was shocked. The man replied in kind, saying “Shut up, bitch.”

And she gathered all of her powers of indignation and fury and launched the most scathing, deadly, hurtful thing she could come up with: “Fuc$ing Trump voter. I hope you die, but don’t you kill me!”

And then his order arrived and he went to a corner table to eat.

I was still in shock. I was debating whether to say anything when the woman told the cashier: “I live here and I’m not going to let that animal make me sick.”

And that did it. I said, “Ma’am, that was completely wrong. I’m wearing a mask. I’m vaccinated. But you are out of line. Did you have to be insulting? Calling him fat? And really? Trump? Last time I checked, Biden is president.”

She looked taken aback that someone who was superficially a fellow traveler (female, mask wearer, wearing animal print accessories) was criticizing her. But she rebounded quickly. “He’s a fat, ignorant anti-science Trumper.”

At that point the manager came to the register and looked at me and said, “Please, can you stop raising your voices and making a scene?”

And that’s when Joan of Arch Street emerged and said, pointing like Emile Zola in “J’accuse!”

“It was THAT woman. Her. She started it when she insulted that man (waving an accusatory finger at the embarrassed male diner). She called him fat. She called him a Trump voter. She is at fault.”

And then I looked at the manager and said, “I don’t need your pizza that badly. I need to be more than 6 feet away from HER.” (Accusatory finger shifts back to Redhead, who was as naturally Red as a California Redwood) and then I stormed out of the pizzeria.

As I trudged home, sans pizza and umbrella but with conviction, I realized that I do not want to be within 6 feet of anyone who makes masks and vaccines the hallmark of their humanity.”

That was the entire content of my post, give or take a few emojis.  It got a few thumbs up, lots of clicks, and I also shared it in a private Facebook group I belong to. Private groups are just that, private. Only those who have access to the group can see the posts, and I’m pretty sure that no one in this group objected to my post.

But lo and behold, I get a notice from Facebook that I was being suspended for three days because my post had “violated Community standards” by spreading “misinformation” about masks and vaccines.  That’s exactly what it said. I re-read my post, and while it did appear a bit cutting, particularly the comments about the lady’s flaming hair, I couldn’t find anything in it that disseminated false facts.  It was pure opinion, albeit snarky in tone (is there any other tone?)

Ironically, hours after I was told that I’d been put in Facebook Siberia, they took off my ankle bracelet and I was released. There was no warning nor explanation, I  just woke up the next morning and was able to post like a normal human being.  It wasn’t exactly Alexander Solzhenitsyn getting out of the Archipelago Zuckerberg, but it was rather momentous.  Apparently, my appeal to the Facebook gods had been reviewed and approved.

But I’m not celebrating. The fact that something I posted in a private social media group caught the attention of someone with Stasi propensities, and a knee-jerk decision was made based on partisan assumptions, is appalling.  The fact that an opinion was considered “dangerous” is Kafkaesque. The fact that making fun of a woman who was making fun of a man violates “Community standards” and we have no idea what those standards are really troubles me. It should trouble all of us.

Whatever your opinions on masks or vaccines or abortion or election fraud or Chris Cuomo or Larry Krasner, they’re your opinions. Opinions are not dangerous. You know what is, though?

Not being able to have them.