Opinion | Fiery debate over TikTok ban puts America’s culture wars in spotlight

Ban supporters cite security concerns, Chinese influence and spread of antisemitic content while critics cite free speech and reject the government’s interference

The debate has stirred fierce feelings, defying the traditional conservative vs liberal divide. Whatever the outcome, there is little hope of pleasing the crowd

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TikTok devotees Mona Swain (centre) and her sister Rachel, both of Atlanta, monitor voting at the Capitol in Washington, as the House passed the TikTok bill on March 13. Photo: AP

Published: 5:30am, 20 Mar 2024

A recent US bill to force TikTok’s Chinese owner ByteDance to divest the popular app received rare and overwhelming bipartisan support in the House of Representatives, thrusting a possible TikTok ban back in the heat of debate. The video-sharing platform has about 180 million US users, around two-thirds of whom are aged 12-34 years.

Politicians have voiced national security concerns over TikTok because of its Chinese ownership. Some commentators have accused TikTok of being a breeding ground for the culture wars that polarise the American public and weaken its democracy, while also collecting data on Americans that they say can be used to create problems for the country.

Others have accused TikTok, with its endless stream of short videos, of reducing young people’s attention span, potentially making them less intelligent over time.

Concerns about TikTok have been around for years and many of the accusations seem to ring hollow. In 2020, US courts overturned the Trump administration’s ban on TikTok and WeChat, citing insufficient evidence of national security concerns and a likely overreach of authority.

Since then, TikTok has invested significantly in ensuring tighter compliance with US laws, including housing all of its US data with Oracle, an American company. Also, while ByteDance was founded in China, it is 60 per cent owned by US multinationals including Carlyle Group, General Atlantic and Susquehanna International Group – Susquehanna’s co-founder Jeff Yass also happens to be the biggest donor in the US presidential election.

As for TikTok’s data gathering, well, so do the other big tech companies and apps, including Google and Facebook.