TIKTOK ‘DELENDA EST’
TikTok is an app for sharing short videos that keep people entertained. It is how more and more Gen Z kids get their news and information. It is also a massive Chinese surveillance application. Though TikTok claims to be headquartered in Singapore, its parent company ByteDance is a Chinese company ultimately controlled by the Chinese Communist Party.
ByteDance has given the Chinese government access to its servers and systems. It has shared its algorithm with the Chinese government and has, in at least one documented case, allowed the Chinese government to spy on journalists through its system. ByteDance has also structured TikTok to share disinformation and propaganda. The Wall Street Journal recently reported one data scientist found TikTok showed pro-Palestinian videos to its audience at a rate of 69 for every single pro-Israel video.
A bipartisan movement in Congress advanced legislation that would force ByteDance to sell its interests in TikTok. The well-crafted legislation would not impact the freedom of speech of TikTok’s users. What it would do is force China to give up control of TikTok. Some propagandists claim the government would also use the legislation to punish X, formerly Twitter. But the legislation very carefully and clearly only applies to apps and websites whose server content is controlled by Russia, China, North Korea or Iran. As long as X’s servers are not controlled by those entities, it has nothing to worry about. Anyone claiming otherwise is simply wrong — or lying.
Some on the right who have screamed about TikTok and its use as a progressive indoctrination platform have now changed their minds because Donald Trump, the man who first called for TikTok to be sold, changed his. Trump changed his mind because he thinks the legislation might help Meta, a company he hates. Likewise, an American investor in ByteDance has been throwing money at Republicans in Trump’s orbit.
Notably, several members of Congress have pushed the talking point that the legislation against TikTok would be used to punish other websites and social media platforms. Almost every one of these members has received donations from Jeff Yass, the billionaire American who has invested in ByteDance. Yass is also a donor to the Club for Growth, which opposes the legislation.
There are the members of the nihilist right who have decided that because Washington is controlled by progressives and progressives might spy on the right, we should do nothing about Chinese spying. This is the argument of those who need to touch some grass.
The federal government spying on Americans is an issue. Other social media platforms spying on Americans is an issue. But neither the federal government nor other social media platforms are controlled by a nuclear power that wants to destroy the United States. TikTok is. The legislation that is now in the Senate focuses on that category — an app controlled by the Chinese Communist Party that has already been showed to be used for nefarious purposes.
Right-wing nihilists twisted by the culture war, like many left-wing nihilists, have lost the ability to recognize that a political enemy in this country really is nothing compared to a giant nuclear power enemy that wants to take our nation’s place on the world stage. Too many unserious X-famous people just want to watch the world burn for their own entertainment.
Cato the Elder would end each of his speeches in the Senate of the Roman Republic with “Carthago delenda est,” or “Carthage must be destroyed.” The legislation pending would not destroy TikTok but would force China to give up control of the platform. Notwithstanding the same, TikTok delenda est.