I find myself at 1:00 am aimlessly scrolling through clips of pubescent teens striving for fame, creating dances and lip-synching to second-rate music. I am enthralled, even obsessed, with this new app –– a way to throw away hours of time that could be spent doing literally anything else. But, instead of doing homework, reading, watching Netflix, or even writing this article, I scroll and scroll through the For You page until I hit videos with zero likes, comments, or even views. If you’ve never visited before, it’s a very dark place. So I ask: why is this app so addictive? Why is it so easy to spend hours on it even when the content is truly sub-par?
To understand TikTok as a social media platform and its rapid road to popularity, one must look back to other apps: Vine, Instagram SnapChat, and even Facebook. Years ago, YouTube birthed the slapstick humor seen in many TikTok videos — the short and obvious humor, and even the lip-synching is seen in the early years of YouTube. These jokes were then transferred to Facebook, then Instagram, and finally formatted into the shorter video format via Vine. The untimely death of Vine created a void that needed to be filled, a void for shitty short-length videos to entertain children, teenagers, and young adults, including me. Then came the magical birth of TikTok, its speedy popularity, and all the recent controversies surrounding the app.
Firstly, let’s talk Big Brother. In one New York Times article, “We Should Worry About How China Uses Apps Like TikTok”, journalist Nick Frisch goes as far as to refer to the app’s digital surveillance in China as a panopticon-like structure. He points to the dangers of Tik Tok in China, specifically to Uhigur people in the nation. Facial recognition and artificial intelligence embedded in the app infringes upon personal privacy. Scary, right?
But, still, I am a sophomore in college talking to my friends about Charlie D’Amelio and her new TikTok relationship. Why? Why are 15-year-olds, famous for 15-second dances, invading my daily conversations? TikTok has broken global download records and even sparked some concern in the US government. TikTok has been considered a cultural phenomenon, a social media platform that will help to define this generation’s adolescence. What will this symbolize as Gen Z adolescents become adults and a new generation is born? The social media age is now in full swing and the detrimental effects are splattered across news sources everywhere. Body image issues, high rates of mental health issues, and loneliness are all attributed to this new digital age. To understand the dark side of this age, one must simply visit the comment sections of many videos on the For You page of TikTok. This place seems to be particularly brutal, as many of the subjects of hatred are young teenagers. The sexualized comments targeted toward young women who are not even able to legally drive is quite disturbing. In the same vein of these remarks is the body shaming and the criticism of their promiscuous dances and clothing. After reviewing all the negative impacts of the app, is there really a positive? Is it worth sacrificing our own privacy for the renegade dance? I guess it isn’t my job to answer. So, maybe we should just talk about Charlie’s new relationship and attempt to learn simple dances, rather than acknowledge the concentration camps in China gaining new members from this same app. •
