In March 2020, The Intercept leaked a memo sent to TikTok moderators directing them to censor certain videos from appearing on the app’s For You page, an endless-scroll stream of personalized content determined by an algorithm that the company keeps under wraps. The criteria for censoring a video included– but was not limited to– “abnormal body shape”, “ugly facial looks” or a shooting environment with “obviously slummy character”.
The writer of this memo justifies each statement – if a video features unattractive people or environments, the video itself is unattractive and will deter new users from coming back to the app. However, appealing to new users should not equate to suppressing content featuring overweight, older, disabled, or poor users of the app. Content can be eye-catching without having to feature the thin, white, young and rich users that have come to dominate the app. The visual aspect of TikTok is perhaps its biggest draw, and the platform’s top content creators have taken notice. Chase Hudson, a founding member of the exclusive TikTok influencer collective Hype House, told the New York Times that one of the keys to going viral is being “extremely good looking”. It’s worth noting that, excluding creator Avani, who is biracial, every one of the Hype House’s 20 plus members is white.
Visual platforms like TikTok are certainly angled towards turning out eye-catching, attractive content and videos of shirtless, messy haired teenage boys slowly opening their eyes to reveal their unnaturally blue color regularly make TikTok’s For You page. This type of content is purely focused on aesthetics; there are none of the entertainment or comedy aspects that have become hallmarks of the app.
Additionally, the endless scroll is effortless and the feed is curated for you – all a user needs to do is watch the video and swipe down to the next. The obvious issue with this type of content is that it promotes idealized beauty standards, body types and lifestyles. The Intercept’s memo echoes all of these ideals. TikTok is especially popular with children and teenagers – isn’t it most harmful to bolster those outdated standards to the youngest generation while they still have a shot at subverting them?
Tiktok, owned by Beijing-based technology company Byte-Dance, has been an object of controversy since its inception. Byte-Dance is affiliated with members of the Chinese Communist party, and has led to national security concerns in the United States. Chinese law dictates that ByteDance must share its user data with the government and a March 2020 U.S. Senate bill suggested banning TikTok from all government employees’ cell phones over data security fears. The app has been known to censor political speech and further probing by The Intercept found that live streams that could “endanger [China’s] national security” were to be removed from the app. Users publishing this sort of content could be faced with a permanent ban–the memo references the Tiananmen Square massacres as an example.
At this point, TikTok is beyond a household name. The video-sharing app boasts around 800 million users worldwide and was the App Store’s most downloaded app of 2019 by a landslide according to Sensor Tower. It’s reminiscent of Vine, endlessly entertaining, and wildly popular among Gen Z-ers, but TikTok’s ever-rising prevalence means that users must consider the ethical implications of using the app.