Okay, but this thread and its related article is about TikTok. Yes, western social media and surveillance is a major problem, but every single time an article critical of TikTok shows up, a million minions appear out of the woodwork to criticize Facebook and Twitter instead.
Here’s the thing: those companies have numerous articles about their surveillance practices hitting the news all the time, and yet you don’t see an army of people jumping into those threads to say “Well what about TikTok?” That’s because this sort of approach does nothing but derail the actual subject and steers it towards something that you feel is more important than the actual topic being discussed.
Firstly, you do not get to dictate how I engage with this thread. Secondly, right wing and neo-liberal progressive government officials spent the better part of two years concern trolling over china and their vaguely evil intentions with TikTok. Something the US tech monopoly has hardly had to deal with, since they have the privilege of operating within the imperial core. The goal with this rehtoric isn’t to ensure privacy for the American people, because if it was, we’d hold Silicon Valley to the same standard. Instead It’s to stoke fear over the communist “threat” that is finding its way into your phones like a Trojan Horse.
It’s spread wild and baseless conspiracies about political censorship, all the while priming the American people to embrace actual censorship through a ban on the distribution of TikTok. Something you might find on the other side of the Great Firewall of China ironically enough.
You should ask yourself, why are American pundents, politicians, and their media apparatus so interested in “protecting” citizens from TikTok? What material interests might drive them to ban a platform that is actively being imitated by nearly every major player in the social media space? Could it be that the lobbyists that line their pockets are more interested in ensuring they maintain their dominance? [1]][2][3][4] Or could it be they know that they’ll be left out of the game they accuse China of playing? [1][2][3 26% removal rate for US]
The real threat is inside your walls, not on the other side of the ocean.
Okay, but this thread and its related article is about TikTok. Yes, western social media and surveillance is a major problem, but every single time an article critical of TikTok shows up, a million minions appear out of the woodwork to criticize Facebook and Twitter instead.
Here’s the thing: those companies have numerous articles about their surveillance practices hitting the news all the time, and yet you don’t see an army of people jumping into those threads to say “Well what about TikTok?” That’s because this sort of approach does nothing but derail the actual subject and steers it towards something that you feel is more important than the actual topic being discussed.
Firstly, you do not get to dictate how I engage with this thread. Secondly, right wing and neo-liberal progressive government officials spent the better part of two years concern trolling over china and their vaguely evil intentions with TikTok. Something the US tech monopoly has hardly had to deal with, since they have the privilege of operating within the imperial core. The goal with this rehtoric isn’t to ensure privacy for the American people, because if it was, we’d hold Silicon Valley to the same standard. Instead It’s to stoke fear over the communist “threat” that is finding its way into your phones like a Trojan Horse.
It’s spread wild and baseless conspiracies about political censorship, all the while priming the American people to embrace actual censorship through a ban on the distribution of TikTok. Something you might find on the other side of the Great Firewall of China ironically enough.
America’s own social media industry has been caught red handed participating in clear and present evil. From developing eating disorders in young girls. To stoking genocide. Something Zuckerberg was interested in policing both sides of. The evidence of their evil is all around us, they do not even attempt to hide it. Yet curiously, when the media makes similar clames about TikTok, the sources are never revealed or published for consumption. I can go read the internal slide decks of Instagrams conclusion on it’s ability to induce eating disorders. If the evidence is so damning, why not publish it? And yet with all this, these corporations walk free with a slap on the wrist, if that. Ironically enough, Facebook is doing exactly what TikTok is being accused of in the above article.
You should ask yourself, why are American pundents, politicians, and their media apparatus so interested in “protecting” citizens from TikTok? What material interests might drive them to ban a platform that is actively being imitated by nearly every major player in the social media space? Could it be that the lobbyists that line their pockets are more interested in ensuring they maintain their dominance? [1]][2][3][4] Or could it be they know that they’ll be left out of the game they accuse China of playing? [1][2][3 26% removal rate for US]
The real threat is inside your walls, not on the other side of the ocean.