Comment on "It's Silencing" - Albania Shuts Down TikTok.

• Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

  Depends how you look at it. If enemy states are actively leveraging their social networks to undermine democracy in your country, 2 months before the election may be the perfect time to ban US/Chinese commercial social networks.

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  • huppakee@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

    In that case you could argue that it is the perfect time, but that is not happening in this case. The current government sees this particular medium as a threat because of the users on it, not because of the owners.

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    • Alphane_Moon@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

      That’s fair.

      I was just trying to point that American attitudes (theatrical polemics claiming some sort allegiance to free speech) around social networks are not always applicable or desirable.

      In my own country, Ukraine, we banned all Russian social networks and internet services in 2014 after they invaded. This is a reasonable action.

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      • huppakee@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

        Banning all Russian social networks and internet services in Ukraine seems like a smart decision, definitely. When it comes to TikTok it is less clear to me what a good decision would be, but the fact a foreign and potentially hostile state can influence the people is a serious threat.

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• unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

  Thats exactly when you should do it tho…

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  • huppakee@lemm.ee ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

    I don’t think you understand the quote you use. What is in the article and in your quote of the article is thataccording to the opposition (and others) the current government is banning TikTok to silence critics and manipulate the upcoming elections.

    Then you mention how TikTok is being used to manipulatie elections … on a global scale. I don’t disagree with what you’re saying, but in this case the banning of a social media platform is similar to how governments suppress newspapers and tv-channels because they are a threat to the ruling party.

    This is not about foreign agents influencing elections, this is about a local power suppressing their people.

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    • unexposedhazard@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨week⁩ ago

      I understand that their motivation is to suppress opposition. What im saying is that banning tiktok wont have that effect, but the opposite. Im saying the opposition will actually benefit from moving to a different, more neutral platform in response to this ban.

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