House of Representatives Passes the TikTok Divestiture Bill by a Huge, Bipartisan Margin

The bill does not outlaw TikTok or shut it down. What it does is required the ChiCom owner of TikTok, a state-controlled entity called ByteDance, to sell the US part of the operation (I believe) to some non-China-controlled entity within (I think) six months or so.

If the ChiComs do not sell, then TikTok gets shut down.

But they have plenty of time to sell.

Jake Sherman @JakeSherman

BREAKING -- TIKTOK BILL PASSES THE HOUSE

352-65-1

15 R nos
50 D nos

That's a very, very big yes vote

Is this a good idea?

Well, there's no doubt that Red China is using TikTok both for purposes of espionage as well as a really vicious demoralization campaign against America's children. China has its own version of TikTok, but that platform encourages pro-social activities, studying, being dutiful to one's parents, etc.

The American version of TikTok is 24/7 transgender conversion therapy.

Oh, and the Chinese version of TikTok imposes a time limit on usage, so that children do not spend their entire f***ing young lives endlessly scrolling through crap content.

In an interview with CBS' "60 Minutes," a tech expert stated that the U.S. version of TikTok -- a Chinese-owned social media platform -- is different than the Chinese version of the app, comparing the two experiences to opium and spinach.

Although they're both owned by ByteDance, Douyin -- China's version of TikTok -- offers a different version of the social media app that is unavailable to the rest of the world, especially for children.

"It's almost like they recognize that technology is influencing kids' development, and they make their domestic version a spinach version of TikTok, while they ship the opium version to the rest of the world," Tristan Harris, a former Google employee, and advocate for social media ethics, said of China's approach to TikTok.

"If you're under 14 years old, they show you science experiments you can do at home, museum exhibits, patriotism videos and educational videos," said Harris, according to "60 Minutes," adding that children in China were limited to only 40 minutes a day on the app.

"There's a survey of pre-teens in the U.S. and China asking, 'what is the most aspirational career that you want to have?' and in the U.S., the No. 1 was a social media influencer, and in China, the No. 1 was astronaut," Harris said. "You allow those two societies to play out for a few generations and I can tell you what your world is going to look like."

It is widely agreed that TikTok mostly appeals to "teens" and pre-teen children, and is psychologically harmful.

TikTok and its possible harmful effects on the mental health of children and teenager users are being investigated by a bipartisan group of U.S. state attorneys general from coast to coast -- the latest issue for the wildly popular video-sharing app.

A nationwide probe was announced Wednesday by a number of states, led by officials from California, Florida, Kentucky, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, Tennessee and Vermont. Officials plan to investigate if using TikTok is harmful to children and teenagers and if the company is violating state consumer protection laws in promoting its platform to young people.

The announcement came amid widening scrutiny of the video-sharing app, which is particularly popular among teens and younger children and is estimated to have 1 billion monthly users.
Tiktok and kids

U.S. lawmakers and federal regulators have criticized TikTok for its computer-driven algorithms, saying it pushes video content that can endanger the physical and mental health of young users. Last month, Texas opened an investigation into TikTok's alleged violations of children's privacy and facilitation of human trafficking.

"As children and teens already grapple with issues of anxiety, social pressure, and depression, we cannot allow social media to further harm their physical health and mental wellbeing," Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey said in a statement.

California Attorney General Rob Bonta noted in a separate statement how "children are growing up in the age of social media -- and many feel like they need to measure up to the filtered versions of reality that they see on their screens."

"We know this takes a devastating toll on children's mental health and well-being. But we don't know what social media companies knew about these harms and when," Bonta said.

Though kids should get off all of social media, not just TikTok.

New research confirms the dangers of too much screen time for kids and teens: Those who play sports, take music lessons, or socialize with friends after school are happier and healthier than children who are glued to a screen during these hours.

"Screen time, where you are sitting and watching TV or playing computer games or scrolling social media for hours on end, is so detrimental because it's sedentary and usually not engaging," said study author Rosa Virgara, a research associate at the University of South Australia.

She and her colleagues looked at how nearly 62,000 kids aged 4 to 9 spent their time after school. These kids also completed questionnaires about their well-being. Children who played video games, watched TV and used social media after school almost always had lower levels of well-being than their peers who took part in after-school activities, the study showed.

Kids from lower socioeconomic backgrounds were less likely to play sports, take music lessons or hang out with friends than kids who came from wealthier households, but the study found those who had access to organized sports were happier and healthier as a result.

I imagine that applies to adults as well.

Andrew Huberman and Cal Newport just discussed social media causing attention deficit disorder and depression among kids. Newport notes that while TikTok didn't invent the dopamine-manipulating addictive algorithm, it seems to have perfected it.

On the other hand, of course, the left has agreed to the divestiture bill for TikTok because they have the Real Prize in mind: Twitter. They would like to pass the same bill to force Elon Musk to sell Twitter to representatives of the Democrat Party.

Republicans can object and say that the TikTok bill was only justified because it was owned by a hostile foreign nation, doing the bidding of that hostile foreign nation's intelligence services.

Democrats will say, no, the action was justified because TikTok "causes harm" and nothing causes more harm than Pepe the Frog memes on Twitter. They will say that Elon Musk is much, much more dangerous than Red China.

I mean -- what is more dangerous than Free Speech? Nothing, that's what. So we need to control it. "Free Speech" is only safe when it is fully controlled by The Regime.

On the other other hand, the Zaphod Beeblebrox spare hand, the right constantly argues that "we can't do x because that will free the left to do something horrible," but this argument has been proven hollow: The left is doing horrible things whether we grant a precedent they can claim to justify it or not.

The left is currently using lawfare to steal billions from Elon Musk. They're already gunning for him -- forcing TikTok to be American-owned doesn't give them a "precedent" to do that which they are already eagerly doing.

Oren Cass knocks libertarians for fighting for China's right to indoctrinate American children:

Oren Cass @oren_cass

1/ Can't be overstated how badly isolated libertarians are in this TikTok fight, and how much their kicking and screaming is hurting their credibility in the conservative coalition.

2/ You oppose market intervention? What if a hostile, communist regime controlled America's largest media platform, would you intervene in the market then? It's an absurd hypothetical come to life. I guess credit to the libertarians, sort of, for sticking to their guns...

3/ But now groups like @Club4Growth, @FreedomWorks, @CatoInstitute, plus politicians like @RandPaul and @RepThomasMassie, find themselves hoisting aloft the Chinese Communist Party's banner in the name of "liberty," arguing for the CCP's right to a free market and free speech.

4/ Of course, the American tradition often honors the unpopular stand made on principle. John Adams defended the British soldiers accused of opening fire in the Boston Massacre. But Adams was insisting upon their right to an attorney, not their right to shoot dead the colonists.

5/ With China, the libertarians have chosen not only an unsympathetic client, but also one whose behavior contradicts the basic tenets of their case. Granting media control to the world's most notorious censor does not advance free speech.

6/ Inviting a Communist Party into our market, even as it bars foreign competition in its own, is no one's idea of advancing capitalism. At some point it's fair to ask, what exactly do these groups think they're defending? Is this really their conception of the free market?

7/7 Eventually, "principled" becomes dogmatic and doctrinaire. Libertarian groups like Club for Growth, FreedomWorks, and Cato were able to exercise significant influence within American conservatism by purporting to know the difference. But if they ever did, they no longer do.

I think libertarians should be dunked on for their dogmatic and attention-whoring ways, but there's no doubt that this precedent will be turned next on Twitter and Rumble.

And speaking of Rumble: Rumble, which I saw one Regime Media headline call "the controversial free speech platform" -- free speech is controversial! -- has announced its interest in buying TikTok, should the divestiture bill pass the Senate.

Rumble shares RUM, 8.39% rose 18.3% to $7.90 on Tuesday following its expression of interest in taking over TikTok.

The stock is down 14% over the past 12 months.

Chris Pavlovski, chief executive of the video-sharing site, said Rumble is ready to join a consortium with other parties seeking to acquire and operate TikTok inside the United States in the event that China's ByteDance divests its ownership in the video app.

Specifically, Rumble said it's ready to serve as a cloud technology partner. The offer comes a day after publicly launching Rumble Cloud, a cloud offering for businesses.

Does Rumble have anywhere near enough money to even be part of a consortium to buy TikTok? I dunno. This could just be a clever way to get out news about the start of its cloud service, which will compete with Amazon's monopoly control over cloud services.

posted by Disinformation Expert Ace at 01:18 PM

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