this post was submitted on 28 Jul 2023
623 points (85.9% liked)

Technology

59750 readers
2858 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related content.
  3. Be excellent to each another!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, to ask if your bot can be added please contact us.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed

Approved Bots


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

TikTok has been pushing Chinese propaganda to millions of users in Europe: analysis::More than 1,000 ads from Chinese state media outlets have run on European users' TikTok feeds since October 2022, according to the platform's latest ad library update that was analyzed by Forbes.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] ghariksforge 21 points 1 year ago (41 children)

And American social media does the same for America. Every dog barks for its master.

[–] ABC123itsEASY 10 points 1 year ago (3 children)

You're not necessarily wrong in all respects, but this comment is peak whataboutism. Western tiktok is targeted mostly at children and young adults who are obviously highly impressionable, so I would argue that regardless of whats happening on any other social media platform, this is unwanted and harmful and therefore shouldn't be accepted.

[–] charles 22 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The difference is there is American federal policy being put in place around TikTok specifically that is not being done against other social media apps.

[–] ghariksforge 17 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Whataboutism is the correct and logical answer to hypocrites. There is nothing that Tiktok is guilty of that Twitter or Instagram aren't.

[–] TwilightVulpine 4 points 1 year ago

For sure. Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts are all functionally identical and equally concerning as TikTok in every way, and Xitter is trying to jump onto that too.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Are children and young adults really more impressionable than Fox news, and thereby Facebook's, audience?

I also don't know that I agree with "targeted mostly at children and young adults". There are very large parts of TikTok that would be wholly unappealing to your average kid. Not to mention that American social media started out very much targeted at children and young adults. Or have we already forgotten what the main demographics of Facebook and myspace used to be?

The problem with whataboutism here is that these conversations pretty much always involve TikTok and rarely other platforms until it's brought up in comments where it can be dismissed as whataboutism.

Either they're all a problem (it's this one) or none of them are. We need to stop drawing arbitrary lines between offenders. It's just giving a bunch of shit bags freedom to continue being shit bags.

[–] Buelldozer -4 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Are children and young adults really more impressionable than Fox news

Fox News isn't being paid by the Federal or State Governments to run "Ads" that attempt to put a positive spin on negative events.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Suuuure. Not paid directly by the gov, but unless you've been living under a rock, everyone knows that politicians and big corporations (or in this case: Fox News) work hand in hand to push propaganda... Or like you said "put a positive spin on negative events".

People just like to jump on TikTok and be like CHINA BAD!. As if America was an angel lmao.

[–] Buelldozer -1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

WTF is wrong with you? China is running ads trying to convince people that they're not really genociding the Uyghur Muslims they're just detaining them to send them all to school!

As if America was an angel lmao.

I never said it was, again WTF is wrong with you in your head? Criticizing one group doesn't equate to support for an opposing group.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Does it count when a major political party, that does that all the time, uses the money it pilfered from that government, or is that different somehow?

What about that the only reason they're not doing it directly from the government account is because of the safeguards against that kind of thing they haven't pulled down yet

[–] Buelldozer -3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

A political party is not the Government nor do their ads attempt to whitewash Government misdeeds.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

A political party makes up parts of the government and uses their ads to whitewash their own actions within the government.

This division is not at clean as you're trying to make it

[–] Historical_General -4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Oftentimes they're connected to party members mate. Trump literally spoke to a bunch of their broadcasters daily.

[–] Buelldozer -2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Was the US Federal Government paying Fox News to run ads talking about how the mass murder of American Indians was a good thing?

No? Then GTFO out of here with this whataboutism. It's fucking gross.

[–] Historical_General -3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

The same people fund both the government (through elections) and the news media. I guarantee you Murdoch is friends with many of his fellow billionaires.

L

load more comments (37 replies)