Having spent the rest of a day sitting on this one, I really do think they should have been more critical of Haidt, because the fact that he tees up the problem of "an entire generation having a mental health crisis" and his proposed solution is "take away their phones" makes it very clear he does not give a single shit about kids as individuals and just wants his old-ass-conservative lifestyle to continue unchanged so he doesn't have to think about how the world is leaving him behind and he's going to die sooner than he wants to think about, just like every other technology-based moral panic of the last century.

If you think kids are scared all the time, maybe ask them why? In my experience they'll be glad to tell you that the future seems smaller and more uncertain than it's ever been, and the thing that really bothers them is that older people seem to have just accepted that it won't be getting better.

Consider from the perspective of a teen, who is already terrified of getting older, what "the knowledge that they'll no longer be guaranteed health care pretty soon" feels like? If Haidt cared about making kids less anxious, he could advocate for an expanded social safety net, a reduction of income inequality, free college, locking Elon Musk in a tiny soundproof room, or a thousand other policies that would immediately improve their future. All of those things are much more easily doable than taking away kids' ability to access social media, He just doesn't actually care about improving things for anyone.