Users on TikTok searching for “WGA” are met with a screen claiming that the phrase “may be associated with behavior or content that violates our guidelines.” No videos return. Users are also unable to search for the “WGA” hashtag.

TikTok has also blocked the search term “WGA strike.”

Additionally, it appears that TikTok is blocking results from any simple search that includes “WGA” in the search term. Including “WGA” in addition to another word — like “WGA support” or “WGA strong” — blocks results.

Update (9/11/23): A TikTok spokesperson told Media Matters that “WGA has been inadvertently blocked as part of the platforms’ protections against QAnon conspiracy theories.” (WWG1WGA is a common QAnon phrase.) The spokesperson added that searches for “Writers Guild of America” and “Writers Guild of America Strike” were not impacted. Searches for “WGA” and related terms now appear to function normally.

(Thanks mike591, SCB, and others for putting in the comments)

  • @utopianfiatEnglish
    0•9 months ago

    You’re missing the point - the entire notion that political ideologies can have some discrete vectorization in a linearizable space is a social construct. To the extent that it has validity at all, it’s a projection of reality onto a space with inherent distortions. I’m not arguing that it’s not useful but it’s important to realize that the shared understanding it provides people with is a shared understanding of the idealized world of the model, not of the underlying reality.