This article is unnerving. That 51% of young people back Hamas makes me feel ill. As a country, we need to do something about tiktok now! Thankfully my children (16-21) haven't the slightest interest in the app. They know right from wrong, and they can spot propaganda a mile away.
My teenage son who is very logical and a fact based conservative automatically assumed that Israel was at fault on October 7th. He saw some videos on TikTok about Palestine. We don’t want him to just believe what we believe, but we most importantly want him to recognize propaganda. We shared with him what happened on Oct 7th and we talked about the history of that area, and the opposing arguments about the conflict. It is so important that we teach our children to be critical thinkers or the western world is doomed in the future. Whoever controls the information controls the people.
I'm sure this is all true. But it's American professors and teachers who have personally instructed two or three generations to detest their country, western civilization, and market capitalism. We've done that to ourselves with little Chinese help.
This may be one of the most important stories that's not being covered right now. Pro-Hamas propoganda is just the tip of the iceberg with TikTok -- although it's hopefully something that will wake a few people up. For example....
- One of the things pushed quite heavily is anti-marriage/anti-family (there was a specific video filmed in China with a Ukrainian actress refusing a ring that went viral a while back). Do a search for "marriage" and see exactly what you get.
- Mukbang/overeating/fat-acceptance content is very prominent, while healthy diet/excercise/healthy-living content will NEVER be on the front page.
- Searching for most religions will find you anti-religious content. Semi-topically, try searching "Judaism" and see what comes up (I saw 3 clearly antisemitic videos out of the first 9). "Orthodox" gives me "why are Orthodox people so scary?" on the front. 7/9 under "Mormon" are anti-mormonism ("how to troll Mormons", "weirdest Mormon beliefs", "book of Mormon is fanfiction", etc). "Quaker" just gives me quaker oats and quaker birds, so I guess my original religion is mostly safe.
- Transgender influencers are propped up by the algorithm, and the top TikTok creator is a certain well-known Dylan. Note that gender transition is both illegal and not generally talked about in China. But it's featured *very* prominently outside of China. TikTok is clearly contributing to some of the social contagion aspects.
Again, all of this could be coincidence. Globally, we've got more than enough social decay as it is. So might not be China directly egging it on, just kind of a natural evolution of things.
The Chinese government/CCP is using a long term policy referred to as Sinification to pursue its malign socialist agenda. In other words they have are playing chess while the west is playing checkers. The scary part is that if an actual shooting war breaks out, Americans may have a large 5th column in our own back yard.
When President Trump attempted to wrestle control of tik tok from China the Democratic party did what it always did with Trumps initiatives, it killed the message because of the messenger. IMO that's the main issue with politics today and why we need more politicians like Seneca Scott but on a national level as well. People who want to get things done more then they want to get reelected.
Would we have allowed Pravda in our schools or permitted TASS to be broadcast to schoolchildren at the start of the school day during the Cold War? Of course not. Because America was sane then. We no longer live in a sane country.
I have never been so relieved that my 21 YO son quit social media when he was 15. He has never had a Tik Tok account and it shows because when he saw the videos of what happened on October 7 he was horrified. He can't understand how so many of his classmates are trying to justify it.
While I agree with Gallagher, the weaponization of Social Media by China and others is ubiquitous. Banning TikTok may seem easier to pass than addressing the whole problem. Reversing the exemption from liability (granted by Congress) for all Social Media companies will force them to blow up algorithms and re-code to protect themselves and consequently our Society.
Don't forget the campus majority that believe free speech is a bad idea, long before tiktok. We have ignored the signs of academic brain washing of our own for far too long.
How is this different than what the Democratic Party did with Facebook and old Twitter? They got
Things amplified that turned out to be total lies
And they censored things at government request that were true but not politically helpful to democrats. If the Chinese are doing this to hurt America why are democrats doing it
Nellie - I totally get that after reading so many articles about the homelessness and drug addiction and crime and corruption in California you would want to out Gavin Newsome in charge of the whole country. Similarly my family is worried about eating healthier so I support putting Ronald Macdonald in charge of our meal planning. Both decisions make sense to me and I don’t made what could go wrong. We both make good choices
TikTok is a Chinese Trojan horse.
This article is unnerving. That 51% of young people back Hamas makes me feel ill. As a country, we need to do something about tiktok now! Thankfully my children (16-21) haven't the slightest interest in the app. They know right from wrong, and they can spot propaganda a mile away.
God bless our country and God bless our youth!
My teenage son who is very logical and a fact based conservative automatically assumed that Israel was at fault on October 7th. He saw some videos on TikTok about Palestine. We don’t want him to just believe what we believe, but we most importantly want him to recognize propaganda. We shared with him what happened on Oct 7th and we talked about the history of that area, and the opposing arguments about the conflict. It is so important that we teach our children to be critical thinkers or the western world is doomed in the future. Whoever controls the information controls the people.
I'm sure this is all true. But it's American professors and teachers who have personally instructed two or three generations to detest their country, western civilization, and market capitalism. We've done that to ourselves with little Chinese help.
This may be one of the most important stories that's not being covered right now. Pro-Hamas propoganda is just the tip of the iceberg with TikTok -- although it's hopefully something that will wake a few people up. For example....
- One of the things pushed quite heavily is anti-marriage/anti-family (there was a specific video filmed in China with a Ukrainian actress refusing a ring that went viral a while back). Do a search for "marriage" and see exactly what you get.
- Mukbang/overeating/fat-acceptance content is very prominent, while healthy diet/excercise/healthy-living content will NEVER be on the front page.
- Searching for most religions will find you anti-religious content. Semi-topically, try searching "Judaism" and see what comes up (I saw 3 clearly antisemitic videos out of the first 9). "Orthodox" gives me "why are Orthodox people so scary?" on the front. 7/9 under "Mormon" are anti-mormonism ("how to troll Mormons", "weirdest Mormon beliefs", "book of Mormon is fanfiction", etc). "Quaker" just gives me quaker oats and quaker birds, so I guess my original religion is mostly safe.
- Transgender influencers are propped up by the algorithm, and the top TikTok creator is a certain well-known Dylan. Note that gender transition is both illegal and not generally talked about in China. But it's featured *very* prominently outside of China. TikTok is clearly contributing to some of the social contagion aspects.
Again, all of this could be coincidence. Globally, we've got more than enough social decay as it is. So might not be China directly egging it on, just kind of a natural evolution of things.
The Chinese government/CCP is using a long term policy referred to as Sinification to pursue its malign socialist agenda. In other words they have are playing chess while the west is playing checkers. The scary part is that if an actual shooting war breaks out, Americans may have a large 5th column in our own back yard.
It is nothing short of appalling to me that TikTok hasn't been banned yet. Complete abdication of responsibility by the government.
When President Trump attempted to wrestle control of tik tok from China the Democratic party did what it always did with Trumps initiatives, it killed the message because of the messenger. IMO that's the main issue with politics today and why we need more politicians like Seneca Scott but on a national level as well. People who want to get things done more then they want to get reelected.
Would we have allowed Pravda in our schools or permitted TASS to be broadcast to schoolchildren at the start of the school day during the Cold War? Of course not. Because America was sane then. We no longer live in a sane country.
I have never been so relieved that my 21 YO son quit social media when he was 15. He has never had a Tik Tok account and it shows because when he saw the videos of what happened on October 7 he was horrified. He can't understand how so many of his classmates are trying to justify it.
While I agree with Gallagher, the weaponization of Social Media by China and others is ubiquitous. Banning TikTok may seem easier to pass than addressing the whole problem. Reversing the exemption from liability (granted by Congress) for all Social Media companies will force them to blow up algorithms and re-code to protect themselves and consequently our Society.
Don't forget the campus majority that believe free speech is a bad idea, long before tiktok. We have ignored the signs of academic brain washing of our own for far too long.
How is this different than what the Democratic Party did with Facebook and old Twitter? They got
Things amplified that turned out to be total lies
And they censored things at government request that were true but not politically helpful to democrats. If the Chinese are doing this to hurt America why are democrats doing it
TikTok exposes our youth to many unhealthy beliefs. Downright dangerous beliefs.
The CCP make sure Chinese kids in China are not exposed to TikTok's dangerous memes.
Understanding that this is no mere coincidence is vital to the West. IMHO.
Nellie - I totally get that after reading so many articles about the homelessness and drug addiction and crime and corruption in California you would want to out Gavin Newsome in charge of the whole country. Similarly my family is worried about eating healthier so I support putting Ronald Macdonald in charge of our meal planning. Both decisions make sense to me and I don’t made what could go wrong. We both make good choices
You can thank leftists. Begin with RINO Richard Nixon. The solution is a very difficult one. Just try to not buy Chinese made.