Building Safer Digital Worlds for Youth: Equity, Harm, and Practical Strategies

Highlights from the Children & Screens’ International Scientific Congress Panel, Cyber Risks and Violence: Understanding Child Safety Online

Our kids’ online lives aren’t neutral. The same racism, misogyny, and bias that shape offline experiences show up across platforms, often amplified by algorithms and available 24/7. At the 2025 Digital Media & Developing Minds International Scientific Congress, hosted by Children & Screens, researchers and practitioners explored how digital harms affect youth mental health and development — and what actually helps.

Culture Reframed’s Director of Programming, Dr. Mandy Sanchez, was invited to participate in the panel, “Cyber Risks and Violence: Understanding Child Safety Online,” alongside Dr. Brendesha Tynes of the University of Southern California, a developmental and educational psychologist who has spent decades studying racism in digital spaces and its impact on youth mental health. The conversation, moderated by Dr. Desmond Upton Patton, a social worker and data scientist at the University of Pennsylvania and scientific advisor to Children & Screens, moved beyond risk to interventions, policy ideas, and youth-centered strategies that can make digital spaces safer, healthier, and more equitable.

Together, they explored how racism, misogyny, and bias show up in digital spaces and what those realities mean for the well-being of young people.

Online Racism Is Frequent and Harmful

The conversation began with Dr. Tynes, whose decades of research reveal just how common and damaging online racism has become. Research shows that young people experience online racial discrimination on a near-daily basis — slurs, demeaning stereotypes, and even mock lynchings. Viral videos of police violence and algorithmically amplified racist content add another layer of harm. These exposures are not fleeting. They are linked to measurable increases in depression and anxiety among adolescents.

As she explained, “A successful intervention would center race and racism and give young people the historical thinking skills to place messages in context.” Tynes described this as building a kind of “force field” that lets youth recognize and deflect racist content, rather than internalize it. She stressed that generic “be kind online” programs are insufficient; young people need tools that explicitly name racism, situate it historically, and help them critique and cope with what they encounter.

Pornography as Mainstream Online Violence

From a different angle, Dr. Sanchez highlighted the role of online pornography in shaping harmful beliefs and behaviors. She emphasized that today’s online porn is violent, degrading, and algorithmically designed to keep kids hooked. “We’re focused on kids not having access to pornography,” she said. “This is a public health issue. The industry is largely unregulated and predatory on youth.”

Sanchez pointed to child advocacy centers that now report cases of child-to-child sexual assault rooted not in family abuse but in scripts kids picked up from pornography. Exposure, she explained, can distort young people’s sense of consent, intimacy, and even their expectations for a first sexual experience.

From Research to Solutions

Both experts stressed that solutions must move beyond awareness. Tynes is piloting a new platform that pairs AI literacy with coping skills and historical context, helping young people recognize algorithmic bias and resist harmful content. “It’s not just AI literacy we need,” she said. “It’s critical AI literacy: understanding how racism can be baked into data and outcomes.”

At Culture Reframed, Sanchez and her team have developed free parent programs, a comprehensive, porn-critical sex education curriculum, and a youth advisory council that provides space for young people to shape interventions. She noted that parents often feel shame or judgment when trying to set boundaries, but support has to be practical and non-blaming: “Kids didn’t create this mess, yet they’re swimming in it. Our job is to reconnect them with authenticity and rewrite the scripts toward healthy, safe relationships.”

“Our job is to reconnect them with authenticity and rewrite the scripts toward healthy, safe relationships.”

Balancing Protection with Joy

The panelists also emphasized that protecting youth online does not mean taking away what makes the internet valuable. Tynes pointed out that many young people find community, connection, and education online, especially around issues of racism and justice. “They have access to scholars and peers who are teaching them how to critique racism,” she said. “We don’t want to take that away. We want to amplify it.”

For Sanchez, the key is helping youth distinguish between empowerment and exploitation. “Not being exploited is authenticity and agency,” she explained. Building media literacy and comprehensive, porn-critical sex education creates space for kids to experience joy, connection, and agency online without manipulation from predatory industries.

What Parents, Educators, and Communities Can Do

The panel closed with practical steps families, educators, and communities can take now:

• At home: Lead with empathy and core values, co-create family media plans, and go beyond “consent” to teach respect, body boundaries, and communication.
• At school: Provide critical digital media and AI literacy that names race, gender, and history. Train teachers with practical tools and peer support.
• In communities: Support age verification for pornography sites, push for platform accountability, and create offline opportunities and coalitions that give kids healthier options.

A Path Forward

As Dr. Patton summarized, “Youth deserve digital environments designed with equity and safety in mind, and systems that address racism and misogyny head on.” The path forward, the panelists agreed, is not about banning technology but about reshaping it: shifting platform incentives, centering youth in program design, and equipping adults to guide kids with empathy and critical tools.

Watch the full conversation to hear more from Dr. Brendesha Tynes and Dr. Mandy Sanchez, including how to address racism and misogyny in digital spaces, help youth develop critical media and AI literacy, and create online environments that support safety, equity, and joy.