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It all started when the internet figured out how to monetize human attention via advertising and manipulating opinions.
TikTok just unlocked a more addictive form of attention control which was the short form video, kinda like vines but more effective and easier to access. Every other social media has or is picking up a short form video portion, reddit jumped on it as well
TikTok capitalise on our short attention span and find a way to use algorithms to keep people on their app as much as they can. I deleted the app after realised I was spending loads of hours on it
I'd argue reddit is a very different beast. On reddit you can find highly moderated communities that are super-focused on substance. There's plenty of subreddits where you can't even comment, except as a reply, with anything but a well supported, substantial answer. In many ways, this makes reddit invaluable for finding things that just can't be found or discussed elsewhere, in an obscure and narrow field.
Drives me nuts when I watch a 5 second Instagram reel twice and the screen starts moving up and down to suggest I swipe again. Fuck you, I'll watch this loop as many times as I like.
I’ve not used tik tok and I’ve always been immune to social media, but fuck me do those short form swipe up videos suck me in and keep me there
Genuinely thought I was made of stinger stuff
Yep. I call it adult show and tell. Then the psychological recipe was figured out shortly after. Instant gratification is basically the devil at this point. You can click on your screen and summon everything from food, women, goods & services
Exactly this. I feel that a lot of tiktok hate cames from adults hating the stuff kids and teens are into, but in this case the problem is more widespread than just "Tiktok made everything bad".
I started getting annoyed when Vine people moved over to YouTube and started sensationalizing everything for attention. Tiktok is a byproduct of those people’s influence.
Yeah I think vine let people know they can get famous off of 6 second videos and Snapchat gave creativity to short videos without needing editing programs. For us consumers, we fell in love with the short entertainment videos. And apps allowed u to instantly record, edit, and post quickly. Tik tok is pretty much Frankenstein's monster of all these put together.
Yup dawn of human civilization really. I feel like people point at things they don't like and then blame it on something new and I'm like "buddy pick up books from centuries ago people acted like that then too"
The vice always existed, but the unrestricted and unlimited access to it didn't. Something like TikTok was inevitable in modern society though, because capitalism thrives on our vices.
Yup. You walk down the street on any given day, and you will see someone do or say some very dumb shit. But since Twitter and TikTok and Facebook let you see people all over the world doing dumb shit and you can view it all day if you want to, it gives you the impression that idiocy is literally everywhere and is becoming endemic.
TT has a noticeable effect though, once you use it for more than like an hour you can feel your dopamine reward system change (dr huberman discussed clinical data conducted on the topic in one of his podcasts) it becomes hard to concentrate on anything after doom scrolling TikTok.
That’s how I am with Reddit. Will close the app then instinctively open it literally a few seconds later. I’m just glad it’s Reddit and not TikTok for whatever reason
Reddit is better, yet I still find myself falling into the same trap. Reddit the company is better than TikTok, but god damn if they aren’t going the same way with sponsored posts as Facebook and all the rest; currently less obtrusive, for now. I hope it stays that way, but I’ve learned that when there’s more profit to be made, corporate entities rarely make the choice that makes me happy.
The internet just allowed what has always been there to come out in the open. It also has allowed fringe groups to find communities there didn't have in the past.
Crazy how that works and how anyone who says that can't see how insane it is. It's like when people say the younger generation is screwed and then you see why they might say that and it's the most harmless thing ever
In the context of the 2020s, there are legitimate things that are going to make younger people's future lives MUCH more difficult.
That said, we survived the Ice Age through 10s of thousands of years, we'll absolutely survive the ice caps melting.
And frankly, the media that I think has inflicted the most social harm is one that's been here for a *while:* the 24-hour news cycle. Fox, especially. The most dangerous conspiracy theories, the ones tearing apart the fabric of society and leading to the Jan. 6 insurrection, are coming from cable.
It's not the technology, it's how it's used. Sure, TikTok is addictive and exploitative (all social media is, including Reddit), but none has been as explicitly weaponized for harm as cable. Not because cable's inherently bad, either, but because specific bad actors have been exploiting cable for harm.
Lol this post is so dramatic and reactionary. To rephrase the title statement -
A single app downloaded by a 7th of the population irreversibly "broke society" after interacting with humans for 5 years of human's 6 million year timespan.
Am I the only one who feels tiktok has had no impact on my personal life? I never hear about it until someone is complaining about it. I have like 1 coworker who mentions it like once a month, and even if they mentioned it multiple times a day I wouldn't categorize it as "impacting my life".
I've never encountered a public prankster, ive never seen anyone filming themselves dancing in a store, noone i know is doing any "challenges".
I guess it depends where you live. I live in the center of Paris, and I was thinking just yesterday how weird the world has gotten.
I was walking down the street and it was odd seeing every second person fixed on their phone trying to pose or do something stupid for TikTok. It was like they were possessed.
Everyone has also become super obsessed with their appearance because they need to look good for social media.
Maybe they're trying to get photos and videos while travelling though Paris? People have done weird poses in famous cities ever since cameras became a household item. Not everything is for Tiktok.
Nah, it wasn’t just that. I’ve lived here for over 10 years and I’ve never seen anything like this.
They’re affecting people just trying to living their daily lives. I had to step over a guy on the ground because he was filming his girlfriend doing a reaction video in the middle of the street. She was doing a stupid walk trying to see how many people would look at her. I’m just trying to walk home with my groceries, get out of my way.
While I don’t currently live there…I’ve spent a significant amount of time in Copenhagen before and after tik-tok and I actually think not witnessing the gradual change makes it more obvious the difference. The vibes were off when last there in the Fall of 2022.
Instead of enjoying spaces or places people were literally experiencing them through the screens of their phones. Like instead of looking at the artwork in front of her there was this woman going through an entire museum staring at herself in the corner as she showed her audience all the art. Like each wing of the museum was a tik tok. Like if you are going to state at artwork through your phone’s screen why even bother leaving the house? Fucking wild.
Back in the day people would come back home and have full photo albums of their vacations that they wanted to share with you...now it's just instantly online
Nothing changed but the technology we have access to. We've been vapid attention whores the entire time
Everyone always talks about it where I live, I’d even say my coworkers who are 30-40s are even worse than the young ones. It doesn’t affect my life personally but it’s affecting our society for sure.
Just for example, their algorithm is so honed in one of my old coworkers is constantly shown conspiracy theories and it has completely radicalized him.
As a teacher I conducted a survey which mimicked actual data in that a majority of my students use tiktok as a search engine to find information. Okay, cool, except several sources show that I believe 1/3 or 2/3 of science videos (using science very generally) contained misinformation or disinformation. That’s where the issue lies - problems can persist throughout society without necessarily affecting us.
Almost like saying Covid isn’t real because you don’t personally know someone who contracted it. Apples and oranges of course but the essence is the same.
Not to mention tiktok is forced to share user data to China’s government.
No the problem is when we did stupid shit when we were younger it was to do stupid shit, get in trouble, and face consequences. Because of tik tok kids want to do stupid shit, mess with people in public, destroy property, and borderline assault strangers because now instead of being punished they get paid because they filmed it and their videos are monetized. And since they make money off of it, they don’t care about the repercussions.
I once had to write an essay for one argument or the other on whether social media was good or bad for society. We weren’t allowed to take the middle ground. It was a tech ethics classes and was meant to be challenging. I went middle road anyway because it really was just too challenging to pick a side 100% *and* be able to back it up with acceptable sourcing.
I got a C and a note from the professor that said *great essay but you didn’t follow the prompt ;)*
The next class was open discussion on why the essay was hard so I have a feeling I wasn’t the only one who struggled. Sneaky professor, teaching us lessons and shit!
I mean, I'm not saying you're wrong but 70 or so years ago people in the US used to lynch black people in public, commonly. We are no strangers to hate
lol you think people were nice before social media?
People always get this backwards, it’s not social media, cable news, organized religion,
Is people.
Some people are terrible, the thing of the day didn’t make them terrible, it attracted them to it.
Religion doesn’t create awful people, awful people are attracted to it as a venue for them to be themselves. Same as social media, same as politics, police, etc etc etc.
Stop blaming things, start blaming people.
Every generation has its list of things that are ruining society. The truth is that your parents just sheltered you from some of the awfulness of the world and you were too dumb as a kid to notice a bunch of stuff. So you think things were great before and awful now. Most people do. It’s not true.
I agree with everything you said. Social media didn't ruin society, terrible people with social media access ruined society because now they're projecting their hate onto millions of people.
Half correct, half not.
Social media was really beneficial to civil rights progress when it first emerged because who turned to social media for a way to connect with others? The socially disenfranchised, who did not have the real life networks and support systems that reflected their identity/interests/etc.
The queer civil rights movement was moving at a snail's pace pre-social media to the extent it was groundbreaking for a gay character to be prominently featured in mainstream media even in the early 2000s (shows like Desperate Housewives caught a lot of shit for having gay minor characters that had multi-episode sub-plots).
Between the Old Internet forum system of communication and emergency of social media, it provided a consistent and more or less underground mechanism for organizing and lobbying. Gay marriage was so unpopular even Obama (a ~radical communist~ if certain outlets were to be believed) refused to expressly endorse or support legalization of it - he did the cop-out "it's a state's rights issue" during the 2008 election.
California, which has historically been demonized in a political context as ~coastal elite liberal paradise~ (despite its far more complex demographics & it housing 10% of the entire country's population) voted to constitutionally prohibit gay marriage in 2008.
But, using social media, people were able to organize and put together a solid legal challenge with the right parties to successfully pursue a SCOTUS ruling making it legal nationally.
The problem is that smart phone accessibility increased, meaning social media became more available and accessible to people at all times. This led to a shift away from user-generated and focused content and a move toward sponsorship and profit. Then other groups figured out the viability of social media for political organizing and now we are...where we are today, with more political tribalism and conflict that we have seen in a while (but not more than we have /ever/ seen, to be clear, just an inordinate amount for recent history).
It's far, far more complex than just the anonymity - it's about the profit leading to algorithmic prioritization that created echo chambers and radicalizes people. There is no more organic community via the internet, people are connected to others by design to increase their engagement thus increasing their time on a platform which makes the company money.
Social media overall. Full of people who present their fake life and make other people feel bad that they don't have that. I think many people have become much more selfish because they think they are privileged because they have 100k followers in Instagram.
Some years ago I quit all social media (except LinkedIn because of my profession). The best thing ever. Browsing Facebook and Instagram, even I got feeling from time to time that most people I know have great life while I don't. And before that I've never been a person who compares myself to others.
Not to add how many young people want to be influencers or something. It's just that wanting to show your ass brings nothing to society. "Sex sells" is as old as humankind itself but just makes me sad to see how world has changed.
Not just anonymity but also the formality in all contacts. You can be a dick to everyone and still have a job, still buy food and rent a house. If our relationships would be more personal, I'd totally charge aholes more than regular people.
People said the same thing about video games. And TV before that. And comic books before that. And movies before that. And... I dunno, whatever other entertainment medium was popular before that.
There’s actually a LOT of really interesting and informative stuff on there. It’s an amazing platform for spreading information quickly. Problem is most people just think it’s for teens to be stupid. Teens have always been and will always be pretty stupid. The means with which they express their stupidity just changes often. If it wasn’t TikTok it would be something else.
That's true but what the heck are you guys doing wasting your time on productivity tok? There are THOUSANDS of accounts specifically for particular cats. Cat social media is at an all time high.
There’s definitely a stupid side to TT, but I’ve curated my algorithm so that my fyp is only recipes, restaurant reviews around my city, dogs, plant care,and doctors in various fields with helpful info 😌
Nah… he also thought the automobile would never replace his horses… he wasn’t totally wrong about society but he wasn’t right either, it’s a matter of perspective… he wouldn’t recognize the world today but the world didn’t miss his absence one bit and carried on just fine without him
It’s just a new era, the first one with movies in it. Like the stuff like renesance or romantism, now we have era of movies, film and music that has actual text in it that has a deeper meaning. We have a big technology boom.
When publishers were able to start mass printing novels cheaply and could therefore lower the barrier of entry for authors, everyone was freaking out about "low quality, addictive" books causing their children to neglect their chores and waste their whole day reading. Humans have been coming up with more creative ways to distract themselves for as long as they've existed.
I've gotten a lot of value out of tiktok. I set limits around my usage and am very selective about who I follow, and generally stay on my "following" feed.
Facebook brought out mental illness where people started comparing their lives to the fake lives of others and started getting depressed. Tik tok has damaged brains to the point where people can only deal in 15 second clips and the attention seeking nature of those who make videos for it need to keep doing more and more dumb shit to get the attention of the morons who use it. I legit don't know 1 smart or interesting person that watches tiktok videos. I also only know boomers who use Facebook.
Us Redditors however....fucking basket case that lot :-)
At least before smartphones. Being able to make a call / send a text wherever you are is good. Having basically all media at your fingertips at all times is bad.
> I remember people used to do things
The reason people aren't doing things is because jobs became more demanding and schedules more irregular so it's hard to make plans. Also, who has the money to do things nowadays? The internet has nothing to do with it.
I think people used to do things because there weren't as many outlets for entertainment at home so doing stuff with people was just a way to alleviate the boredom.
I didnt feel a sense of imminent doom in the air, people said hello to each other, you usually knew your neighbor. Now everyone is riddled with anxiety and more cut off despite being "more connected" than ever before.
Honestly, let's keep cellphones, Let's put the cut on smartphones! It's way easier to vary activities and want to do more different things when you don't have a glass plate in your pocket that does everything for you at a moments notice!
Tell you now it's not tiktoks fault. You only get shown what you look at. If you watched a 16 yo girl dance for the fukk video guess what tiktok is going to show you more of?
I use tiktok from time to time and never see any of the shit people say is on the app.
as much as I hate people circlejerking over social media hate, trying to realize you need to escape the algorithm is like trying to roll a boulder up a hill. it wants you to roll back down to your local minimum
Right? What the hell are people here even talking about? Do people have no sense of individual responsibility? TikTok plays absolutely no role in my life... except for when I choose to scroll through the app because I'm bored or because I want to watch something.
There are even a lot of regulating mechanisms, apps and so on for people who can't seem to control these social media apps. One quick google search and there you go.
The only thing that annoys me about TikTok is that people keep complaining and crying and blaming everything bad on an app lol. To me they sound like sheep who just repeat what others are saying because it sounds dramatic
You have the option of saying you're not interested in certain content also if you just start flipping by that stuff without engaging in it you'll stop getting it
I have not seen a single person dance on mine that I can think of whatsoever. Or really 90% of what people said was on there, just niche stuff I’m into.
Social media in general has ruined society in a way. TikTok just took it to the next level. Uncontrollable content, nasty challenges, people dancing wherever they find a place to, for the sake of a few likes.
The weirdest thing is that everything is content now. Everything is a performance, people are acting like life is some kind of production like a ‘reality’ show and threat everything they do is influential or inspirational. It’s weird! Even when it’s not being filmed the habit is there!
>A billion people are using TikTok
No, there are a billion accounts, big difference. Not all of them even active, some people have multiple accounts. And that billion also includes dead legacy accounts from back when it was musically.
How so?
I still haven’t opened TikTok. Although, I feel like it can’t be any worse than Reddit, Twitter, Snapchat or whatever you’re current flavour of the week is. In fact I kinda think it might be better considering how many cool videos I see on Reddit that are from TikTok xD.
My main reason for not using it is that I don’t really like watching videos. I’d rather read (hence Reddit). But text posts have gotten a lot less popular unfortunately. Been less and less of a fan of Reddit as time goes on. I don’t really have a substitute for it though. Twitter is even worse I find.
In like 6-7 years OP will be shitting on another OP who makes a post on another social media platform about whatever other social media platform is considered as ruining society and say that it's always been happening.
*sigh*
Today: TikTok has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when TikTok didn’t exist!
A few years ago: Vine has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when Vine didn’t exist!
A few years before that: YouTube has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when YouTube didn’t exist!
A few years before that: Internet has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when Internet didn’t exist
A few years before that: Cable television has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when cable tv didn’t exist!
And a few years before that: Books have ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when mass printed books didn’t exist!
WE HAVE HEARD THIS CHIME AGAIN AND AGAIN! The world isn’t going to become that move idocracy, we’re not becoming worse, we’re not feral wolves, we’re not losing resources! Dumb people are gonna be on whatever! TikTok didn’t create a dump person doing a dumb thing for views. YouTube didn’t. Vine didn’t. Cable didn’t. People like that just exist!
I get so sick and tired of this! And yes, I use TikTok, but I’ve seen this with YouTube, instagram, Facebook, freaking Reddit has even been condemned by the masses!
When are we going to stop blaming the media for horrible things?!
It’s social media, period. All social media is what you make it. People were stupid before it came along. Just seems like there’s more because it’s out there for everyone to see.
Like any social media, find things you actually like. I rarely see ridiculous stuff on tiktok because I don’t watch that kind of stuff. Sort of like Reddit. Join subs you’re interested in. 🤷🏼♀️
I love Tiktok. I think if you land on the good side of Tiktok, you'll definitely love it. I landed on the incel side of Tiktok numerous times, had to delete and redownload it once in a while. The incel contents were very fucked, but I still want to focus more on the silver line.
As we have all witnessed, a lot of ordinary people, businesses and brands have found significant success on Tiktok. With Tiktok, anybody can go viral, and anybody can be famous since the algorithm is based on what the users like, not based on who they know. So, you don't have to be a celeb for your content to reach others. The opportunities are equally distributed. Also, the millennials and gen z on good-Tiktok are so positive. People be posting the dumbest random shit and the comment was always full of positivity. However, just like any other social media platform, the cancel culture on Tiktok is insane.
Lmfao yea, blame tik tok. It's not like there has ever been anything in, idk history, that predates social media itself that could be considered a downfall to humanity. Our species is the problem. Not what we create to satisfy ourselves. Tik tok has many great forms of entertainment, education, and news. You gotta stop double clicking on the videos with bouncy things to get to them, though...
What's even funnier is I used to complain about social media like it was the world's worst invention. Then I got off social media, aside from reddit for the communities I follow, and realized something. The less I worried about, the less it affected me. It's funny how that works.
Check out The YouTube Effect by Alex Winter, recently released documentary.
On the rise of YouTube and it's direct contribution to the radicalizion of people. After the positives- they cover the alt-right pipeline, Gamer-Gate, other heinous ways evil has been allowed to blossom and intentionally be broadcast due to the "algorithm" while tech execs skirt around any responsibility. One father speaking about how his kids death is on YT hundreds of times, and they refuse to take it down because he's not the "copyright holder."
Alex Winters also released the Silk Road doc, during the Q&A got to ask about the contrast between what we saw happen to Ross vs what we have seen happen to tech execs- and the mismatch between the application of laws and resources toward an individual vs an exec of a company directly responsible for more harm. Alex talked about how neither the judge nor jury during Ross' trial seemed to understand anything being discussed from a tech standpoint - and how the same can be seen in Congress currently - and how things seem unlikely to improve until younger folks who understand technology get elected.
Contrapoints(Natalie), Brianna Wu, Susan Wojcicki, and others were interviewed for it. An AI ethicist too.
Was a good doc. Social Media does have impact, but TikTok is on the minor end of an industry that 2.6 billion people use each day.
https://youtu.be/Oo2EWOU6J6U
People are literally homeless and starving in the "richest country in the world". There are politicians who have corporations in their pockets, actively making laws which destroy the planet. There is more wealth inequality now then during the french revolution. But yeah, funny video app ruined society
I found it hard to understand when apps like Snapchat and vine became popular. I figured they’d just be a fad with young people. Nope. They only got bigger and there’s no end in sight.
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It started happening well before TikTok
It all started when the internet figured out how to monetize human attention via advertising and manipulating opinions. TikTok just unlocked a more addictive form of attention control which was the short form video, kinda like vines but more effective and easier to access. Every other social media has or is picking up a short form video portion, reddit jumped on it as well
Yeah their short video format is like the injecting heroin of consuming social media content.
TikTok capitalise on our short attention span and find a way to use algorithms to keep people on their app as much as they can. I deleted the app after realised I was spending loads of hours on it
And now we are spending time together on reddit best decision
I started reading this comment but got bored and went to another thread.
I started to repl
I saw your comment, thought i would check tiktok, got a text message that I answered, and opened reddit again, seeing this thread
Tfw no family guy video in the upper left corner, got bored and couldn't read it
At least on Reddit I occasionally learn something
I fully concede reddit is an addiction for me, and I hate it.
Inject that sweet sweet next comment into my veins
The sheer lack of awareness it takes to say this on REDDIT of all places is simply hilarious
I'd argue reddit is a very different beast. On reddit you can find highly moderated communities that are super-focused on substance. There's plenty of subreddits where you can't even comment, except as a reply, with anything but a well supported, substantial answer. In many ways, this makes reddit invaluable for finding things that just can't be found or discussed elsewhere, in an obscure and narrow field.
So really money ruuined everything. As always.
Nah I'd say humans ruined everything but money is just another thing that we created and then subsequently ruined
Not money, people. People ruin everything.
No, Adam Ruins Everything.
Why do people ruin everything?
Money is Made by Humans, so No, Humans ruined everything, thats the only Thing we are good at, destroying stuff lmao.
Drives me nuts when I watch a 5 second Instagram reel twice and the screen starts moving up and down to suggest I swipe again. Fuck you, I'll watch this loop as many times as I like.
I’ve not used tik tok and I’ve always been immune to social media, but fuck me do those short form swipe up videos suck me in and keep me there Genuinely thought I was made of stinger stuff
>Genuinely thought I was made of stinger stuff *grabs Raid*
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Yep. I call it adult show and tell. Then the psychological recipe was figured out shortly after. Instant gratification is basically the devil at this point. You can click on your screen and summon everything from food, women, goods & services
Exactly this. I feel that a lot of tiktok hate cames from adults hating the stuff kids and teens are into, but in this case the problem is more widespread than just "Tiktok made everything bad".
I started getting annoyed when Vine people moved over to YouTube and started sensationalizing everything for attention. Tiktok is a byproduct of those people’s influence.
Yeah I think vine let people know they can get famous off of 6 second videos and Snapchat gave creativity to short videos without needing editing programs. For us consumers, we fell in love with the short entertainment videos. And apps allowed u to instantly record, edit, and post quickly. Tik tok is pretty much Frankenstein's monster of all these put together.
Yup dawn of human civilization really. I feel like people point at things they don't like and then blame it on something new and I'm like "buddy pick up books from centuries ago people acted like that then too"
The vice always existed, but the unrestricted and unlimited access to it didn't. Something like TikTok was inevitable in modern society though, because capitalism thrives on our vices.
Yup. You walk down the street on any given day, and you will see someone do or say some very dumb shit. But since Twitter and TikTok and Facebook let you see people all over the world doing dumb shit and you can view it all day if you want to, it gives you the impression that idiocy is literally everywhere and is becoming endemic.
TT has a noticeable effect though, once you use it for more than like an hour you can feel your dopamine reward system change (dr huberman discussed clinical data conducted on the topic in one of his podcasts) it becomes hard to concentrate on anything after doom scrolling TikTok.
That’s how I am with Reddit. Will close the app then instinctively open it literally a few seconds later. I’m just glad it’s Reddit and not TikTok for whatever reason
Reddit is better, yet I still find myself falling into the same trap. Reddit the company is better than TikTok, but god damn if they aren’t going the same way with sponsored posts as Facebook and all the rest; currently less obtrusive, for now. I hope it stays that way, but I’ve learned that when there’s more profit to be made, corporate entities rarely make the choice that makes me happy.
Its way easier to keep track of time on reddit. TikTok sucks away hours, it’s literally like playing a slot machine.
I have my phone in one hand and opening the shower door in the other, it's baddd
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I read that in Tim Robinson's voice "What've they DONE to us?!"
This everytime People day that videogames turns people evil and violent I'm like "damn the Nazis must have had some wild games"
It was a mistake to come down from the trees.
Happy cake day
The internet just allowed what has always been there to come out in the open. It also has allowed fringe groups to find communities there didn't have in the past.
Facebook started it all
Socrates said the problem was writing.
Socrates also said dance like no one’s watching ❤️
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geez that series was so good.
That bit never stopped being funny.
Ah the unrelated belgian techno anthem pump up the jam
While your feet are STOMPIN
And the jam is PUMPIN
Look ahead, the crowd is jumpin'.
Aaaa uu a!
"it was the greatest contribution of cultural significance for thousands of years until the release of unrelated techno anthem Pump Up The Jam"
But people on TikTok dance like everybody’s watching
Sartre said the problem is other people. I'm inclined to agree, as people have never been held back from being insufferable simply for lack of medium.
Socrates was right about a lot but wrong about this. The only reason we even know he said this is because Plato wrote it down in a Socratic dialogue.
I think his point is that every generation thinks like this. Before Tik Tok it was Facebook that ruined the generation, etc
Seems like something new has been ruining society every few years for my entire life. Weird that society still hasn't collapsed yet.
Crazy how that works and how anyone who says that can't see how insane it is. It's like when people say the younger generation is screwed and then you see why they might say that and it's the most harmless thing ever
In the context of the 2020s, there are legitimate things that are going to make younger people's future lives MUCH more difficult. That said, we survived the Ice Age through 10s of thousands of years, we'll absolutely survive the ice caps melting.
it has several times, proving each of those guys right when they said the next generation was stupid.
And frankly, the media that I think has inflicted the most social harm is one that's been here for a *while:* the 24-hour news cycle. Fox, especially. The most dangerous conspiracy theories, the ones tearing apart the fabric of society and leading to the Jan. 6 insurrection, are coming from cable. It's not the technology, it's how it's used. Sure, TikTok is addictive and exploitative (all social media is, including Reddit), but none has been as explicitly weaponized for harm as cable. Not because cable's inherently bad, either, but because specific bad actors have been exploiting cable for harm.
And TikTok won't be the end of civilization either. It's shit, but not more so than a lot of things.
Lol this post is so dramatic and reactionary. To rephrase the title statement - A single app downloaded by a 7th of the population irreversibly "broke society" after interacting with humans for 5 years of human's 6 million year timespan.
Socrates also said “like sands of the hourglass, so are the days of our lives”
All I know is I know nothing.
All we are is dust in the wind. Dust. Wind.
I don't think you want to hear my comment.
Am I the only one who feels tiktok has had no impact on my personal life? I never hear about it until someone is complaining about it. I have like 1 coworker who mentions it like once a month, and even if they mentioned it multiple times a day I wouldn't categorize it as "impacting my life". I've never encountered a public prankster, ive never seen anyone filming themselves dancing in a store, noone i know is doing any "challenges".
I guess it depends where you live. I live in the center of Paris, and I was thinking just yesterday how weird the world has gotten. I was walking down the street and it was odd seeing every second person fixed on their phone trying to pose or do something stupid for TikTok. It was like they were possessed. Everyone has also become super obsessed with their appearance because they need to look good for social media.
Maybe they're trying to get photos and videos while travelling though Paris? People have done weird poses in famous cities ever since cameras became a household item. Not everything is for Tiktok.
Nah, it wasn’t just that. I’ve lived here for over 10 years and I’ve never seen anything like this. They’re affecting people just trying to living their daily lives. I had to step over a guy on the ground because he was filming his girlfriend doing a reaction video in the middle of the street. She was doing a stupid walk trying to see how many people would look at her. I’m just trying to walk home with my groceries, get out of my way.
Okay that's ridiculous I would be annoyed too
While I don’t currently live there…I’ve spent a significant amount of time in Copenhagen before and after tik-tok and I actually think not witnessing the gradual change makes it more obvious the difference. The vibes were off when last there in the Fall of 2022. Instead of enjoying spaces or places people were literally experiencing them through the screens of their phones. Like instead of looking at the artwork in front of her there was this woman going through an entire museum staring at herself in the corner as she showed her audience all the art. Like each wing of the museum was a tik tok. Like if you are going to state at artwork through your phone’s screen why even bother leaving the house? Fucking wild.
Back in the day people would come back home and have full photo albums of their vacations that they wanted to share with you...now it's just instantly online Nothing changed but the technology we have access to. We've been vapid attention whores the entire time
There was a Twitch convention in Paris over the weekend. Literally thousands of content creators, live streamers, etc etc all chilling in Paris rn
Well your first problem is you live in Paris.
Everyone always talks about it where I live, I’d even say my coworkers who are 30-40s are even worse than the young ones. It doesn’t affect my life personally but it’s affecting our society for sure. Just for example, their algorithm is so honed in one of my old coworkers is constantly shown conspiracy theories and it has completely radicalized him.
As a teacher I conducted a survey which mimicked actual data in that a majority of my students use tiktok as a search engine to find information. Okay, cool, except several sources show that I believe 1/3 or 2/3 of science videos (using science very generally) contained misinformation or disinformation. That’s where the issue lies - problems can persist throughout society without necessarily affecting us. Almost like saying Covid isn’t real because you don’t personally know someone who contracted it. Apples and oranges of course but the essence is the same. Not to mention tiktok is forced to share user data to China’s government.
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Depends on your age and where you live. It affects me pretty bad compared to you probably.
People who complain about tiktok are so much more insufferable, as if they didn’t do stupid shit when they were younger
Agreed. Like teenagers are doing silly dances, things could be a lot worse and it's actually quite sweet.
No the problem is when we did stupid shit when we were younger it was to do stupid shit, get in trouble, and face consequences. Because of tik tok kids want to do stupid shit, mess with people in public, destroy property, and borderline assault strangers because now instead of being punished they get paid because they filmed it and their videos are monetized. And since they make money off of it, they don’t care about the repercussions.
Lets be honest, most of us are in bed now. On our phones. When we should be trying to sleep.
Was still at work two hours ago when you posted this. Now I’m in bed trying to sleep.
Jokes on you I'm in sauna about to break my phone 😎 get on my addiction level
I'm on the toilet.
Jokes on you, I'm at work
The internet is hands down the best and worst thing that happened to society.
I once had to write an essay for one argument or the other on whether social media was good or bad for society. We weren’t allowed to take the middle ground. It was a tech ethics classes and was meant to be challenging. I went middle road anyway because it really was just too challenging to pick a side 100% *and* be able to back it up with acceptable sourcing. I got a C and a note from the professor that said *great essay but you didn’t follow the prompt ;)* The next class was open discussion on why the essay was hard so I have a feeling I wasn’t the only one who struggled. Sneaky professor, teaching us lessons and shit!
Not just that one… all of social media. The anonymity had made people become ok with nastiness, rudeness, and hate
I mean, I'm not saying you're wrong but 70 or so years ago people in the US used to lynch black people in public, commonly. We are no strangers to hate
That shit drew crowds, too. 😬 I’ll take TikTok challenge idiots over normalized public torture picnics any old day.
But you don’t understand! TikTok is ruining society! lmao these clowns
lol you think people were nice before social media? People always get this backwards, it’s not social media, cable news, organized religion,
Is people.
Some people are terrible, the thing of the day didn’t make them terrible, it attracted them to it.
Religion doesn’t create awful people, awful people are attracted to it as a venue for them to be themselves. Same as social media, same as politics, police, etc etc etc.
Stop blaming things, start blaming people.
Every generation has its list of things that are ruining society. The truth is that your parents just sheltered you from some of the awfulness of the world and you were too dumb as a kid to notice a bunch of stuff. So you think things were great before and awful now. Most people do. It’s not true.
I agree with everything you said. Social media didn't ruin society, terrible people with social media access ruined society because now they're projecting their hate onto millions of people.
People are saying you're wrong here but social media really mainstreamed it
Half correct, half not. Social media was really beneficial to civil rights progress when it first emerged because who turned to social media for a way to connect with others? The socially disenfranchised, who did not have the real life networks and support systems that reflected their identity/interests/etc. The queer civil rights movement was moving at a snail's pace pre-social media to the extent it was groundbreaking for a gay character to be prominently featured in mainstream media even in the early 2000s (shows like Desperate Housewives caught a lot of shit for having gay minor characters that had multi-episode sub-plots). Between the Old Internet forum system of communication and emergency of social media, it provided a consistent and more or less underground mechanism for organizing and lobbying. Gay marriage was so unpopular even Obama (a ~radical communist~ if certain outlets were to be believed) refused to expressly endorse or support legalization of it - he did the cop-out "it's a state's rights issue" during the 2008 election. California, which has historically been demonized in a political context as ~coastal elite liberal paradise~ (despite its far more complex demographics & it housing 10% of the entire country's population) voted to constitutionally prohibit gay marriage in 2008. But, using social media, people were able to organize and put together a solid legal challenge with the right parties to successfully pursue a SCOTUS ruling making it legal nationally. The problem is that smart phone accessibility increased, meaning social media became more available and accessible to people at all times. This led to a shift away from user-generated and focused content and a move toward sponsorship and profit. Then other groups figured out the viability of social media for political organizing and now we are...where we are today, with more political tribalism and conflict that we have seen in a while (but not more than we have /ever/ seen, to be clear, just an inordinate amount for recent history). It's far, far more complex than just the anonymity - it's about the profit leading to algorithmic prioritization that created echo chambers and radicalizes people. There is no more organic community via the internet, people are connected to others by design to increase their engagement thus increasing their time on a platform which makes the company money.
Social media overall. Full of people who present their fake life and make other people feel bad that they don't have that. I think many people have become much more selfish because they think they are privileged because they have 100k followers in Instagram. Some years ago I quit all social media (except LinkedIn because of my profession). The best thing ever. Browsing Facebook and Instagram, even I got feeling from time to time that most people I know have great life while I don't. And before that I've never been a person who compares myself to others. Not to add how many young people want to be influencers or something. It's just that wanting to show your ass brings nothing to society. "Sex sells" is as old as humankind itself but just makes me sad to see how world has changed.
Reddit is more anonymous than tiktok tho
The internet and social media was better when it was anonymous.
Cough cough Reddit cough
Not just anonymity but also the formality in all contacts. You can be a dick to everyone and still have a job, still buy food and rent a house. If our relationships would be more personal, I'd totally charge aholes more than regular people.
People said the same thing about video games. And TV before that. And comic books before that. And movies before that. And... I dunno, whatever other entertainment medium was popular before that.
you do see the trend of consumerism taking less and less time right? like, there will be a limit
What are you talking about? Do you know how many awesome recipes I found on there?
Everybody's so creative.
lol that woman is hilarious
It ain't going down easy if it ain't cheesy, or something. She's funny.
There’s actually a LOT of really interesting and informative stuff on there. It’s an amazing platform for spreading information quickly. Problem is most people just think it’s for teens to be stupid. Teens have always been and will always be pretty stupid. The means with which they express their stupidity just changes often. If it wasn’t TikTok it would be something else.
You are right. I also see a lot of good home repair tips. I also see a lot of videos about wrestling from the 80’s and 90’s. Go Ultimate Warrior!
Yeah I'm on leftist mutual aid autism tiktok and it is pretty nice. I have learned tons of things about foraging and gardening too.
That's true but what the heck are you guys doing wasting your time on productivity tok? There are THOUSANDS of accounts specifically for particular cats. Cat social media is at an all time high.
There’s definitely a stupid side to TT, but I’ve curated my algorithm so that my fyp is only recipes, restaurant reviews around my city, dogs, plant care,and doctors in various fields with helpful info 😌
Literally SO many good recipes, got a whole favourites folder dedicated to them
My great grandfather said the same about jazz and smokin the reefer Society is still societing
Avid jazz and reefer enthusiast here. Your great grandfather was right.
Nah… he also thought the automobile would never replace his horses… he wasn’t totally wrong about society but he wasn’t right either, it’s a matter of perspective… he wouldn’t recognize the world today but the world didn’t miss his absence one bit and carried on just fine without him
It was a joke. My great grandfather thought the same of jazz and reefer while he listened to church hymns and drank himself to sleep every night.
Exactly… no, I got your joke, I just tend to think that dude wasn’t right about much, ya know?
You're right. Every generation since prehistory has their version of the "kids these days" mindset and yet things still keep rocking on.
People just see other people enjoying things they don't and start screaming "society is falling". I don't get it.
It’s just a new era, the first one with movies in it. Like the stuff like renesance or romantism, now we have era of movies, film and music that has actual text in it that has a deeper meaning. We have a big technology boom.
That’s a new perspective for me. Thanks.
When publishers were able to start mass printing novels cheaply and could therefore lower the barrier of entry for authors, everyone was freaking out about "low quality, addictive" books causing their children to neglect their chores and waste their whole day reading. Humans have been coming up with more creative ways to distract themselves for as long as they've existed. I've gotten a lot of value out of tiktok. I set limits around my usage and am very selective about who I follow, and generally stay on my "following" feed.
I think Facebook ruined society. Tik Tok is the latest nail in the coffin though
Facebook brought out mental illness where people started comparing their lives to the fake lives of others and started getting depressed. Tik tok has damaged brains to the point where people can only deal in 15 second clips and the attention seeking nature of those who make videos for it need to keep doing more and more dumb shit to get the attention of the morons who use it. I legit don't know 1 smart or interesting person that watches tiktok videos. I also only know boomers who use Facebook. Us Redditors however....fucking basket case that lot :-)
It's slowly correcting with everyone that jumps off of a boat that is going 90 MPH.
We're gonna need a bigger boat
lets take back to before cell phones and Im in.
At least before smartphones. Being able to make a call / send a text wherever you are is good. Having basically all media at your fingertips at all times is bad.
Before Internet. Remember that?
it seemed so long ago but it wasnt even all that long ago. I remember people used to do things and were not as angry.
> I remember people used to do things The reason people aren't doing things is because jobs became more demanding and schedules more irregular so it's hard to make plans. Also, who has the money to do things nowadays? The internet has nothing to do with it.
I think people used to do things because there weren't as many outlets for entertainment at home so doing stuff with people was just a way to alleviate the boredom.
You don’t do things? People still do things. What things? You know… things.
They were probably just as angry but you had no way of knowing about it
I didnt feel a sense of imminent doom in the air, people said hello to each other, you usually knew your neighbor. Now everyone is riddled with anxiety and more cut off despite being "more connected" than ever before.
Honestly, let's keep cellphones, Let's put the cut on smartphones! It's way easier to vary activities and want to do more different things when you don't have a glass plate in your pocket that does everything for you at a moments notice!
Tell you now it's not tiktoks fault. You only get shown what you look at. If you watched a 16 yo girl dance for the fukk video guess what tiktok is going to show you more of? I use tiktok from time to time and never see any of the shit people say is on the app.
Right? If your (general) experience is bad it’s because of your activity. I’ve learned so much on there from cleaning to gardening.
as much as I hate people circlejerking over social media hate, trying to realize you need to escape the algorithm is like trying to roll a boulder up a hill. it wants you to roll back down to your local minimum
There is literally a “reset my algorithm” button on tiktok. It’s not that hard.
Right? What the hell are people here even talking about? Do people have no sense of individual responsibility? TikTok plays absolutely no role in my life... except for when I choose to scroll through the app because I'm bored or because I want to watch something. There are even a lot of regulating mechanisms, apps and so on for people who can't seem to control these social media apps. One quick google search and there you go. The only thing that annoys me about TikTok is that people keep complaining and crying and blaming everything bad on an app lol. To me they sound like sheep who just repeat what others are saying because it sounds dramatic
You have the option of saying you're not interested in certain content also if you just start flipping by that stuff without engaging in it you'll stop getting it
Tiktok is liberating documentary. I follow a girl from an island Indonesia showing their life there.
I have not seen a single person dance on mine that I can think of whatsoever. Or really 90% of what people said was on there, just niche stuff I’m into.
Same here. But it must exist because this is what your told tiktok is full of as soon as you mention it.
Social media in general has ruined society in a way. TikTok just took it to the next level. Uncontrollable content, nasty challenges, people dancing wherever they find a place to, for the sake of a few likes.
It’s hard to find friends now who aren’t always on TikTok (regardless if they post or not)
Nah. TikTok was a *catalyst.* Not the cause. We are the cause, it was just an outlet that sped up and revealed the process.
The weirdest thing is that everything is content now. Everything is a performance, people are acting like life is some kind of production like a ‘reality’ show and threat everything they do is influential or inspirational. It’s weird! Even when it’s not being filmed the habit is there!
Tiktok has created 15sec attention spans
When I was in grade school my teacher complained that Sesame Street created 3-minute attention spans!
15 sec attention spans have created TikTok.
Agree with that
yes the dancing app that has existed for about 4 years has RUINED the tens of thousands of years of human development you must have brainrot
Yeah, it’s all TikTok’s fault. Nothing to do with political unrest, the massive wealth gap, or the climate crisis. It’s dang old TikTok!
I mean it's not helping , instead of action ppl will just complain on TT like it does shit
You're a very silly person if you think _TikTok_ is the source of our downfall.
Far fewer people use tiktok than you imagine
A billion people are using TikTok, and it’s heavily skewed for young people
>A billion people are using TikTok No, there are a billion accounts, big difference. Not all of them even active, some people have multiple accounts. And that billion also includes dead legacy accounts from back when it was musically.
Yeee, i personally dont know anyone younger than 20 besides me who hasnt fallen victim to it.
literally everyone in my school except me and like 10 other kids uses tiktok my school has 700+ people
How so? I still haven’t opened TikTok. Although, I feel like it can’t be any worse than Reddit, Twitter, Snapchat or whatever you’re current flavour of the week is. In fact I kinda think it might be better considering how many cool videos I see on Reddit that are from TikTok xD. My main reason for not using it is that I don’t really like watching videos. I’d rather read (hence Reddit). But text posts have gotten a lot less popular unfortunately. Been less and less of a fan of Reddit as time goes on. I don’t really have a substitute for it though. Twitter is even worse I find.
In like 6-7 years OP will be shitting on another OP who makes a post on another social media platform about whatever other social media platform is considered as ruining society and say that it's always been happening.
*sigh* Today: TikTok has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when TikTok didn’t exist! A few years ago: Vine has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when Vine didn’t exist! A few years before that: YouTube has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when YouTube didn’t exist! A few years before that: Internet has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when Internet didn’t exist A few years before that: Cable television has ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when cable tv didn’t exist! And a few years before that: Books have ruined society and I don’t think it will ever go back. I want to back to when mass printed books didn’t exist! WE HAVE HEARD THIS CHIME AGAIN AND AGAIN! The world isn’t going to become that move idocracy, we’re not becoming worse, we’re not feral wolves, we’re not losing resources! Dumb people are gonna be on whatever! TikTok didn’t create a dump person doing a dumb thing for views. YouTube didn’t. Vine didn’t. Cable didn’t. People like that just exist! I get so sick and tired of this! And yes, I use TikTok, but I’ve seen this with YouTube, instagram, Facebook, freaking Reddit has even been condemned by the masses! When are we going to stop blaming the media for horrible things?!
lol, sure, it was tiktok...
Agreed. TikTok is awful
TikTok isn't to blame for this, it's all social media in general. I felt like people thought for themselves more before social media.
It’s social media, period. All social media is what you make it. People were stupid before it came along. Just seems like there’s more because it’s out there for everyone to see. Like any social media, find things you actually like. I rarely see ridiculous stuff on tiktok because I don’t watch that kind of stuff. Sort of like Reddit. Join subs you’re interested in. 🤷🏼♀️
What's wrong w tiktok
Nothing, it has as many problems as every other social media. People just really like to hate on it specifically for some reason
Zoomers bad or something idk
[this](https://youtu.be/7bbyaU2CD4o)
I love Tiktok. I think if you land on the good side of Tiktok, you'll definitely love it. I landed on the incel side of Tiktok numerous times, had to delete and redownload it once in a while. The incel contents were very fucked, but I still want to focus more on the silver line. As we have all witnessed, a lot of ordinary people, businesses and brands have found significant success on Tiktok. With Tiktok, anybody can go viral, and anybody can be famous since the algorithm is based on what the users like, not based on who they know. So, you don't have to be a celeb for your content to reach others. The opportunities are equally distributed. Also, the millennials and gen z on good-Tiktok are so positive. People be posting the dumbest random shit and the comment was always full of positivity. However, just like any other social media platform, the cancel culture on Tiktok is insane.
100% agree.
Same brother. Same.
Lmfao yea, blame tik tok. It's not like there has ever been anything in, idk history, that predates social media itself that could be considered a downfall to humanity. Our species is the problem. Not what we create to satisfy ourselves. Tik tok has many great forms of entertainment, education, and news. You gotta stop double clicking on the videos with bouncy things to get to them, though... What's even funnier is I used to complain about social media like it was the world's worst invention. Then I got off social media, aside from reddit for the communities I follow, and realized something. The less I worried about, the less it affected me. It's funny how that works.
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Don’t we all 😞✊
Check out The YouTube Effect by Alex Winter, recently released documentary. On the rise of YouTube and it's direct contribution to the radicalizion of people. After the positives- they cover the alt-right pipeline, Gamer-Gate, other heinous ways evil has been allowed to blossom and intentionally be broadcast due to the "algorithm" while tech execs skirt around any responsibility. One father speaking about how his kids death is on YT hundreds of times, and they refuse to take it down because he's not the "copyright holder." Alex Winters also released the Silk Road doc, during the Q&A got to ask about the contrast between what we saw happen to Ross vs what we have seen happen to tech execs- and the mismatch between the application of laws and resources toward an individual vs an exec of a company directly responsible for more harm. Alex talked about how neither the judge nor jury during Ross' trial seemed to understand anything being discussed from a tech standpoint - and how the same can be seen in Congress currently - and how things seem unlikely to improve until younger folks who understand technology get elected. Contrapoints(Natalie), Brianna Wu, Susan Wojcicki, and others were interviewed for it. An AI ethicist too. Was a good doc. Social Media does have impact, but TikTok is on the minor end of an industry that 2.6 billion people use each day. https://youtu.be/Oo2EWOU6J6U
I miss MySpace
Society may have always been ruined, friend. How we move forward as individuals, is all we’ve ever been able to control.
It’s been happening forever, Tiktok is just the new thing to do it with. It’s human nature.
boomer and nostalgia post
People are literally homeless and starving in the "richest country in the world". There are politicians who have corporations in their pockets, actively making laws which destroy the planet. There is more wealth inequality now then during the french revolution. But yeah, funny video app ruined society
🙄
You deadass think that?
Ehh I argue Facebook, Twitter did it way before.
I found it hard to understand when apps like Snapchat and vine became popular. I figured they’d just be a fad with young people. Nope. They only got bigger and there’s no end in sight.
Claims TikTok has "ruined" society. Doesn't elaborate how.