Users on TikTok searching for “WGA” are met with a screen claiming that the phrase “may be associated with behavior or content that violates our guidelines.” No videos return. Users are also unable to search for the “WGA” hashtag.
TikTok has also blocked the search term “WGA strike.”
Additionally, it appears that TikTok is blocking results from any simple search that includes “WGA” in the search term. Including “WGA” in addition to another word — like “WGA support” or “WGA strong” — blocks results.
Update (9/11/23): A TikTok spokesperson told Media Matters that “WGA has been inadvertently blocked as part of the platforms’ protections against QAnon conspiracy theories.” (WWG1WGA is a common QAnon phrase.) The spokesperson added that searches for “Writers Guild of America” and “Writers Guild of America Strike” were not impacted. Searches for “WGA” and related terms now appear to function normally.
(Thanks mike591, SCB, crowsby, and others for putting in the comments)
Of course ByteDance is influenced by its government, every company is. And to more of an extent in China, because China is governed by a communist-inspired party who seeks to crush bourgeois influence.
My point is that this instance is much more likely an example of ByteDance doing pretty normal, if stupid, private company things. Hell, TikTok itself doesn’t even exist in China. They do have a very similar sister app, Doiyin, but operations between the two are ultimately separate.
According to the article in the post, this suppression of the writer’s strike was related to its effort to remove QAnon-related content from the platform. Apparently some QAnon acronym has WGA in it, and sure, you can dismiss that statement as deflection, and I wouldn’t fault you for it. But then I raise this question:
What does China stand to gain suppressing information about a strike in the US?
It doesn’t help anyone here be more pro-communist, if anything they would push pro-union content for that. China’s image isn’t being emboldened in the US for this, as your comment clearly shows it makes it worse. It makes far more sense for TikTok’s US operations to be suppressing pro-union information, whether at the request of other companies or their own enrichment. But even then, that would easily be spotted and called out, as it did even still. I believe China has far more to gain with its existing spy operations and suppression of internal affairs such as Xinjiang than it does with a labor strike in an entirely sifferent country that its own citizens likely have little, if any, knowledge about.
I don’t like China’s government, by the way. The reason I say all this isn’t to defend them, the reason I do it is because people tend to blame all of Chinese companies’ bad decisions on China itself instead of the companies. Intentionally or not, it absolves the companies of wrongdoing and puts it on China. While China obviously deserves plenty of criticism, from people of all ideologies, this situation just isn’t relevant to that discussion. I also suspect the mass panic surrounding Chinese influence is in no insignificant part manufactured to make the US populace okay with going to war over Taiwan. This isn’t anything new, remember Iraq’s WMDs? I want people to focus on fixing our own, very significant issues, here at home before turning attention overseas. This applies to other countries too but that’s out of scope for this discussion.
That being said, you’re right, I’m not going to continue. Not because I’m not interested in good faith discussion, as my wall of text implies, but because you straight up insulted me and that’s a dick move. My comment might have sounded stern, and I apologize for not clarifying my tone, but you didn’t need to go full Reddit warrior at the end of your comment either. To assume you’d “win” a discussion, instead of engaging to learn the other side, is pathetic and insulting.
China has less worker enfranchisement than the US - they’re not communist, or communist-inspired - they’re just red-coded authoritarian state capitalist. The only “unions” that exist in China are government-controlled - actual collectivisation is a meaningful threat to them, and as I’ve already pointed out, TikTok are pretty happy to censor narratives like this the CCP don’t like.
If you get your panties in a bunch and drawn away from a point because some dickhead on the internet decided not to handle you with kid gloves, stepping away is a good call. There’s not much changing of minds in forums like these, and not much point to civility politics with that being the case.
Why the transphobia? I clearly use he/him pronouns, why would you mention panties? Not cool.
You could’ve engaged in a civil manner, there absolutely was room for civility politics. Don’t accuse me of getting pissy first when you called me “stupid” in another comment before I said another word. You made it toxic. My initial comment was nothing but objective in content.
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Your initial comment was factual, but more important, it was both irrelevant and misleading. It revealed a dishonest agenda you’ve only reenforced since.
Do you want to go ahead and finish joining the dots on that transphobia accusation, or should I jump straight to pointing out what a piece of shit you are for disingenuously using a marginalised community as a human shield rather than walking away from a point you’re clearly incapable of engaging as you lied you would?
“Panties in a bunch” = misogynistic? Yes. “…” = Transphobia? Come on.
You’re stretching here for a win a la victimizing yourself. If you are actually trans and this was a mistake (I hope you realize to be one) I really hope you take this to heart. Y’all need as much support as you can get and making blatantly false allegations like this against people is just gonna hurt your cause.
Unless you’re a troll and this is what you want and tan out of brain juice so you flipped the ol switxh and goo goo ga ga’d your way out of being responsible for your life.
I jumped to transphobia because of my personal experience with gender. Yes, misogyny is a better word. That’s not a mark on trans people though, I’m not the one attacking people’s identities here.
Christ you really just can’t take this one on the cheek huh.
Part of being an adult (purposefully not using the term being a man here as a note) is recognizing that sometimes we don’t speak clearly enough and sometimes we misunderstand each other.
I can sympathize with your prior experience causing bias but maturity is recognizing your biases every day, ahead of time, and fight against it. It’s absolutely not a mark on trans people but it sure does fuel the other side which is not what we want.
I do totally agree with your last paragraph