Comment by eagleislandsong
2 months ago
> if an app is declared an agent of foreign powers
I suspect that people pattern-match this declaration to McCarthyism.
Additionally, the US has been invoking national security for a series of extremely dubious moves recently as well -- e.g. Biden's latest decision to block the sale of US Steel to Nippon on shaky grounds of national security, and his administration's recent policy to introduce export limits on GPUs to all countries except 18 (most US allies, NATO or otherwise, are now unjustly being restricted in how many GPUs they can import). Coupled with the incoming Trump administration's threats of trade war and expansionist designs on Greenland, people -- especially non-Americans, also in countries that have historically been friends of the US -- are very quickly running out of goodwill for the US, and in light of these events naturally the TikTok ban is seen as just another draconian attempt by the US to practise (economic) imperialism.
McCarthyism wasn't a very credible threat. There are reams of evidence that CCP is trying to destroy democracy and attacking all of our critical infrastructure (electronic especially) looking for weak points. There is nothing imagined about it like there was with McCarthyism
Overall I agree with you. I was merely speculating on why there is so much pushback against the TikTok ban -- that people (erroneously) pattern-match this decision to McCarthyism.