Like, I know why it’s being banned or has been banned or whatever. I just don’t understand the rage behind to keep this shitty ass social media platform that is essentially Vine 2.0
TikTok has been the detriment to society today as Facebook was and is. People doing stupid challenges. People’s attention span getting lower and lower. People pretending they’re more popular than life itself because of their faux acting and lip-syncing.
Why keep the piece of shit?
Short answer: because doing a good thing for a bad reason - particularly when it establishes a bad legal precedent - is often a very bad thing in the long run.
I fucking detest TikTok for a variety of reasons (largely around the societal impact it has), but playing the national security card and then not applying it consistently (e.g. meta, twitter, insta, etc are not getting NEARLY the same level of scrutiny, despite very similar ways in which they influence society at both a national and global level) is a recipe for trouble, because that card can be (and often is) played for esoteric bullshit reasons. And I fully expect the incoming admin to use esoteric bullshit reasons for pretty much anything they possibly can.
When Tik Tok gets banned they can and will ban other platforms (ex: Lemmy, Mastadon, Peertube, Matrix, Signal). They will also attempt to ban secure vpns (MullvadVPN) and “encurage” censorship on major platforms.
It will like when we switched to https, except now we will switch to TOR and make it fast through network effect.
You shouldn’t keep TikTok, it’s trash, same as most social media. But this also shows why banning it is bad. It’s not significantly different from any of the other brain-numbing, privacy-disrespecting trash out there.
It’s not being targeted for the things that are wrong with it, it’s targeted because it’s a Chinese company. That’s the problem with the ban.
People doing stupid challenges. People’s attention span getting lower and lower. People pretending they’re more popular than life itself because of their faux acting and lip-syncing
Sorry but this reeks of moral panic.
App plaforms contain propaganda but America wants to control the propaganda. TikTok shows what happens when America does not. Suddenly when presented with different viewpoints not allowed on American platforms, people change their opinion of America. See the censorship on Palestine on American platforms as an example.
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The legal framework and argumentation used to justify the ban is worrisome and can be applied overbroadly in the suppression of speech.
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Despite this broad possible argumentation, it has just been, and will likely continue to be, wielded in a way targeted towards suppression of speech in a targeted, nationalistic, and at times overtly racist ways. (See: “Senator, I’m Singaporean, not Chinese.”)
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Like it or not, it’s become a large repository of internet history and online conversation. The loss of the platform is the loss of that history.
If the government had particular problems with the platform’s practices and behaviors, it would have been able to field an actual lawsuit with real charges, or levy fines. This “sell or be banned” is a clear grab for power more than any actual gesture towards protecting the people.
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I don’t know if I’m about to say something that someone has already stated but there are a few reasons I’m aware of.
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There is nothing preventing another platform from becoming another TikTok. All of the problematic users will just migrate to some other platform that probably has less moderation and continue doing everything they were doing before.
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I’ve seen some concern about what it could do to the economy. A lot of content creators on TikTok were making money from it and some were successful enough to make a living. Some of these users have expressed that they were either unable to gain an audience on other major platforms or they were banned from them, making TikTok their only significant income source.
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There are concerns about the hypocrisy of banning TikTok for spying on it’s users when other platforms and services, like Facebook and Windows, do pretty much the same thing.
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Monopolization of social media is a bad thing. The two remaining largest social media companies have both publicly begun supporting far right narratives. (Meta and X)
So what it comes down to is really the possibility that the TikTok algorithm gets controlled. But that’s a distraction. SCOTUS already decided that corporations have first amendment rights. So even if TikTok is controlling it’s algorithm in that way, it has the right to do so. Either that or Hobby Lobby has to pay for birth control for it’s employees.
If you’re worried about national security then these billionaires publicly turning their platforms into international political machines would be a problem too. But they clearly aren’t a priority.
So what’s left other than racism and protectionism? The law is also absolutely unconstitutional because it mentions TikTok by name and that’s a big nono. The Constitution bans that and requires that all laws are enforced equally specifically because the ability to single out one entity with legislation is breathtakingly corrupt.
If you don’t like TikTok that’s fine. But you need to realize what this law is capable of. After banning TikTok by name they can also point the finger at any other social media company (and a couple other sectors) and simply declare them to be controlled by a foreign adversary. Even if it’s wholly owned by US Citizens.
They gave themselves the power to force a fire sale and you all cheered because they said TikTok.
My TikTok feed is full of content that I find interesting and educational, from creators who work hard to make something valuable.
For them, banning TikTok means the work they put in to curating an audience will be partially lost, they’ll retain only the followers who find them on another app. If they are monetizing, they’ll potentially have to start over. That may discourage some who are just getting started from developing their craft.
If china, bytedance, meta, or any other platform is collecting user data in such a way as to be a national threat they definitely need to cut it out and this should be regulated. For example, it should be impossible to identify the location of military generals based on where their wives access TikTok from, or who’s having an affair with who based on proximity to each other, or to develop a vast dataset of individually identifiable profiles of every user that could be used to selectively damage their character.
Aside from these problems, which are potentially solvable, I think the individual creator/maker economy is an awesome way to give more power to the people.
My TikTok feed is full of content that I find interesting and educational, from creators who work hard to make something valuable.
Exactly as I’ve found it too. My feed has a lot of old mine explores, vehicle repair, walking and similar ‘educational’ content. I’ve learned a lot of stuff - and I’m probably older than the demographic is perceived. The algorithm was extremely quick to start showing me the stuff I like - far, far better than any of the other apps.
I’m not American, but much of the content I see is made by Americans, so if this ban happens it will change what I see quite dramatically.
OP asked a question in an extremely toxic and biased way, well done for answering it reasonably.
We can’t even get running apps to not post the exact running route of soldiers in conflict zones. And if adultery wasn’t an actual crime in the military then it wouldn’t matter so much. You go to your security officer and tell them, matter handled.
Part of the reason we’re so worried is because we demand so much of people with security clearances that they already regularly lie about their activities. Weed, sex workers, and black listed bars. All of which can get your clearance revoked, and none of which would interfere with the work of most people with clearances.
Trying to block out society isn’t going to work. We need to tackle that aspect from the other side.
It’s the only way to stop my 65+ year old father from listening to it full blast while we’re hanging out.
I know why it’s being banned or has been banned or whatever.
Maybe you don’t. It is the only non zionist media platform in the US. The zionist offers to buy it are happy to not include the algorithm behind its success. Just to let them censor it. The ban did move forward during the Oct 7th and election cycle psyops, and Tiktok did not prevent voter suppression that gives Israel 4 years to implement its final solution.
It doesn’t specifically have any strong/empire reason to be banned now. FB/Google/Musk donations to Trump are new reasons, that can enhance their properties.
If you actually knew all of this already, then you might not ask why it matters. Do you “know differently”?
Because it is a source of addiction imho
For me personally: I really enjoy tiktok. My feed is curated enough over time that I only see stuff I’m genuinely interested in, comedy, science, tech, fitness and ofcourse skimpy dancing ladies. I do not suffer from the so called propaganda on it.
I agree that tiktok melts brains of teenagers, but so does Instagram reels, facebook and YouTube shorts. So that isn’t a tiktok issue in itself anymore.
For me it’s not about TikTok. It’s about using whatever flimsy, poorly worded law they will make to ban a platform I don’t use to open the door for further bans and possible censorship in the future. A platform should be allowed to function if it can. If it’s horribly made, or supremely unprofitable it’ll find its own way out. I don’t use it, I don’t plan on ever using it, and honestly it doesn’t affect my daily life outside of my mother in law thinking that some of the pallet crafts on there are worthwhile and me having to explain that they’ll look good for a moment and then fall apart rather quickly.
A platform should be allowed to function if it can. If it’s horribly made, or supremely unprofitable it’ll find its own way out.
I mean, this doesn’t allow for any form of ethical analysis, though. Should every drug be legalized? How about gambling?
I’m not saying I am for the TikTok ban persay, but if the only conditionals for whether a product or service should exist are “is it ‘well made’ and does it make money,” we are setting ourselves up to achieve a corporate dystopia rather quickly.
They government should consider what parts of TikTok make it not okay, and target those forms and functions with well reasoned laws. Unfortunately, as you said, I suspect they’ll target things that are good and users like, while pretending that the issue is entirely about one small portion of the complete law. Ie, stress that the issue is one of security, and then write a law saying that all social media in the US must be willing to submit it’s data to the American government. (To be clear, I have no idea what the actual law they wrote is, but this is the kind of shit I expect them to get up to )
I know it’s not really the topic you considered… But yes, I do believe every drug should be legalized. If you consider the benefits alone it should be obvious that it is the correct choice.
Drugs made by lisenced people/locations that use safe ingredients and are open to litigation if they end up making a bad batch.
The revenue collected isn’t going to some drug lord overseas, it’s going into the country which you live instead.
Dispensaries can be used secondary as a councelling/rehabilitation center.
The long and the short if it is that if people want them, they will get them. I live in a place that hasn’t legalized weed yet… But if you are around certain neighborhoods at around 9am, it starts to smell very obvious that legality doesn’t matter. While currently that’s not surprising as many states near mine have legalized, we’ll before that happened things were exactly the same.
I don’t want people to be addicted to drugs, but I don’t see why we as a society shouldn’t benefit at all from someone who is.
I’m not talking about weed, though. It’s been traditionally over policed but that doesn’t mean we should stop policing all drugs. There’s hardly any sense in saying that severely addictive drugs with visible negative effects on the human body should be sold for recreational use for profit. The majority of opiods are a good example of this.
But more to the point, giving moral purchase to profit justifies the abuse of the consumer. I can’t say for certain whether the TikTok ban is government overreach, as I’m not knowledgeable enough on the topic to speak with any authority, but “it makes money, so it’s fine” really shouldn’t be the end of the conversation.
Like the other user said, this is clearly a problem if you allow any platform to exist. Let’s take this to an extreme extent. Say a company invents a platform that is 100% addicting, because they’ve figured out how to mind control you. Watching a single video means you will never stop using the platform and you will say whatever the creators want. Clearly that shouldn’t be allowed to exist. Things that social media sites do approximate that. They manipulate users brains into doing things that they normally wouldn’t do. This is why regulation exists. Clearly my example is farcical, but it’s meant to explain why you don’t allow just anything to exist. As a society, certain things are more dangerous than others, and we regulate those things.
Clearly this ban isn’t about that, it’s about a Chinese government doing something that the US government only wants US companies to be able to do.
That’s exactly how I feel… I see my parents being addicted to YouTube shorts/amazon/TEMU… And it makes me really sad to see them in that addiction state :(.
Those things should be illegal…
Clearly this ban isn’t about that, it’s about a Chinese government doing something that the US government only wants US companies to be able to do.
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Because it’s clearly being banned, not because of privacy violations, not because of the nefarious impact of a foreign government, but because of the content that is shared on it. It is the only major social media platform with a strong pro-Palestinian viewpoint on it. And the people in Congress have been caught on camera explicitly stating this is why they want to ban it.
I hate Tiktok. I don’t use it. Never have. But I still don’t want to see the US turn its internet into the Great Firewall of China 2.0.
The leaders in Congress cannot stand the idea of there being a social media platform that is popular in the US that isn’t hosted in the US. Why? The answer is simple - control. All the US social media platforms are heavily influenced by the US government. Hell, most of them openly contract with the NSA. Facebook is an NSA contractor. These platforms get a ton of money from the US government. And despite what conservatives bitch at in regards to “being censored,” the real censorship is against anything that doesn’t advance US power and influence. Outside of Tiktok, the major platforms heavily censor pro-Palestinian messages and stories. Go to r/worldnews and post anything other than “Palestinians deserve to be vaporized,” and you’ll be banned within 5 minutes. It’s literally that bad. Even when outright bans aren’t in place, the platforms will severely down shift any pro-Palestinian content and keep it out of peoples’ feeds.
“Beware of he would would deny you access to information, for in his heart, he dreams himself your master.”
