Before I downloaded Tik Tok, I thought it was just a platform where kids could post videos of themselves doing funny dance moves. However, after finally giving in and downloading the app, I quickly realized that it goes way beyond dancing. I mean there are videos regarding fashion tips, life hacks, recipes, workouts, travel ideas, and clips from your favorite movies and tv shows. Although these topics seem helpful, in reality, they are actually quite alarming and dangerous, especially to our younger generations. These videos make us fall victim to comparison and lead us to think that we have to change our appearance, where we live, how we dress, or what we consume, in order to reach a certain level of satisfaction or worthiness from the rest of society.
Yes, it’s nice to be shown helpful tips and tricks and watch funny clips that give us a good laugh. But, when I scroll through Tik Tok and see videos that are suggesting daily calorie amounts to consume in order to lose weight, I can’t help but pause and think about the dangers that they are causing to the eyes of innocent young girls. The majority of Tik Tok users are middle and high schoolers who fall between the ages of 11-18. Back when I was in middle school, the word “calorie” didn’t exist in my mind because my attention was put towards things in life that brought me joy and happiness instead of fear, guilt, and anxiety. My mind was thinking about what I should look like or how much food I should consume throughout the day.
I was more focused on hanging out with my friends than how much I weighed or what I was putting in my body. But now, my fear is that social media platforms like Tik Tok are presenting different obstacles to younger generations that are creating serious effects on not only their mental health but their physical health too.
Now I’m not completely bashing Tik Tok because I do find myself sharing a few laughs and smiles after scrolling through videos but we have to be more aware and cognizant of the content that we’re watching and putting out for the public to see. Whether that’s unfollowing accounts that are lowering your self-esteem or making you feel like you’re not good enough, it’s in the best interest of our younger generations to teach them what is truly important in life and do our best to remove anything from our social media accounts that are trying to convince you to believe otherwise.
Unruly Bodies 
Social media has been very popular lately especially right now due to COVID. Tiktok in particular has been very very popular with the new latest trends and dances and other things. I can see why many people avoid to have any social media because then they can be more focus on themselves instead of watching others and comparing themselves to them. Many famous tiktokers tend to have lots of views and likes on their videos when they simply just do nothing, like just wave or something. That is the issue, when we post a tiktok we tend to think to ourself like “why am I not getting this much views than that one person?” then you will begin to think like dang I wish I was that pretty or that I know how to do those moves etc. This is the issue that happens in many other social medias like instagram twitter, etc.
Hi, I agree completely with this post. I also think that TikTok is very big into fad dieting, or unrealistic dieting and working out. I am constantly bombarded by images of “10 minute work our for a flat stomach in 30 days”. And while this may be a truth for some everyones body is different. I think social media has further pushed the diet culture in our society and is encouraging frankly dangerous ways to loose weight as opposed to show casing different body types and showing an acceptance of them all. This post made me think of one person on tiktok. She would wear a crop top everyday and dance to the same song. She had a beautiful body but she was not the beauty standard of “thin”. She go hate and bullied but she still did it everyday to give the people like her confidence. I think we need to see more of that and less of these influencers spreading dangerous misleading information that can give a lot of people really bad dysphoria.
Thank you for sharing. Social media continues to play a huge role in our lives and also our perception of ourselves. I agree with you wholeheartedly that although Tik Tok and our platforms can be dangerous for ALL individuals, they can be particularly damaging for younger kids who are still in early adolescence/teen developmental stages.
Tik tok has the same problem as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram (the worst one in my opinion) that you just named. Social media definitely did not cause the human habit of comparison, but it certainly is feeding into it. People only want to post what they deem is their best and we often compare ourselves to that. I don’t blame these apps as a whole (except maybe instagram) because the apps are what we make of it. As users of the app, we definitely should not be sharing or uplifting posts that contribute to the anxious scrolling of young teens (or even adults), because nobody needs to feel bad about their body or their life choices simply because an influencer has talked down about it. Really appreciate you pointing this out. Great post!
Definitely agree with what you said, but also social media platforms have always pushed similar narratives as well (which just comes with the fact that it’s accessible to such a wide array of people). Like my experience was opposite to yours, as I had always been body conscious in middle school, especially due to Tumblr’s influence. I already had the notion that I was overweight and had to be skinnier due to my immigrant background, but Tumblr’s body image representation(?) was always promoting thinness and thigh gaps. There would always be accounts casually promoting/encouraging eating disorders and fatphobia that was just presented as being normal rather than absurd. I think this topic is something that will always emerge with social media and that there just has to be a better way for these platforms to moderate content in order to protect younger people/people overall.