For good or bad, many people around the country consider TikTok to be their whole life. What would happen if TikTok was completely wiped off millions of people’s phones?
The US Senate is considering a bill that will ban TikTok in the US, unless it is quickly sold to a US company. At Harrison, students have mixed feelings about the possibility of a TikTok ban. When asked how they feel about the possibility of TikTok being banned, 56% of students say they feel either terrible or bad about it, 28% of students say they feel okay, or in the middle about it, and 16% of students say they feel amazing or good about the possible ban.
TikTok is a social media app created in 2016, and it has over 1 billion monthly active users. The app is very versatile as you can do many things on the app, such as post videos, watch videos, buy things, etc. Many internet trends are born on TikTok, and are quickly spread to the rest of the internet, and then the rest of the world.
TikTok is very important to many people around the world, but in our school, it’s only important to about half of us. When asked how important TikTok is to them, 45% of students said that TikTok is either extremely or somewhat important to them, 25% were neutral, and 30% of students said that TikTok is somewhat not important or not important at all to them.
Some students have an issue with the government focusing on banning a social media app rather than focusing on more important matters. Junior Noah Hodge says, “The American government needs to get their priorities straight,” and sophomore Ariana Altman says, “I believe Congress has better things to worry about than TikTok and it can be an source for information like all social media.” These students suggest that the government is wasting its time and resources on a matter as trivial as TikTok.
Another issue students talked about is the future of small businesses on TikTok. Sophomore Cheyenne Wolfert says, “People who use TikTok to sustain a living and . . . get products out for small companies would get hurt with sales and income.” Freshman Izabella Stoner says, “Many businesses rely on TikTok,” and freshman Ripley Caroll agrees: “The TikTok ban seems to hurt more than it helps. Why in the world are they banning TikTok when so many small businesses rely on it?” In other words, if TikTok is banned in the U.S., then a lot of small businesses will lose customers and sales because of how much they rely on TikTok.
You might ask yourself, why is our government trying to ban TikTok so badly? Well, the reason is that US legislators fear that TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance, secretly shares its users’ information with the Chinese Communist Party. However, it is also important to note that American social media platforms such as Facebook and Instagram sell data to data collection companies, who then sell that data to third parties for various purposes.
The House of Representatives held a vote for the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act on March 13, 2024. According to CNN, the bipartisan bill was passed on a bipartisan 352 – 65 vote.
In the House of Representatives, some representatives have benefited from TikTok. Most of them voted no and continue to advocate for the bill not to pass, but some voted yes and are now suffering the consequences of it. Back at WHHHS, Freshman Isabella Thacker said, “I don’t like those representatives who use TikTok for clout and then betray us by voting yes.” For example, Rep. Jeff Jackson (NC), who gained his popularity on TikTok, voted yes, and is now being canceled online. There are still some representatives who benefitted from TikTok and did vote against the bill, such as Rep. Ro Khanna (CA), who has made several videos on why he voted no to the bill. The bill still must pass in the Senate and must be approved by President Biden, who has already said he will approve it, before it becomes a reality. Only time will tell whether TikTok is banned in the US or sold to an American company.
