TikTok removing posts for violating the "joy of TikTok"

https://twitter.com/prem_thakker/status/1976786912154386828/

by bhouston • 10 months ago

103 102 10 months ago

    "TikTok took down my 8-second video featuring an image
    of Debbie Brockman — the news producer just detained by
    CBP agents — saying it violates the “joy of TikTok” "

The violation notice from tiktok:

    "Violation reason
    Shocking and Graphic content

    Part of the joy of TikTok is coming across new and
    unexpected content. But the platform is not a place to
    intentionally shock, upset, or disgust others. We recognize
    this type of content may be triggering, cause psychological
    harm, or lead to extreme discomfort.

    We do not allow gory, gruesome, disturbing, or extremely
    violent content."

nomel11• 9 months ago

I suspect this is data driven. It would be reasonable to think that long term engagement drops if people don't enjoy what they watch, in aggregate, even if short term engagement is high for "non joyful" content. From what I can tell, TikTok is powered by dopamine, not cortisol. With dopamine being the "joy" hormone...

edit: is there some inside knowledge to the data or algorithm that I'm not aware of that's driving these votes? is this some unreasonable perspective? do humans seek stress, long term?

ansley• 9 months ago

aside from users "stuck in the dopamine loop", i also think tiktok will see users plateau and eventually shrink without relevant content, even if it's a tough watch. If "joy of tiktok" becomes code for "news that does not upset dear leader" folks will go somewhere else for that content, and imho that's a meaningful chunk of users.

xtajv• 9 months ago

This is legitimately reassuring.

There are nearly-century-old journalistic guidelines and ethical codes about what you do and do not put into widespread news media.

Posting explicit details about methods used in a celebrity suicide encourages copycats.

Posting explicit details about a shooter's extremist philosophical beliefs brings those beliefs closer to the mainstream AND encourages copycats.

There was a certain recent college debate that I was very surprised to see proliferate across social media, because of the fact that We Do Not Publish Snuff Films.

I actually assumed it was a deepfake, doubted AP News Wire and Reuters, and finally bought it when I saw a tiktok from the TMZ cutting room floor. The fellow in charge didn't believe it either... until he did, and then it was an all-hands-on-deck moment steadied by someone clearly experiencing a huge surge of adrenaline but keeping their cool while operating in their element.

huflungdung2• 9 months ago

So what though? If I have a website and I want a particular type of content on it, why should I NOT be allowed to moderate it? These are not public services.

urbandw311er• 9 months ago

Came to say the same. You posted something on somebody’s service. It wasn’t in line with what they allow on their service. Accept that truth or else use a different service.

deepsun• 9 months ago

Agree, time to host our own websites. People falsely believe sites like Facebook and Twitter are public utilities (some government services even depend on them now). While in reality their owners benevolently allowed you to store and share your content on their premises.

I would also add full responsibility for social platforms for actions of their visitors that they allowed on their premises. Similar to how, say, we accept responsibility of a private park owner allowing public visitors to.

https://harvardlawreview.org/blog/2024/09/courts-should-hold...

PS: somebody flagged your comment, I clicked "vouch" for it.

huflungdung2• 9 months ago

Thanks. The fact that this got flagged and removed is rather apt.

aprilthird20216• 9 months ago

The problem is the US government very publicly and explicitly forced TikTok to sell their website so they could change the content on it.

If you cannot have a particular type of content on your website and it get very popular without the government demanding you sell it to them, then there's a problem. TikTok was the first website to reach social media scale viewership in the US with such anti-American sentiments broadcast on it

nomdep• 9 months ago

Because the alternative was to keep letting the Chinese Communist Party to do it.

Anything else is preferable.

nemothekid2• 9 months ago

I imagine this is being posted as a response to the fact that TikTok was forced to sell itself after it didn’t play nicely with US propaganda.

There is (or was) plenty of politically charged content on TikTok. There’s company began to change its tune once its livelyhood required being in Trump’s good graces

ares623• 9 months ago

Ignorance is bliss

Freedom is slavery

War is peace

makk• 9 months ago

All for one and one for all.

And I’m for myself.

nitrix3• 9 months ago

That's fine. Not every platform has to work the same way and attract the same communities.

lwansbrough• 9 months ago

Well there's always going to be one lobster that likes the water a little warmer.

jmcgough• 9 months ago

It's hard to know for sure, but many people are reporting that rules are being enforced unequally to silence news critical of the current administration.

GeoAtreides• 9 months ago

That's true.

You can post creative works on both Ao3 and spacebattles, but you certainly can not post some Ao3 works on spacebattles (or, indeed, anywhere).

kragen7• 9 months ago

Citizen, your expression reveals a disturbing lack of joy. Why are you engaging with the Customs and Border Protection agents repressing subversive journalists? Wouldn't you rather drink a nice, refreshing Coca-Cola?

gruez10• 9 months ago

At the same time letting politics go unchecked turns it into a cesspool like reddit, where politics is shoehorned into most of the default subreddits and "Epstien" is brought up in any thread vaguely political. You might think these issues deserve attention, and they might even drive engagement for some, but not everyone wants their cat video app to be like a 24/7 cable TV news channel.

thrance2• 9 months ago

That's a terrible take. Of course politics will play an increasing part in daily life when the country is devolving into a dictatorship. A journalist is getting abducted on the street by the regime's gestapo and your first reaction is "boring, I want to be kept in the dark and resume my mindless consumption of brainrot".

Grimblewald2• 9 months ago

Was never a problem on TT to date. Only when it gets taken over is it suddenly that truths freedom is a problem. I wonder why.

kragen7• 9 months ago

Did letting politics go unchecked turn the telephone system into a "cesspool"? How about the newspapers? The bookstores? Videotape rental stores? The public library?

Maybe censorship is the problem, not the solution. The fact that people are allowed to use a medium to talk about things you aren't interested in doesn't imply that you can't use it to talk about the things you are.

gonzobonzo2• 9 months ago

And Reddit's far more tightly censored than Tik Tok. Most subs won't even allow open discussion of certain hotly debated topics because the Reddit admins have threatened to shut them down (and shut down subs that didn't tightly censor discussion in the past). Twitter used to be pretty tightly censored as well. Right now there's a huge drama on Bluesky because many people want those that don't agree with them politically banned.

That's one of the things that's tiring about these debates. Too many people only view "free speech" as a rhetorical cudgel, using it to hit "the other side" when it's convenient, then immediately discarding it and going back to "freedom of speech doesn't mean freedom from consequences!" when it's not.

paulhebert2• 9 months ago

Three thoughts:

- Isn’t the point of apps like TikTok that they show you content that is interesting to you? Why can’t they show politics to people who are interested but not to people who aren’t?

- Does TikTok ban all political content? Or just some? Do they ban all “non-joyful” content? Or just some?

- Might this be related to the sale of TikTok to American investors linked to Trump?

nomel11• 9 months ago

This is, fundamentally, what made TikTok a success.

This is why TikTok is not a lens you should perceive the world through, or get "controversial" news from. It's a highly curated feed to maximize long term engagement and profits. Cortisol, the stress hormone, is the "situational avoidance" hormone [1].

High glucocorticoid stress-responses are associated with prolonged freezing reactions and decreased active approach and avoidance behavior in animals.

Increasing a chemical that is tied to avoiding an activity is in complete odds with the goals of TikTok.

[1] https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/15854783/

kragen7• 9 months ago

That's the opposite of what Facebook notoriously found—but, either way, is maximizing long-term engagement in the best interest of the users?

bhouston2• 9 months ago

This is, fundamentally, what made TikTok a success.

The algorithm optimizes for engagement.

This is outside of that optimization because it is outright just removing this content, not even considering it for display.

jazzyjackson• 9 months ago

huh? Doesn't tiktok engagement increase as a person becomes more avoidant of whatever it is they'd have to do if they weren't scrolling on tiktok?

resters3• 9 months ago

The administration's theft of TikTok is absolutely unacceptable and we should all be horrified. Entrepreneurs built a great business with an algorithm that is still -- years after it launched -- head and shoulders more entertaining and engagement-generating than anything domestic firms could come up with, even with years to figure it out.

TikTok is also significantly better for content creators and has more useful tooling. TikTok lets videos be downloaded by default which is why most Instagram Reels (tm) and YouTube Shorts (tm) are actually TikToks someone uploaded.

TikTok was a problem for the US Government both because it outshone US firms -- ironically by making the algorithm show more interesting and appealing content to users, rather than the "viral" rubbish that overtakes the incumbents feeds... and also because it started becoming a source of highly informative citizen journalism, spreading awareness about many social issues, from police brutality to the treatment of the people of Gaza by Israel and the US.

It's the politically sensitive citizen journalism that Bebe considers a "weapon" that needed to be stolen from its creators.

Now, per Larry Ellison's recent comments, everyone's TikTok history is being mined by Oracle to help suppress dissent against Trump's policies and keep people in line.

I've already started noticing a few obviously fake disinformation campaigns that support pro-Trump goals starting to gain ground on TikTok and other social media in the past week or so.

There is absolutely no reason that any country that values freedom of speech and press freedom should confiscate someone else's company to weaponize it against the American people. This is an utterly shameful episode motivated by the worst and darkest human motivations -- controlling others and suppressing the speech of the downtrodden.

nitrix3• 9 months ago

Or people are just trying to not be reminded every second of their living lives that there's one conflict or another going on. TikTok is made in China and used worldwide. Not many things are relatable and relevant to a world wide audience.

resters3• 9 months ago

Have you ever used TikTok? It responds rapidly to your engagement (likes, skips, etc.) and very quickly starts showing you mostly the kind of content you enjoy.

Not sure what you mean about it not being relatable to a worldwide audience. I see mostly US content in English and a bit in Spanish, but the algorithm will quickly adapt to show the user content from whatever regions they are interested in.

SoftTalker• 9 months ago

Now, per Larry Ellison's recent comments, everyone's TikTok history is being mined by Oracle to help suppress dissent against Trump's policies and keep people in line.

Almost as if everyone using the same few centralized platforms that they ultimately have no control over is a situation ripe for abuse.

nomel11• 9 months ago

The administration's theft of TikTok is absolutely unacceptable and we should all be horrified.

TikTok is still under Chinese ownership. Nothing has changed (yet).

IceHegel• 9 months ago

"Democracy" is obviously a scam if a foreign power can buy the platforms and adjust information flows to "shift" public opinion their way.

Votes are the output, not the input. Not that officials seems to listen anyway.

aprilthird20216• 9 months ago

if a foreign power can buy the platforms and adjust information flows to "shift" public opinion their way.

NO.

I will never accept this premise and nor should any American. The people ARE the government and they can be influenced any which way they want to be. There shouldn't ever be any such thing as the government "protecting" people from influence. If the people want to all tune into some foreign broadcaster all day and love everything he's saying. That's how the country will be.

The second you accept "oh foreign influence is manipulating our voters to X or Y so it has to be stopped" you are signing the death warrant for free speech. This is EXACTLY the justification used in all sorts of authoritarian garbage places to suppress information and restrict speech

iamnothere• 9 months ago

I agree with you on this. People who don’t believe this fundamentally do not believe in democracy.

You may worry about citizens being sufficiently educated, you may worry about them having access to enough information to make good decisions. But to restrict information for fear that they may make the “wrong” decision—the one you don’t like—there is nothing democratic about that.

Foreign voices and perspectives are critical to understanding the world as a whole and making informed decisions. If the population isn’t ready to take in that information and sort the wheat from the chaff, then they aren’t ready for democracy.

nemothekid2• 9 months ago

Bit ironic that we are finally getting the dreaded draconian Chinese censorship once the company was forced to sell to Americans

gruez10• 9 months ago

Finally? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship_by_TikTok#Politics

bgwalter• 9 months ago

Trump claims that China has practically approved the deal, but as of Oct 10th we again have a 100% tariff threat on China and no confirmed Chinese approval:

https://www.nbcnews.com/business/economy/trump-threatens-chi...

With Trump flooding the zone, this news was difficult to find. Much of the press just reported that the deal is practically sealed, which he (probably falsely) bragged about on Truth Social.

So the ICE censorship appears to be still done by Chinese algorithms, perhaps to soften up trade relations or because their algorithms are tuned to censor videos of persons in military gear beating down a citizen anyway.

stackedinserter4• 9 months ago

"Just build your own tiktok". "Freedom of speech is not absolute". "Freedom of expression doesn't guarantee giving you a platform". "1st amendment protect you from government, not from companies".

Let me guess: they censored some leftist content, am I right?

krapp2• 9 months ago

Freedom of speech isn't absolute, and it doesn't guarantee you a platform, and the 1st Amendment does only protect you from government, not companies.

I don't see what the point of your comment is. It seems like you're dunking on "the left" for... being factually correct?

stackedinserter4• 9 months ago

My point is that so called "progressives" kept justifying and even celebrating censorship for more than a decade, but screeching and screaming now, when it hit themselves.

bhouston2• 9 months ago

Let me guess: they censored some leftist content, am I right?

It is this video of ICE arresting a prominent news reporter and slamming them into the ground - it isn't clear she is leftist or simply reporting the news:

https://chicago.suntimes.com/immigration/2025/10/10/feds-arr...

nomel11• 9 months ago

Is there an uncut video? As controversial as the desire for full understanding is these days, there an incredible amount of context missing from that video:

The video starts with her car being faced diagonal, facing the wrong way in traffic, blocking traffic, with an ICE vehicle clipping her trying to go around. What's the context for that? The article has a single sentence, "Jennifer Welday said she first heard honking and yelling just after 8:30 a.m.". Is that related? Was that her honking and yelling? Was that before or after they hit?

There's a cut in the video, then her on the ground. What happened during that cut?

stackedinserter4• 9 months ago

So I was right, as usual.

jauntywundrkind• 9 months ago

Who knows, but worth noting at least that China has demanded purges of negativity across the internet. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/10/08/world/asia/china-censorsh...

I don't think it's probable that that's what's going on here. But it is possible. And the overlapping concerns of state control & platform censorship seem abundantly clear.

tstrimple• 9 months ago

One of the few social media outlets that didn't blatantly censor Israel's war crimes. So of course it had to go. Places like Hacker News are safe because they toe the line and ensure "inconvenient topics" aren't popular or promoted. It's fully baked into their rules and it's generally accepted as a Good Thing somehow. Anti-censorship lip-service out of one side of their mouth and rampant clampdown on "unacceptable conversations" within their VC safe space.

TikTok removing posts for violating the "joy of TikTok"

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