No.

He said access to the internet, not to Facebook or something. You know, that thing that has new wonders of the world and incredible educational content such as Wikipedia, YouTube, etc.

Yes, the internet has some "wonders", and I appreciate them greatly. (If I didn't think it had value, I wouldn't have spent the last decade-plus of my life working on internet-related software and standards.)

However, it also has a huge amount of toxic garbage, by no means restricted to a few "social media" sites.

Whether we can stem the deluge of junk, so that the average person's experience of the internet is actually a net positive, seems uncertain at this point. I don't think we've yet figured out how to manage this.

Food has healthy stuff and unhealthy stuff.

Access to food usually means access to both.

Internet has healthy stuff and unhealthy stuff.

Access to the internet means access to both.

Food is an actual necessity for ... you know ... living.

Access to the internet by children is not.

You're ridiculously off-topic and plain wrong. Internet access is in fact necessary for a lot of people. And since now in many countries children socialize online, not just in real life, it's a necessary aspect of their life.

>Internet access is in fact necessary for a lot of people.

We're talking about children. Internet is a fact of modern life and yes, at some point in their development, children will be exposed to it ... nobody is denying that. I fundamentally disagree however that internet access (limited or otherwise) is fundamentally necessary for child development, or academic success or education in general. That's bullcrap.

>And since now in many countries children socialize online, not just in real life, it's a necessary aspect of their life.

Yeah. I know. We're in the midst of a mental health crisis especially amongst girls brought on by social media use. That's not a good thing by the way.

>I fundamentally disagree however that internet access (limited or otherwise) is fundamentally necessary for child development, or academic success or education in general.

I don't think that's true for many parts of the world, where the level of education attainable through standard means would hardly meet your standard of what is deemed reasonable. For such places, the internet is the only way for children to make steps towards that standard, albeit not easily.

In what way is "internet access" equivalent to "the unchecked availability and aggressive marketing of unhealthy, addictive junk food" in this analogy? I'm quite sure you've misunderstood the analogy.