TIKTOK A ‘HATE’ MAKER
Ackman says ‘ban’ it
Hedge fund billionaire Bill Ackman said TikTok should “probably be banned” for “massively manipulating public opinion” in favor of Hamas and stoking anti-Israel animus.
Ackman (inset), the CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, blamed social media for “amplifying the hate” following reports that pro-Palestine videos on TikTok outnumbered proIsrael videos by as much as 15 to 1.
“The world is quickly moving to a very dark place,” Ackman wrote on his X social-media account on Monday. “Social media has been amplifying the hate for a decade as algorithms wind us up.”
Ackman nevertheless lamented the “generational differences on support for Hamas,” partly blaming TikTok.
He noted that “51% of the TikTok generation say that Hamas’ barbaric acts are justified” — apparently referring to a Harvard University poll of Americans between the ages of 18 and 24 who believed Hamas was justified in carrying out the attacks which left at least 1,400 Israeli civilians and soldiers dead.
Meanwhile, a recent Reuters poll found 20% of people ages 18 to 24 go to TikTok for news, up 5% compared with last year. At the same time, public trust in traditional news outlets has dwindled.
Ackman echoed Republican lawmakers who earlier this week told The Post that TikTok’s perceived anti-Israel bias stemmed from its alleged close ties to the Chinese Communist Party. TikTok is owned by Beijingbased parent company ByteDance.
Ackman singled out TikTok, though he also slammed other social-media platforms, including Meta’s Facebook and Instagram as well as X, the Elon Musk-owned outfit.
He said AI that drives the apps is “quickly beginning to destroy the ability to empirically identify the truth” and that they “need to fix the algorithms so that we are able to find common ground.”
“And yes, TikTok should probably be banned,” Ackman added. “A foreign government should not be in control of the minds of our next generation of leaders.
“If we don’t fix this soon, humanity is on a rapid path to oblivion, and it will be too late.”
A TikTok spokesperson pushed back on Ackman’s claims, telling The Post: “There is no basis to these false claims.”