Over the last two years, TikTok has become one of the most popular short-form video platform apps among teenagers. TikTok has over 1.5 billion all-time downloads, and its popularity and influence have only continued to spread. TikTok is known for its trending internet challenges, viral dancing videos, and is the epicenter of the latest internet memes. However, under the guise of harmless “trendy posts”, many have used the short video platform to spew racist remarks and perpetuate racist stereotypes.
Last week a racist TikTok video, that included two high school seniors in Georgia stating racist slurs and disparaging comments about black people, made its rounds across other social media platforms. In the video, the two students are demonstrating the “making” of a black person by pouring cups of water into a sink that represent insensitive and racist stereotypes such as, “don’t have a dad” and “rob people — specifically whites”. Shortly after the video went viral, both students were expelled. However, this incident is just one of many, and other users on TikTok continue to find ways to be blatantly offensive and racist because social media platforms fail to filter them and hold them accountable.
TikTok is also filled with white teenagers imitating stereotypical lifestyles or characteristics of black people or other people of color. The use of appropriated slang, the nonchalant accent that mimics AAVE (African-American Vernacular English), and the use of certain mannerisms to be comical for the purpose of entertainment perpetuates racist cliches. The lack of comprehension/ respect for different cultures, and minimizing the experiences of people of color for tone-deaf TikTok to elevate one’s social following is gross.
While videos of white people being racist blow up, and continue to gain traction both inside and outside of TikTok, people of color on the platform who have relentlessly complained about inconsistent policies towards racist content get their videos taken down. People of color who share their opinions about the discrepancies in treatment between white and non-white users are silenced because according to TikTok, their videos violate community guidelines. TikTok’s community guidelines have a history of being discriminatory, a TikTok spokesperson confirmed to The Intercept, an online news publication. Moderators were explicitly told to suppress uploads from users with “abnormal body shape”, “ugly facial looks”, “low-quality traits” and videos in which “the shooting environment is shabby and dilapidated,” including but “not limited to … slums, rural fields” and “dilapidated housing”. Another TikTok spokesperson Josh Gartner said that these guidelines are no longer in use, and their excuse for implementing them in the first place was to prevent bullying.
Tik Tok has grown immensely over the past two years, and truly provides a source of entertainment filled with funny content creators that will have me cry laughing for hours. However, it is essential to address the flaws within the platform and not assume that the “woke” youths of generation Z will eradicate racism.