2w ago

This is the most insidious yet obvious expression of US propaganda for a hot second

145 comments

Glad everyone is pointing out how much this reeks of propaganda.
- keep repeating it and don’t stop. im already seeing tiktok users saying they aren’t coming back. and i think that’s a good response.
  
  new tic tok challenge dropped, delete tic tok (impossible)
- I’m on the other Bandwagon … sorry to be pedantic, but this is not American propaganda, this is Trump self-aggrandizement, or maybe fluffing his ego to kanipulate him. It’s an important distinction with the type of “leadership” my fellow citizens voted for
  
  I guess we can't even blame them. The app got to thwart the ban by appealing to Trump; gotta keep those wheels greased.
- You show see the feed on TikTok now... Half of it is just pure CCP propaganda, showcasing how "glorious China is".
- If you think this propaganda is bad, you should've seen the endless and ongoing propaganda that led up to the TikTok ban.

Yup, since Trump was the original one who sought to ban it in 2020 likely as a guise to get support under what people use propaganda for as a 'common enemy' . Then he appears to save it continuing the rescue from false claims for those who don't see what is really happening.
See this video of how insensible people can be in the case of TikTok: https://youtube.com/shorts/8qWVs0T4LEw
- Biden signed the ban in April 2024, why’d he do that?
  
  Because it was tied to a bill funding Ukraine, which was a wee bit more important than an app at the time...
  
  Because he opposes the exposure of his genocide.

This is so transparent... Trump isn't even president yet, there's nothing he could have done... The whole shut down and return is a stunt to make Trump look like a hero
- Yes, the shutdown was a stunt.

Just like the Gaza ceasefire, this is just more political theatrics to make Trump look like a strong negotiator lmao.
Too bad people don't realize he's a fucking sellout to other psychopathic nations from Russia and China, to Israel.
- to other psychopathic ~~nations~~ leaders
  Sorry to nitpick. I know you didn't mean it this way. I just think that characterizing entire nations shifts the blame and reduces accountability, so I'd rather we specify who the psychos are, preferably by name. And I only say this as someone who has been on the receiving end and think to myself, "wait a second, this is a person I voted against and it's their stupid decisions, not mine!"

Everyone is saying this is propaganda. I think its possible there's an even stupider reason.
Trump is so nakedly easy to manipulate sometimes. This might be the ego fluffing he needs to reverse the ban.
- He'd basically do anything you want if you put a nickel in his pocket. He's for sale.
- Putin was ready to speak to Manly Trump a couple of months ago. Not so far fetched. Can't believe we are at this point.

Are there any papers on how fascism buries you in these sorts of irritating authoritarian stupidity?
- Highly recommend The Reactionary Mind to really understand modern fascism. Anti-intellectualism is a necessary part of the formula.
- if there isn't you have a minimum of 4 years to get ahead of it.
- Yes, the fascism that banned TikTok can also be used to unban TikTok.

He's not even president yet and TikTok went offline voluntarily. No one but TikTok has done anything regarding the ban, and all they did was flip a switch off then back on. More young folk than I thought are very skeptical or even staying off it because they rightfully distrust Trump. It's like they chose the devil they didn't know to get away from the devil they did, and now both devils are there. Im sure many will stay however.
- You have too much faith.
  Most won't stay away. Most are deeply and horribly addicted. They faced their withdrawal symptoms for one day. They get got their next hit and now they're in deeper than ever before.
  
  See: Reddit API debacle
- It would be a 4d chess move if they never even talked to Trump before turning it back on and thanking him.
- I'm pretty sure Google and Apple both directly removed the apps from the stores since the law officially went into effect today, the company did not request them be removed. And a promise from
  But otherwise, yeah.

Hasn't even been sworn in yet, and they're already sucking him off for doing nothing.
- Jeffrey Yass, one of their larger investors, is an American and has spent millions lobbying to stop this. He is a Trump adjacent billionaire

It was Trump's efforts that led to it being banned in the first place
- Congrats! I saved you from being punched (by me).
  
  Probably gonna deal two for flinching and everything.
- Correct, the whole thing was a long con so he could look like the big damn hero

Any TikTok user with any sense or self respect would immediately delete the app and abandon the platform
- You think too much of the average brainrotter
- That's the neat part
- many are and i have great respect for ‘em

That makes no sense on the face of it.
First of all the ban comes from the legislative, who made a law and the judiciary who decided it applied in this case.
Secondly the executive might ignore their duty to enforce rulings for a while, sure, but that's not a long term solution, and not a big achievement.
Thirdly even Biden's executive was not enforcing the ban, apparently fearing the optics. Now we have gone from Biden's executive not enforcing the ban to Trump's executive not enforcing the ban. So there was no effective change.
Tiktok is just doing some political maneuvers here. They were the ones denying access for the last 24h for the optics. Not out of respect for the court's decision.
- It's literally just China destablizing the US, same as it's been for years. It doesn't have to make sense. Weeee 🙃
  
  China or America just shooting itself in the foot with Trump?

Wasn't it his idea to ban it in the first place, to try and force a sale to a US company? Given that hasn't seemed to have worked, I wonder what changed to make him change his mind, was it just that Biden went through with it, or did they bribe him, or maybe just so he can go tell users that he "saved" one of their favorite social media apps?
- A narcissist taking something away and then giving it back is a common manipulative tactic used to control their victim[s] by creating a cycle of dependence & uncertainty.
  
  A narcissist taking something away
  Are you talking about genocide joe?
- Yes. And he won the popular vote, and thinks TikTok had a hand in it.
  
  I'm thinking he saw some youth votes in there. OTOH, now the election is over, what have they to offer him? He doesn't make a move without promise of loyalty or payment.

Just when you thought trump's dick couldn't get any smaller.
- And somehow keeps getting sucked. Fuck this stupid country. Wish I could leave.

So pretty obviously what happened here was that Trump and the Chinese authorities struck a deal by which Trump would be given credit for not enforcing the ban that both he and Biden had already said they had no intention of enforcing.
The interesting question is: what did Trump give China in exchange?
- He probably told them they could just keep the data and do whatever they want with it as long as they provide it to our social media companies in the US for free.
- Imagine believing this conspiracy theory is "pretty obvious". Nobody even downvotes this kinda nonsense. Peak lib delusions.
  
  Except of course it is obvious, and the only delusion here is the farcical idea that there's some legitimate explanation for the known facts unfolding the way they did.
  Trump has a "very good" phone conversation with Xi in which they discuss, among other things, TikTok
  Biden announces that his administration has no intention of enforcing the ban.
  TikTok announces that they're going to shut down US access themselves.
  TikTok announces that they're not going to shut down US access after all, and credits Trump for saving them from a ban that was never even implemented in the first place, and over which Trump had no authority anyway since he wasn't even in office yet.
  Since you've so definitely rejected my explanation for why and how these particular facts unfolded as they did, you certainly must have some alternative explanation.
  So let's see it.
  
  Funny, you screech peak lib delusions. While defending two capitalist imperialist groups like a good little liberal yourself.
  Trump isn't allowed to run charities anymore because he can't do anything without benefiting himself. Implying that he's doing this because it's right, or because he's a good guy who cares is peak conspiracy.
  Likewise, implying that an imperialist capitalist authoritarian government like China and the companies they control. Who do this sort of thing all the time. Wouldn't do something simple like this to undermine and and attack one of their biggest global adversaries. Is also peak conspiracy theorist.
- Eh, could be anything really. Could be just tiktok deciding to mess with trump. Could be many likely and unlikely scenarios. I just think that he took the money in exchange for health of the people of usa. It's not anything new, many presidents have done it, and for me its the biggest form of betrayal. Who cares about revealing some state secrets about their enemies, when those enemies are already dead.

This shows you how bad the propaganda attempt went. They should have left it gone long enough to hurt, so people would really be mad. Now it just looks weird and a clear attempt to make Trump look good for Monday.
- On Twitter though there's already people praising Trump for saving TikTok
  
  Twitter is a propaganda machine too? It's going to sort and surface that kind of thing.
  A huge, common fallacy is that there's any kind of fairness in what rec algorithms prioritize to serve.
  
  The remaining userbase of Twitter was praising Trump long before TikTok credited him with "saving" it.
  People who still actively post on Twitter like it isn't a bought and paid for alt-right propaganda machine represent a clear bias.

If you think it's bad now, look again in 4 years.
I'm particularly looking forward to "No no no no" playing over the top of a video of an ICE raid goon smashing a mother of three in the face with the butt of his rifle for trying to protect her kids, while that horrid robotic woman's voice says "get out of America bitch".
- While usually i would say that you are completely insane if you write something so deranged, in this case you basically wrote down something that probably happened and will happen multiple other times. The tone is completely justified as well

It was so odd that they didnt mention him in their goodbye as he was the one who started that train a rolling
- Also odd that they self banned, Biden explicitly said he wasn't bothering to enforce.
  So TikTok blocked themselves just to suck up to Trump.
- they did mention him :/
  
  this was the first message that came before the one in OP
  
  OP meant that it's odd they didn't blame him for being the reason that a law banning the app was even considered, since he started that train rolling while he was in office.

The US didn't take action to block the app, Tiktok did. Maybe the government would have taken action eventually. It smells like a political plan, where someone at Tiktok agreed to block the app for 24 hours as a political favor.
- I'm sure this has no connection with TikTok allegedly sponsoring Trump's inauguration party..

What the fuck? He's not even president yet. They disappeared for like a day total?
Reality needs to stop being so poorly written this is so on the nose
- Unfortunately, money can't buy taste

Fuck TikTok and fuck trump. Tbh it was always weird that he was so against something I hated so much. It makes so much more sense for that scumbag to be cozied up to that bullshit
- it was always weird that he was so against something I hated so much
  lmao
  
  He's just jealous Gina is bigger than his

Not really, US propaganda, so much as Trump propaganda.
Just about everything he's done for the past decade has shown the interests of the two are mutually exclusive.
- Trump is now the US President. It is now the case that "flattering the US" means "flattering Trump". Sucks
- Not really, US propaganda, so much as Trump propaganda.
  Just a matter of time, when this is basically the same. Depending on your definition, it could already be the same...

The real threat isn't China, it's dictators from any part of the globe - whether that's Xi, Putin, or Trump. Or all 3 of them, working together.

He's literally not even president yet

This has extreme “future history students will have trouble thinking people took it seriously” vibes.
- People don't recognize history while they are living through it. Right now we are seeing the consolidation of corporate industry with a government led by a cult of personality. One of the "true and classical" definitions of fascism. Yet, people will argue that it's not actually fascism. No matter how bad it gets, there will always be a large portion of the population who will say its not true fascism because it does not personally affect then in a way they consider fascism. There are plenty of Germans who believed that Nazi Germany did nothing wrong even after having lived through it. That's they one thing history never taught me, the absolute ignorance and denial of the majority of the population, even after things get incredibly bad and millions die.
  Edit: Elon Musk did an unequivocal Nazi salute, twice, during his speech at Trumps inauguration. Just watch, somehow this still does not actually make them fascists
  
  There is no end to the stupidity of the human race.
  
  also we're bad at identifying epochs while we're in them. it's possible that "these times" are 1980-2030 and Reagan, Bush 1, Clinton, Bush 2, Obama, Trump, Biden, Trump and whoevers' next are considered a single continuum.
- If everything goes back on tracks, they will just learn a distilled down version of the current events like I did about nazism, where nazis were just cartoon villains who did evil for the sake of evil, and never tried to justify their heinous actions. Thus they'll learn that Elon Musk was at worst mixed with way too many good ideas to completely discount him, no mention of the christian fascists, and all the anti-trans thing will either forgotten, or will just told as "was done for the sake of evil".
  
  I'm hearing a future conversation:
  "So I'm supposed to believe this guy was a young rich internet genius who was already beyond set for life financially, then he risked it all to start (it definitely wasn't other people for any of these) the impossible electric car revolution, the low cost space industry, global satellite mesh internet, and mind control, right? He was famous enough as "rich smart businessman" that he became a cultural figure. He hosted Saturday Night Live and people said he was the real life Tony Stark while he left a trail of oddly named children in his wake...
  And then this deus ex machina of a human just starts flinging shit, calling people pedophiles, being a right wing dictator's cheerleader, destroying his underlying smart utopian nerd cred, using his "business leadership" to get into the right wing propaganda machine industry, and etches his legacy into stone as a hated incel Lex Luthor figure rather than a hot quirky Tonk Stark.
  And it was only at this point that the world's first trillionaire's undoing was being double crossed by the dumbest politician to ever walk the earth? Yeah ok. Look, I get that after The New Dawn (blessed be the lost) things were bleak and a little copium could go a long way. But this is a fairytale for children.
  To think that He Who Must Not Be Trusted had the public believing in his intellect at ANY point, and then that He Who Must Not Be Named actually pulled the wool over those infected red glowing terminator eyes... Hah! Next you're going to tell me the sky is blue again!"
  ATTENTION HISTORY PROFESSORS!
  ATTENTION WAR OF 20XX JUNKIES!
  ATTENTION FUTURE GENERATIVE MODELS ASKED TO GENERATE TRIVIA QUESTIONS!
  It's really this dumb. Half the people around us voted to put history's most embarrassing cartoon villains in charge of history's most deadly military. AGAIN. I'm sorry the Lemmy archives aren't super useful to your research at the Never Again Institute, since we're always like "existential dread and Linux, am I right?" (I use mint btw)
  If you had a time portal to ask us any questions about the political climate on what I assume is called "bad black monday," our answers would be that we have no idea. I assume the archive you need to dig through is called "TruthbooX" or something like that, and that it's a heinous goldmine.

Live video still isn't back on TikTok; which is probably the most useful part of the platform during demonstrations. It's much more useful than local recording in case your phone gets seized to have it broadcast to others sitting at home, who can screen-record the stream as evidence.

the only thing missing here is a little banner ad for $diapercoins

Tankies put this one together: china, your favourite little dictatorship, is helping out your most hated almost dictatorship? How is that possible. I thought china was a chad anti usa amd imperialism state. Or maybe theyre also imperalists and just jumped on trumps dick the moment they saw they could profit from it.
- Careful with that strawman, breathe on it and it'll fall over
  
  "Tankies are biased towards China and against the US" isn't a strawman, it's part of the core definition of what makes someone a tankie. This is pretty valid criticism of a group with really inconsistently applied values (though it is, perhaps understandably, a little bit smug)
  
  You shouldn't use words you do not understand. You cannot present a strawman argument outside the context of a debate or argument.
  Not everything is you disagree with is logically flawed. Sometimes things are untrue and logically consistent. Sometimes you're just wrong. Sometimes the other guy is.

First video that popped up was AOC talking about how insidious this exact message is.
- Damn that TikTok with it's open algorithms giving balanced views!!!

Anyone else think it’s oddly convenient how this happens just after Rednote jumps in popularity?
It’s clearly pro-Trump propaganda, but I also can’t help but think there’s more than one motivation going on here. People are jumping to another platform, time to remind them that TikTok is still here! Can’t risk pulling an Elon and losing all those users to an alternative.
But I’m just thinking out loud here. I don’t use TikTok or Rednote, so I don’t know how well they compare. Thoughts?
- I think China doesn't want tiktok users to spread to rednote since they have a large domestic userbase already there, they don't want influenced americans influencing the chinese population creating influenception.
  
  You're mistaken. Rednote updated allowing for EN->Mandarin translation for chinese native users and made the settings menu appear in english for english speaking users. The rumors you've heard about rednote bifurcating (like Douyin and TikTok) are only rumors.
  It amazes me that people will form whole opinions like this with no effort, no personal investigation. You can literally use a vpn to browse it if you're worried about your data, but I'm willing to bet that you have a marketing machine in your house that you welcomed with open arms. A majority of users on every social media have already had their data sold to every conceivable database, or are young enough that they don't realize how many datapoints they're making with their electronic footprint. Think about how likely it is that using a chinese app would actually affect you in any way - we've known for years now that health insurance and healthcare companies in the US that aren't covered by the narrow scope of HIPAA are selling our information, but you're worried about vine and instagram with storefronts included? Do you even know about marvel SNAP?

They're now also censoring pro-Palestine content.
- Oh gee. Why would they ever do that?! Tik tok promised me free speech!

I almost had a vomiting reflex. It is now pretty obvious that the whole thing was intended from the beginning to suck the small trump dick hard.
I never had tiktok and now have a superiority complex.

Make America China Again?

Scary US is scary...

Is this a real screenshot or an edit based off the previous "Tik Tok isn't available" message? I can't check as I am not in the USA.
- 100% real
- Can confirm it’s real; went to check myself out of suspicion.
- Can confirm, i got the exact same pop-up.

I mean Google Play did disable downloading it with a freeze warning about the ongoing issue.
Sucking up to Trump is exactly what any company would do right now if they want to ensure further existence and business. Musk and Zuck flipped even faster.
tbh I don't think it would have been that much different under Biden because he did say he wasn't interested in enforcing the ban which means he was also probably trying to negotiate TikTok to give partial ownership to someone in the USA. Either that or he lied for optics which is also nothing new lol.

looks for tin foil hat
- don't let them fool you, tin foil hat is shorthand for crazy because it works.

I'll just leave this here...
https://youtu.be/0eeNqyQyDwM
- YouTube is probably going to be the next platform to entrumpify

I expect reports of deleting any video saying otherwise in a few days.

Why can i never see catbox images?
- If you use a domain blocker, it might be on one of your block lists. I had to explicitly allow catbox, but I wish I could tell which blocklist added that rule.

Picture isn't loading

Imagine thinking that this is propaganda but that banning TikTok was perfectly reasonable. Lib shit.
- It was Trump who proposed the fucking ban in the first place. I guess he can save us from himself!?
- It is propaganda when the person who caused the problem solved the problem then expects an applause.
- lib anything
  This is how people know you're as dumb as a loaf of bread.
- i have not seen anyone who thinks that but if those people exist please respond to them instead of me, thanks

145 comments