← Back to context

Comment by bdndndndbve

19 hours ago

Unlike in America where... they say it's a national security threat and vote to remove it?

Only the control by a foreign adversary part is being threatened in the US, not the algorithmic opium part twisting the minds of the population. They're two different things. The US so far has no qualms with it if an American is in control of the strings. That's where China differs.

  • > The US so far has no qualms with it if an American is in control of the strings. That's where China differs

    Legally, there is no issue with TikTok being Japanese, Korean, Indian, Saudi, Polish, Ugandan, Brazilian or Mexican. Just not owned by a foreign adversary country.

    • Yes, thank you. I've updated the earlier sentence from "foreign control" to "control by a foreign adversary". It's indeed the fact that China is a geopolitical enemy-to-be that's the problem.

      2 replies →

    • Don't fool yourself or fall for the propaganda: China is hardly an adversary -- just look at how much money we send them and how many goods they send us. If they were truly an adversary we'd be treating them like we do Russia.

      3 replies →

> they say it's a national security threat and vote to remove it?

From app stores and American hosting. Only if Bytedance doesn’t sell TikTok to e.g. a French or Indian or American owner. TikTok.com will still resolve (unless Bytedance blocks it).

China literally blocks information.

Any country has mechanisms to ban products the government deems as bad. I think the point is those are much more liberally used in China vs in the US, not that the US would be unable to do it

1) A single party apparatus determines something must be removed, and by fiat it is immediately removed

2) Multiple agencies investigate and make a determination that a real threat exists, the threat and measures to resolve it are debated strongly in two houses of Congress between strongly opposing parties, an passes with bi-partisan support, the law is signed by the President, then the law is upheld through multiple challenges in multiple courts and panels of judges, finally being upheld by the Supreme Court of the country. And no, this is not yet a situation where the country has fallen into autocracy so the institutions have all been corrupted to serve the executive (I.e., not like Hungary, Venezuela, Russia, etc.).

If you think these are the same... I'll just be polite and say the ignorance expressed in that post is truly stunning and wherever you got your education has deeply failed — yikes.