Benson was thrilled with the new playground, delighted to be just out of reach of his frazzled handler. I paced outside the window, coaching him to flip the “unlock” button while I tried to hide my panic. He responded by banging on the window and steering wheel, and playing the best game of peek-a-boo.

A North Ogden police officer came to our rescue. He wielded that Slim Jim like King Arthur ready to slay a dragon. The second he popped the lock, I flung open the door to squeeze my baby. Since then, I haven’t made another parental mistake. As the comedian Jim Gaffigan said, “Parenting is the only thing you can do for 13 years and then suddenly you’re really bad at it.”

Locking a baby in the car is just the tip of the iceberg on stupid parenting choices. I allowed my daughter to shave half her head, agreed to pay $10 for every “A” (three kids, 24 classes) and bought them each a dirt bike to look at. The depth of bad choices adds up, but I know I’ve done one thing right: My children are not allowed to have social media.

Before both my daughter and son started seventh grade, we gave them phones — with a contract. An extensive one. It includes a clause that says all terms are subject to change verbally and need no explanation. Their phones are locked down with Google Family Link, but just like the vicious raptors in Jurassic Park, the animals are always testing the fence for weaknesses. No, you cannot download the app Beer Simulator.

No Instagram, no Facebook, no TikTok or Snapchat. Kik is gross, Reddit is adults only and LinkedIn is for people who’ve actually had a job. There is a debate brewing over Pinterest. Even with our ban, my children know all the trends, devious licks and absurd challenges using household items. While I’m glad I don’t have to worry about constant selfies and comment sections, the real reason for the ban is about something bigger: their data.

Social media platforms feed on our children’s personal data. From the moment they were born, their digital footprints began and companies have been salivating over their information and the dollars it generates. They are the first generation to be fully digital; analog is just a tall tale. Surveillance capatalism, a term coined by Harvard professor Shoshana Zuboff, explains the commodity of our data, mined to profit companies around the world. These platforms make hundreds of billions exploiting the most vulnerable among us, and kids are prime targets.

Algorithms track our every digital move as we consume social media, allowing companies to market specifically to us. Most parents know this. What they may not know is that social media is even watching what we delete. Meta, which owns both Facebook and Instagram, is facing accusations they monitored when teen girls deleted photos from their profiles and then allegedly used that emotional moment to target them for beauty ads.

Former Meta employee Sarah Wynn-Williams testified before Congress, claiming Meta used algorithms to target teens in a vulnerable emotional state. She alleges years of corporate misconduct in her book “Careless People: A Cautionary Tale of Power, Greed and Lost Idealism.” Wynn-Williams is barred from promoting the book after Meta sued, winning the right to enforce a gag order against the author.

Meta fervently denies the allegations, just as one would expect from a billion-dollar company needing to keep the money flowing. Parents must believe these platforms are safe and important for companies like Meta to keep surveillance capitalism working.

A year ago, Utah’s Gov. Spence Cox signed the Utah Social Media Regulation Act, which aimed to limit the collection of a minor’s personal data for surveillance capitalism. Parents should be aware these protections aren’t automatic; they still have to dig into platform settings and disable algorithms to get the full benefit.

Locally, the issue of social media exploitation of our youth is getting the attention it deserves, even with distractions like Pride flag bans. Nationally, Congress is flailing. Former U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy compared the lack of social media oversight for kids to putting them in a car without a seatbelt.

If we don’t demand more from the companies profiting off our children’s insecurity, we’ll be locked in an endless battle for their mental well-being.

Despite never being a contender for mother of the year, I can claim one win: keeping my kids off social media. I’m not naïve enough to think these raptors won’t eventually find a way through the electric fence — my daughter is a “clever girl” — but I’m hoping to delay them just long enough to learn how to sort the good from the bad, to wield social media’s power responsibly. They need to know they’re more than just a data point in someone’s algorithm. They’re real.

Meg Sanders worked in broadcast journalism for over a decade but has since turned her life around to stay closer to home in Ogden. Her three children keep her indentured as a taxi driver, stylist and sanitation worker. In her free time, she likes to read, write, lift weights and go to concerts with her husband of 18 years.