I joined Linuxrocks as a teen, and found it super welcoming. In fact, despite joining many other forums and such since, Linuxrocks is the only place I still use regularly.

My little sister, who is now a teen, is not on the fediverse, but she's not on any social media as such, and just talks with her close friends.

Of course as her loving brother, I tell her all the time I love her, and sit and hear her out whenever anything's bothering her.
But I digress.

@OpenComputeDesign I am also one of the fediverse's young members (19 now, 15 when I joined). I know a few (basically my friends, some of whom are a little younger than me), but we're all tech / FOSS nerds, so aren't really representative of the wider teenaged population. That's why this interests me.

that's also why I'm keeping whether teens should be on socials at all out of this. For me it has been a life changing experience, and first YouTube, now the fediverse and the wider internet, have lead me down the path to FOSS, programming, sys-admin, and made me countless invaluable friends along the way. But for whatever reason, I've never once contemplated anything like self-harming, and I know my story is very different to a lot of others' experiences