By any standards, the short-form video app TikTok enjoys enormous influence: 170 million Americans use it, while its addictive algorithm has both launched businesses and brought news coverage to those younger than 30.
A success story, right? A win-win for folks addicted to their phones and those looking to deepen public conversation about vital issues.
Not so fast.
Every member of Kansas’ congressional delegation — representatives and senators, Republicans and Democrats — wants to end TikTok as we currently know it. In the House, Reps. Jake LaTurner, Tracey Mann, Ron Estes and Sharice Davids all voted for a bill that would force TikTok’s Chinese-controlled parent company to divest the app.
The dubious claim, repeated ceaselessly in Washington, D.C., is that China somehow has extracted useful data from U.S. users and propagandized them. China has denounced the bill. Platform supporters call it a ban, given that owner ByteDance has no interest in selling.
But let’s listen to what the Kansas congressional members have to say.
Of the House members, LaTurner took the hard line: “The Chinese Communist Party will stop at nothing to gain influence in the United States — including using TikTok to steal keystrokes and data from over 170 million Americans. It’s vital that TikTok cuts ties with the CCP to ensure Kansans are not being targeted, manipulated, and spied on by our nation’s greatest foreign adversary.”
Goodness gracious!
Davids spokesman Zac Donley tried a softer approach: “Rep. Davids understands the role that TikTok plays in the lives of many Kansans, including our small business owners, but also recognizes the potential negative impact the Chinese Communist Party could have on our youth and Kansans’ data security.”
I reached out to the press operations of Estes and Mann but didn’t hear back.
This all sounds concerning. So I opened TikTok on my phone to see what evil messages were being promoted by the (DA-DUM) Chinese Communist Party. Here are the first five videos I saw on my “For You Page” (the section full of algorithmically generated recommendations):
- The voice actor of Disney’s Darkwing Duck.
- A skit about a psychiatrist working at a hospital.
- A two-week old “Saturday Night Live” sketch.
- The 1965 song “So Long, Mom” by comic Tom Lehrer.
- A promo from the 1996 “Dana Carvey Show.”
I’m definitely not going to support Taiwanese independence now!
Take a breath
Yes, I use TikTok. I enjoy it. Unlike most other social media platforms, it lifts my spirits. I follow a small group of people whose interests and experiences complement my own, and occasionally it recommends silly clips like the ones mentioned above.
No, I don’t think it’s entirely benign.
Tough questions about TikTok — how it gathers data, what it recommends, how it hooks users — should be asked. But they are the exact same questions that informed citizens should ask about every high-flown tech company that harvests information from the public.
Google and Facebook and Apple have become so gargantuan and important because they reach into the lives of so many people. Indeed, Google probably knows more about you and me and our friends and relations than any other company in history of the republic. According to Business Insider, the California-based behemoth can correctly infer your “age, gender, marital status, income bracket, and personal interests.”
Does that make you feel warm and fuzzy and confident about the safety of your personal information?
I fail to see how another country’s ownership of a social media platform truly threatens national security. Sure, the company’s overlords in Beijing could tweak the algorithm to surface certain results rather than others, but that’s what social media does. It serves up content that users want and demand. If it doesn’t, users (and advertisers) flee elsewhere.
Again, there may be abuse. There may be efforts to influence popular opinion. But none of that means that TikTok has seized control of innocent children’s minds, lawsuit from Kansas Attorney General Kris Kobach notwithstanding.
What we’re seeing here is a good, old-fashioned moral panic. Generations past lost their collective minds about the introduction of television, rock and roll, and women wearing pants. Mothers and fathers fretted about Dungeons and Dragons games, dial-up internet, and music videos.
Or as Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman put it, according to Slate: “I remember Mötley Crüe was dangerous with my parents, and they never took away my Mötley Crüe.”
He still supports the divesture bill, though.
On to the Senate
Having passed the House 352-65, the legislation now heads to the Senate.
Opinions there differ sharply.
Kansas Sen. Roger Marshall released a statement: “My number one job in the Senate is to provide for the safety and security of Kansas families. That is why, as long as the CCP owns it, TikTok needs to be banned. Americans always think the best of people, but we can’t underestimate China and its relentless war against America.”
We certainly know where he stands now!
Kansas Sen. Jerry Moran took a decidedly more cautious tone: “Foreign adversaries are increasingly using products and services to collect information on American citizens, posing a threat to our national security. I introduced legislation that would equip the Department of Commerce with the authority to prevent our adversaries from controlling harmful technology products and services in the U.S. like social media apps. This legislation would apply to TikTok’s parent company ByteDance and any company that tries to infiltrate our information or communications systems.”
Overall, senators seem to lean Moran’s way rather than Marshalls. Many say they want to take a deliberate approach.
Here’s hoping they take a look at what people actually use TikTok for, how the app has allowed for widespread dissemination of news and opinion (including from Kansas Reflector) and what social media means for our civic health. Such conversation won’t just take time — they will demand a willingness to ask tough questions about how we got here and who’s really to blame.
Hint: It’s not the Chinese Communist Party.
Clay Wirestone is Kansas Reflector opinion editor. Through its opinion section, Kansas Reflector works to amplify the voices of people who are affected by public policies or excluded from public debate. Find information, including how to submit your own commentary, here.