4 ms·

Russia seems totally capable of doing that just by paying people and using bots.

ruraljuror 2y ago
No. Not at the scale of Tiktok.
Sabinus 2y ago
Indeed, but that doesn't mean you should expose the youth more to belligerent foreign controlled agitprop information channels.
- roenxi 2y ago
  What is the real risk here? The only thing they can really do is make the case that if China invades Taiwan then the US shouldn't get involved. There problem is they might well be right; if I compare Hong Kong and Ukraine, I'd expect Taiwan would be better off going with the HK model of an "invasion" rather than fighting an actual war with the world's #2 or arguably #1 economy. So I'm not sure what the case is for quelling the message; there are some important issues there to debate. Even if we start with the questionable idea that the US has the moral and physical might to be deciding where the borders are drawn in Asia; it isn't obvious that TikTok would be influential enough to matter. The military-industrial complex lobbyists in the US have a lot of actual power in pushing for war and experience in getting messages to the public.
  - _djo_ 2y ago
    They may well be right that the people of Taiwan, a country with a democratically elected government, should just lie down and accept a complete and undemocratic Chinese takeover of their country? All because China is saying: "Either you submit to us completely voluntarily, or you submit by force, but you will submit"? That's imperialism.
    - roenxi 2y ago
      > That's imperialism. Yep. Just because we don't like something doesn't mean that there are good alternatives. If I were in Tawian, Option A is status quo. Option B is to put the best and brightest into diplomatic posts. And they probably have a stack of other options they're thinking about. But all else failing Option Imperial-Subject is a much better one than Option Taipei-Becomes-A-Pancake-And-Then-Imperial-Subject. If there is going to be war it'd better be war with a credible good outcome to it. The US could step in and police this back when it was 8x, 4x, 2x the size of China. I'd be surprised if it can now. China is pretty powerful.
      - _djo_ 2y ago
        The good alternative is China not wanting to take over a sovereign country, and for the world to gradually normalise Taiwan as a legitimate country. China has no urgent or pressing self defence need to attack Taiwan. It also does not have a strong legal case to justify taking it over. In any rational sense the strongest case is for China to leave it alone. Allowing the status quo to continue is better for the people of China, for the people of Taiwan, and for the rest of us around the world. It's pure imperialist nonsense and we shouldn't seek to legitimise it just because China is powerful.
    - stefantalpalaru 2y ago
      [dead]
  - ruraljuror 2y ago
    I’m exaggerating a little (but not much): the risk with tiktok is that it is brainwashing Americans—particularly young ones—with anti-American sentiment. Not only does that suck for the individual, but diminishes the civil-service talent pool and weakens US institutions. It’s like the CCP looked at what social media was doing to mental health and cable news to our political discourse and said “I can do something with that, I’ll take the extra large.”
  - matwood 2y ago
    > What is the real risk here? You're thinking too literal about what to influence. The more internal divide that foreign powers can amplify, the more likely that US will not/can not intervene in other places around the world. There's also general propaganda to make people more empathetic towards China/Russia prior to any events occurring.
kelnos 2y ago
Sure, there are many avenues to spread this sort of propaganda, but a state-run social media platform can certainly be a lot more effective than someone flooding someone else's social media platform with propaganda. Assuming the Chinese government is using TikTok for influence campaigns (they'd be foolish not to), they only way to stop it is to outright ban it in your country (which the US seems to be trying to do, with possibly-disastrous effects), or find a way to get your citizens to dislike it (good luck with that). While Russia is doing pretty well at their influence campaigns on other platforms, those platforms can choose, if they so desire, to step up their detection and banning efforts. It's a constant cat-and-mouse game, of course, but it's at least possible to stamp out most of that crap if you're willing to spend the resources to do so.
ekianjo 2y ago
really? any proof?
- latchkey 2y ago
  Maybe you missed the recent news... https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-rt-employees-indicted-covertly-funding-and-directing-us-company-published-thousands https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-rt-employees-indicted-cov...
  - bruhlikereally 2y ago
    [flagged]
  - ekianjo 2y ago
    from the government directly at war with Russia. sounds like a super credible source.
    - immibis 2y ago
      What source would you accept if you wouldn't accept this?
    - Cthulhu_ 2y ago
      Who started that war again, and under what pretenses? I'm not saying Ukraine is some golden child or whatever but they weren't the aggressor.
      - ekianjo 2y ago
        the USA tried to invade Cuba when the soviets put missiles there, and somehow people are surprised that Russia would do the same thing in the same situation.
        aguaviva 2y ago
        It did no such thing, and the situations aren't comparable at all.
mpweiher 2y ago
Knives are perfectly capable of killing you, so let's not worry about nuclear bombs?

No. Not at the scale of Tiktok.

Indeed, but that doesn't mean you should expose the youth more to belligerent foreign controlled agitprop information channels.

roenxi 2y ago
What is the real risk here? The only thing they can really do is make the case that if China invades Taiwan then the US shouldn't get involved. There problem is they might well be right; if I compare Hong Kong and Ukraine, I'd expect Taiwan would be better off going with the HK model of an "invasion" rather than fighting an actual war with the world's #2 or arguably #1 economy. So I'm not sure what the case is for quelling the message; there are some important issues there to debate. Even if we start with the questionable idea that the US has the moral and physical might to be deciding where the borders are drawn in Asia; it isn't obvious that TikTok would be influential enough to matter. The military-industrial complex lobbyists in the US have a lot of actual power in pushing for war and experience in getting messages to the public.
- _djo_ 2y ago
  They may well be right that the people of Taiwan, a country with a democratically elected government, should just lie down and accept a complete and undemocratic Chinese takeover of their country? All because China is saying: "Either you submit to us completely voluntarily, or you submit by force, but you will submit"? That's imperialism.
  - roenxi 2y ago
    > That's imperialism. Yep. Just because we don't like something doesn't mean that there are good alternatives. If I were in Tawian, Option A is status quo. Option B is to put the best and brightest into diplomatic posts. And they probably have a stack of other options they're thinking about. But all else failing Option Imperial-Subject is a much better one than Option Taipei-Becomes-A-Pancake-And-Then-Imperial-Subject. If there is going to be war it'd better be war with a credible good outcome to it. The US could step in and police this back when it was 8x, 4x, 2x the size of China. I'd be surprised if it can now. China is pretty powerful.
    - _djo_ 2y ago
      The good alternative is China not wanting to take over a sovereign country, and for the world to gradually normalise Taiwan as a legitimate country. China has no urgent or pressing self defence need to attack Taiwan. It also does not have a strong legal case to justify taking it over. In any rational sense the strongest case is for China to leave it alone. Allowing the status quo to continue is better for the people of China, for the people of Taiwan, and for the rest of us around the world. It's pure imperialist nonsense and we shouldn't seek to legitimise it just because China is powerful.
  - stefantalpalaru 2y ago
    [dead]
- ruraljuror 2y ago
  I’m exaggerating a little (but not much): the risk with tiktok is that it is brainwashing Americans—particularly young ones—with anti-American sentiment. Not only does that suck for the individual, but diminishes the civil-service talent pool and weakens US institutions. It’s like the CCP looked at what social media was doing to mental health and cable news to our political discourse and said “I can do something with that, I’ll take the extra large.”
- matwood 2y ago
  > What is the real risk here? You're thinking too literal about what to influence. The more internal divide that foreign powers can amplify, the more likely that US will not/can not intervene in other places around the world. There's also general propaganda to make people more empathetic towards China/Russia prior to any events occurring.

kelnos 2y ago

Sure, there are many avenues to spread this sort of propaganda, but a state-run social media platform can certainly be a lot more effective than someone flooding someone else's social media platform with propaganda. Assuming the Chinese government is using TikTok for influence campaigns (they'd be foolish not to), they only way to stop it is to outright ban it in your country (which the US seems to be trying to do, with possibly-disastrous effects), or find a way to get your citizens to dislike it (good luck with that). While Russia is doing pretty well at their influence campaigns on other platforms, those platforms can choose, if they so desire, to step up their detection and banning efforts. It's a constant cat-and-mouse game, of course, but it's at least possible to stamp out most of that crap if you're willing to spend the resources to do so.

ekianjo 2y ago

really? any proof?

latchkey 2y ago
Maybe you missed the recent news... https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-rt-employees-indicted-covertly-funding-and-directing-us-company-published-thousands https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/two-rt-employees-indicted-cov...
- bruhlikereally 2y ago
  [flagged]
- ekianjo 2y ago
  from the government directly at war with Russia. sounds like a super credible source.
  - immibis 2y ago
    What source would you accept if you wouldn't accept this?
  - Cthulhu_ 2y ago
    Who started that war again, and under what pretenses? I'm not saying Ukraine is some golden child or whatever but they weren't the aggressor.
    - ekianjo 2y ago
      the USA tried to invade Cuba when the soviets put missiles there, and somehow people are surprised that Russia would do the same thing in the same situation.
      - aguaviva 2y ago
        It did no such thing, and the situations aren't comparable at all.

mpweiher 2y ago

Knives are perfectly capable of killing you, so let's not worry about nuclear bombs?