(This article was written on the 21st, hence the brief mention of the Presidential Inauguration that took place on the 20th, however it only felt right to change the publishing date to be the 19th of January as it was the day TikTok was temporarily banned)
(Also that was kind of wrong as it was really the 18th of January at around 10:33pm but it was supposed to be the 19th so thats what we are going with)
Every year a rumor goes around that TikTok is getting banned. This year though, it was real! At least, for 15 hours. Then it was back. According to TikTok CEO, Shou Zi Chew, it was all thanks to President Donald Trump. Take a minute to imagine what the public’s response would’ve been if it had been Biden or Harris or literally any democrat that brought TikTok back. Different, right?The fact is that the TikTok ban happened under the Democratic Party and more specifically, under Biden and Harris. I feel like that needs to be said as the first thing. I mean, liberals are known for being hypocritical so it’s not out of their character but it should still always be mentioned. I personally don’t care enough about who “saved” TikTok because I feel like it making us miss the main things we should be taking away from this whole situation.
Rednote – or Redbook
After hearing the recent news of TikTok actually being banned, the youth of this country went scavenging for a TikTok replacement, if you will. I’m sure you remember the “Are you Chinese?” or “Does TikTok access the home wifi network?” Clips that became a memes. These questions were to prove that the American public is at risk of Chinese hackers. In my opinion, this led to the youth moving to an actual Chinese app which was Rednote. While there were many different apps that hit the “Top 20 Free Apps” of the week, Rednote was by far the most popular amongst the possible TikTok replacements. In some way, it was a direct protest against our government who was so adamant about banning an app on the basis of it being hacked by Chinese spies and commies. And of course the conversation comes about Rednote being a communist app because of the reference to Mao’s redbook. To conclude this section of this article, it’s really funny how the people downloaded an app that is everything our government wanted to ban in the first place.
Why
You can say its to protect the citizens of this country from Chinese spies, but the honest truth is that TikTok, being so popular, isn’t run by an American. Therefore, censorship is no where in the question. All of the Meta apps like Instagram and Facebook are so heavily censored because they are run by American billionaires. If you watched the inauguration of Trump, you would have seen Zuckerberg sitting front and center along with Bezos and Musk. Really shows you who actually runs the country. TikTok, unlike all of these other apps, is one where conversations about Palestine can thrive. So many people learned about Palestine through TikTok. That was something that wasn’t supposed to happen. On Instagram, those who post about Palestine get heavily shadow banned (and actually banned), their posts get removed, and fact check disclaimers get written at the bottom even if what is on the post in completely true. As someone whose whole instagram page is filled with content about and from Palestine, every single one of my advertisements is either about antisemitism, buying real estate on stolen land, biographies about IOF soldiers, etc. You get the point I’m sure. This is simply not the case on TikTok so it is so easy for people to know the truth. The truth goes against everything the government is doing which leads to justified distrust and organizing on the streets.
Conclusion
My hope for you is to see how corrupt out government, whether blue or red, is and how much they want to censor and silence our voices. My other hope is for you to use your critical mind on both parties because at the end of they day, they are both the same and both against you.