They aren’t protecting us from TikTok, they are protecting themselves from us. They put a lot of resources into controlling mass media then got blindsided by social media. Now they have social media mostly under control, but only in this country. They can’t risk the next Bernie Sanders giving people hope for a better world.
Who said the government doesn’t do anything for the public?
The very concept of a state is the problem.
State - a group of people who claim they are allowed to use violence to get their way and that nobody else is allowed to protect themselves from this violence.
(Others may define “state” to be essentially synonymous with “government”. The above definition contains the only quality in common with every entity I am speaking of.)
There is no reality in which any state is not taken over by those willing to cause the harm necessary to do so.
This does not mean the best course of action is attempted immediate destruction of any state, that will cause the boot to stomp harder on us. The best course of action is minimize dependence on the economic system that state depends on. That is to say, growing some portion of your food is just about as radical as it gets.
This post is inaccurate. It fails to state that you actually work 2 jobs each at 25 hours a week so neither megacorp has to provide any benefits, and you’ll be fired from one next week because despite requesting otherwise they keep scheduling overlapping shifts and you can only go to one job at a time.
Isn’t Zoom supposed to be basically Chinese spyware too? Why are they trying to ban TikTok and not Zoom?
Rhetoical question. I know why. Zoom helps funnel more money to shareholders.
Because the bill lets them ban anything that they want, not just TikTok. All the have to do is assert “foreign influence” and they can block, censor, or force sale to “American interests”.
Basically these motherfuckers are doing their best to make it so you only see, hear, and read what they want. And if that’s not actually their intent, they’re leaving the door wide open for the next guy to do it.
And if the current guy doesn’t get his shit together, that next guy is going to be the former guy and then the entire world’s fucked.
Not true. They have to show that the company is headquartered in or owned by the “sensitive country”.
Giant loophole for American Data vendors and marketers to sell data and targeted advertising to China. (Which is just an algorithm by a different name.)
Because the bill lets them ban anything that they want, not just TikTok. All the have to do is assert “foreign influence” and they can block, censor, or force sale to “American interests”.
How long until this is used against a Fediverse instance?
frfr, i can’t believe how many smug takes i saw about this the day it passed. left and right giddy to oppress the youth just because the dances are stupid
It’s not even just an app full of kids or even dancing. If it ever was that was well before my time. I’m sure it still exists but it never makes it to me. It’s full of young adults and millennials these days. Other than the outrage over the genocide by Isreal another current big drama going around is about NC rep Jeff Jackson because he got a huge following on TikTok and then voted to ban it. There’s also a big thing about boycotting kellogs and we’ve been pretty active in discussing businesses that are stifling unions. Hell, half the front page of reddit is just badly cropped TikTok videos these days anyway lol
Well, ok. I lied. Sometimes I do get dancing videos: https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTLFVoyUw/
They don’t actually want to get rid of tiktok. They just want it to be owned by a consortium of American billionaires so they can influence public policy more easily.
That is a just cause in theory
Except billionaires aren’t loyal to any accepted borders
Part of me would rather have it with capitalistic sociopaths that want to extract my money rather than an authoritarian government that is provably responsible for (multiple?) genocide(s). Like, in a perfect world, there’s a better system, but at least our government still, in theory, can control the businesses within our country. They won’t though.
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an authoritarian government that is provably responsible for (multiple?) genocide(s)
Yes, US has a history of it. As a matter of fact, it was built on a genocide of the native population and is currently contributing to one in the middle ea
Whataboutism. One, in theory, I have a say for/against(in theory) another I don’t. It isn’t hard. But, yes, US bAd. Good job. Anything to actually add?
You don’t have to tell me about the murders of my ancestors.
Also, to follow up, the US government doesn’t control social media here, unlike wherever your bot farm is out of. Which is why your whataboutism really falls flat, cause one media company is controlled by an authoritarian government currently eradicating Uighurs and the other is owned by Zuck, who’s trying to idk honestly, drown in money?
I am not a synthetic bot, instead, I am a human being but yes, USA bad.
That, we’ll agree on.
The US government is controlled by the same interests and lobbbyists that control the government, so it’s similar although not the same thing. Just because their interests align at this moment because the billionaires don’t want competition and the government has a hard-on for Israel doesn’t mean their right.
And for the record, I don’t even use Tik Tok, and I personally think social media and shortform content is bad for young brains and probably causing a lot of ADHD and impairing my ability to read. But I find this whole bill very fake and performative and probably done for the wrong reasons. It’s weird that we finally got an international perspective unfiltered by US media companies that bow to AIPAC and of course it’s getting banned.
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This is my kind of thinking, it does seem as though the US sees TikTok as a possible use of propaganda, but if they own it, well then they can control the propaganda being pushed at least
Don’t forget this part
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Yep, this is McCarthyism and the Patriot Act all over again. We’re really naive if we believe this is just about Tik Tok.
Sounds to me like they don’t want to ban it, they want it sold to American business at a massively discounted rate. Standard mafia shit.
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If they had happened to write a good privacy law that happened to prevent most of Tik Tok’s abuses, I’d have way less of a problem with it because then US companies who do the same shit would have to follow the same rules. But instead we let Zuckerberg and Musk do the exact same shit without repercussions.
But we have a government that’s basically carriage with a steam engine bolted on plus a V8 and also rockets and the thing is broken beyond repair and we just have to wait until most people realize that to get out because they didn’t install emergency exits.
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That’s a fair point, it is a game as much as it is a racket.
Whataboutism
No. I really do want my government to focus on governing instead of handing itself unprecedented and unconstitutional powers to force private sales.
Our two parties that refuse to address relevant problems:
Skill issue
Honestly the genocide part of this meme bothers me. It’s not just one after all.
Usa invented the Online psyops/spy game with facebook/google. Now they pissed china beat them at there own game.
Wanting to ban a app/service that basically gives your biggest economic and political enemy direct conact to the local networks/brain of your population is understandable.
I mean those are the reasons why china banned Facebook/Google years ago.
Reality is more complicated tho, cause unless the usa is willing to build a chinese firewall for themself, it will be impossible to keep people from using TikTok via VPN.
If the usa would actually care for its citizen privacy they could just outlaw closed source software.
willing to build a chinese firewall for themself, it will be impossible to keep people from using TikTok via VPN.
A majority of people probably won’t bother and just move on. A decent chunk, 30/40% maybe but that still leaves a 70/60% reduction and it’s influence permanently neutered so the gov will still see it as a win
unless the usa is willing to build a chinese firewall for themself
Honestly, I feel like in the next decade we’re going to see a whole lot of great firewalls. Every other country wants to control everyone and get in people’s heads. We’re either going to invent some way to regulate this desire (unlikely, if you ask me) or end up with a lot of spying and/or fractured network 😞
It’s my understanding this is designed for TikTok to be sold off, not to ban it.
Anyway, yeah I agree with everything else. Anyone “defending China” here is ignoring the Chinese firewall, but also everyone “defending the US” must also agree the Chinese firewall has a useful purpose. The fact is this is just about control and/or greed. It’s not any more or less evil than all the other shit the governments do to control people. It’s not going to hurt anyone here, but it’s also probably not going to help them either.
I won’t touch TikTok anyway, so I really don’t care. It just seems like everyone is misunderstanding what’s going on and hypocritical with their stance, whichever position they hold.
Which is still an unprecedented power we’ve consistently called out other countries for doing. Also, targeting a single entity is unconstitutional, it’s a Bill of Attainder.
No. It isn’t charging them with a crime, which is what a bill of attainder is for. It’s only saying they won’t be allowed to do business in the US. I’m fairly confident it is absolutely legal and constitutional, and also it isn’t unprecedented either. For example, see Huawei.
You can argue ethics all you want. It won’t stop anything, nor does it really matter in this situation. Ethics aren’t in play, because this is about power. Regardless, it’s equally ethical for the US to do this as what China does to prevent western companies operating in China.
It imposes a punishment without trial. That’s a Bill of Attainder.
And being as ethical as China isn’t a line I want to stand on.
You’re missing a very key part of it, I assume on purpose. It imposes a punishment for a crime. No one is accusing them of a crime. I don’t know where you got this idea from, but they’re wrong. They may have said it very confidently, but it’s incorrect. Doing this to “protect national security” is perfectly fine. The intent is not to punish them.
Oh, that makes it okay then.
We’re going to pass a law that punishes a someone or a group, but it’s okay if we just don’t say, “they’re guilty of X.”
Somehow I don’t think the courts are going to share your interpretation. And in your own article they do not. Nowhere in the test does it state the bill must name a crime.
The last bullet for determining if it’s punishment: “Was that a congressional intent for the statute to further punitive goals.”
It fails that test. It isn’t any sort if punishment. It’s for “national security”.
The correct law is staring them in the face.
Sensitive country is defined by the following list, (xxx,xxx,xxx)
Any company that sells, or gives American data to a sensitive country; or cause their data to come into possession of a sensitive country shall cease operations in the US.
Any company allowing a sensitive country to manipulate their algorithm, examples of (but not exclusively) with targeted advertising, bots, or by manipulating the ranking of posts, shall cease operations in the US.
That achieves the mission and holds the entire industry accountable without unconstitutionally targeting a single company.
They just don’t want you to talk about it
Helping the working class doesn’t net them a fat profit.
how does this give them a fat profit?
It’s the corporate class protecting one another’s shared interests in the US. Kick TikTok out and suddenly it paves the way for a competitor like Meta.
They’re trying to force a sale or ban it, and I don’t think it’s certain what the details are, so who knows what criteria the owner needs to have
(it might be so specific only a handful of people/groups qualify, so they can suppress the price and ensure it goes somewhere specific… It’s shockingly common, especially when legalizing something or when other nations are concerned)
They’re trying to force a sale or ban it, and I don’t think it’s certain what the details are, so who knows what criteria the owner needs to have
(it might be so specific only a handful of people/groups qualify, so they can suppress the price and ensure it goes somewhere specific… It’s shockingly common, especially when legalizing something or when other nations are concerned)
Moreso gives google and meta a fat profit, and they bought congress. I personally also think that suppression of info about Palestine is a driver of the bill as well, and that rewards congress through the legal bribery that is lobbying.
How is TikTok helping the working class? It’s an app that wastes your time and sells you products. There is no intent to help the working class. Stop glorifying governments. China doesn’t want to help liberate the working class or anything like that, if that’s what you’re implying.
Because we deserve a little god damn joy in our life without some asshole billionaires paying to eradicate it for their own gain. That’s why.
TikTok isn’t going away. It’s just being forced to be sold off. Yeah, it’s for profit, but it already is for profit. You’ll still be able to get whatever kind of enjoyment can be had from there. It’s just going to be controlled by a US company.
It’s not going to sell. It literally can’t because of their laws around proprietary tech. They have stated very clearly they will not sell and the people who voted yes knew this before they voted. They voted for a ban.
TikTok doesn’t help anyone but that wasn’t the point of what I said. I was saying that the US government doesn’t actually help its citizens because it’s not profitable for them. The reason the government even cares about “banning” TikTok is because it means their tech buddies (specifically people like Zuck) can benefit from it. It’s corporate greed. TikTok doesn’t care about anything other than profit and data hoarding.
Ah, OK. I misunderstood. Yeah, the US isn’t helping people the way it should, but that’s not really related to TikTok. They aren’t going to do that regardless. Yeah, it’s all about money and power for all of this.
TikTok != China.
That said TikTok is a corporation that isn’t trying to help either.
Absolutely, but I have seen people say China is using it to liberate workers before, as if they care. There are a lot of misinformed people out there.
