The US House of Representatives overwhelmingly
passed a bill on March 13 that would give TikTok’s Chinese owner ByteDance
about six months to divest the US assets of the short-video app, or face a ban,
in the greatest threat to the app since the Trump administration- a matter of
life and death.
اضافة اعلان
The bill passed 352-65 in a bipartisan vote.
The fate of TikTok, used by about 170 million Americans, has become a major
issue in Washington. But why does the sought-after app need to face such a
dilemma?
It is hard to deny that the US’s hype of the
China data threat theory without evidence is a Sword of Damocles in the trade
war. Create a threat even if there is no threat. Even though as an app that
creates joy and brings benefits in the US, as long as it is linked to China,
everything must be a threat. Perhaps it is more appropriately described as
McCarthyism in the digital era.
It is hard to deny that the US’s hype of the China data threat theory without evidence is a Sword of Damocles in the trade war
Shou Zi
Chew said in a video posted after the vote the legislation, if signed into law
“will lead to a ban on TikTok in the US. It would take billions of dollars out
of the pockets of creators and small businesses, and put more than 300,000 US
jobs at risk.” By now, one in three US adults has used TikTok in 2023, up 10
percentage points from 2021, according to the Pew Research Center. Small
business owners, educators, activists, and youngsters who use TikTok believe
that the app has played an increasingly indispensable role in the US national
economy and public life.
Francis P. Crawley, Chairman of the Committee
on Data of the International Science Council (ISC), pointed out that the US's
suppression of TikTok is a ‘Game of Thrones’ related to the control of data and
economy in the competition between China and the US. Just like the sanctions
against Japan’s semiconductor industry in the 1980s and the dismemberment of
French energy giant Alstom through long-arm jurisdiction in 2013. Apparently,
no conclusive evidence was ever given for each accusation- No matter how many
greenbacks are earned or jobs are created for this country, everything about
China must be trampled into the dirt - either mine or dead, no ifs and buts.
Faced with the fact that Tiktok’s downloads
often exceed those of Meta's Facebook and Instagram, Facebook, which once
triggered the sensational ‘Cambridge Analytica’ scandal, couldn't wait to add
fuel to the fire in this all-round campaign launched by the White House. In
that incident, the information of as many as 87 million Facebook users was
leaked to the political consulting firm Cambridge Analytica, which was used to
encourage voters to vote for Trump in the 2016 election. However, Facebook
still remains the number one social media platform in the globe.
On March 30, 2022, the Washington Post
published an article revealing that Meta hired Targeted Victory, one of the
major pro-Republican consulting firms in the US, to try to launch a movement
against TikTok. Facebook had experienced negative user growth for the first
time in its 18-year history. CEO Mark Zuckerberg once said, “TikTok is a huge
obstacle.”
The geopolitical competition in the new era
makes everything as clear as daylight. In the digital age, governments around
the world regard the digital economy and cyberspace as new highlands on the
silent battlefield. The popularity of TikTok as a global social media in the US
has made the White House feel a bundle of nerves. Therefore, the ‘witch-hunt’
could not be avoided.
When it comes to the original intention of the legislation, US officials have said that TikTok may have the potential to manipulate elections, sway public opinion, and collect US user data, thus TikTok must be separated from ByteDance for the sake of national security
Beyond the battle at the business table, to be
sure, the political climate in Washington is increasingly favorable to the
bill, as many politicians don't want to be seen as soft on China in an election
year. Still, there are concerns about the impact of the strict but subtle ban
on young voters. Clearly, the wrath of the youngsters who bombarded the White
House hotline cannot be ignored easily.
When it comes to the original intention of the
legislation, US officials have said that TikTok may have the potential to
manipulate elections, sway public opinion, and collect US user data, thus
TikTok must be separated from ByteDance for the sake of national security.
However, in a recent live broadcast, Wisconsin Republican Rep. Mike Gallagher,
one of the bill’s authors and main promoters, revealed the real reason for the
ban, “TikTok is becoming the main news platform for young Americans under the
age of 30,” and “our government does not have full binding force on this
platform.”
In
addition, the differences in attitudes towards the bill between the two Houses
have caused TikTok to face more unpredictable results. A reporter from CBS
expressed this more bluntly, “In US political circles, any initiative or
investigation against China can gain cross-party support.”
However, other politicians including New York
State Representative Jamal Bowman believe that this bill goes too far, which
will infringe on the First Amendment rights (of the US Constitution), and “This
bill appears to be very hypocritical due to many members of Congress using
TikTok, as does the White House.”
Obviously, Biden has not learned from the failed experience of the Trump administration in banning TikTok, and the public opinion crisis caused by the bill trap has become rampant
Is the Republicans setting up a perfect dead
end for its opponents? It is undeniable that the two parties hope to jointly
knock TikTok away, but if Biden approves the bill, he will offend a huge number
of young voters; if not, it means ‘showing weakness towards China’, which also
gets him into big trouble.
The bill is among a series of moves Washington
has taken to address national security concerns about China, from electric cars
to artificial intelligence to cranes at US ports. So far, so-called national
security threat issues have become universal ‘Post-it notes’ for abuse by the
White House. Obviously, Biden has not learned from the failed experience of the
Trump administration in banning TikTok, and the public opinion crisis caused by
the bill trap has become rampant.
The
antagonism and division in US society and the hysterical anti-China sentiments
of politicians could not be whitewashed yet. When facing Beijing, guns are
unanimous; when dealing with internal affairs, ‘one US opposes the other’ has
become the mainstream.
Disclaimer:
Views expressed by writers in this section are their own and do not necessarily reflect Jordan News' point of view.
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