If things go as per the plan of the Tamil Nadu government, people of Tamil Nadu may not get to use one of their favorite apps- TikTok.
A discussion regarding the lip-sync app took place in the Tamil Nadu legislative assembly on Tuesday in which Nagapattinam MLA Thamimun Ansari requested the government to ban the app. He said that the app creates law and order problems and many obscene activities take place on it and hence it would only be appropriate to ban the app in Tamil Nadu.
Replying to this remark, Information Technology minister M Manikandan, said that the government of Tamil Nadu will recommend the central government to ban the app, just like how it took steps when people were worried about the Blue Whale challenge. However, no information regarding a possible timeline was given by the minister.
Thamimun Ansari told TNM that he received many calls appreciating his call for a ban on TikTok. “Many school and college students are using it. They and their families are getting affected by it, it’s ripping them apart,” he said.
Created by ByteDance, a Chinese Internet technology company, Tik Tok has gained massive popularity across Asia clocking over 500 million users. The app allows users to upload and view lip-synced videos, music, and other performances. In India, it is largely used by people to enact popular videos or film scenes and share their own versions of it. The app also has a variety of filters and editing features to make the videos attractive for the users.
Politicians in Tamil Nadu, cutting across party lines, are mocked and trolled a lot on TikTok.
Is the comparison with Blue Whale Challenge valid?
The comparison to Blue Whale Challenge does not make sense in the case of TikTok. Blue Whale was a challenge, in which young people especially teenagers played a dangerous game, which would eventually lead them to kill themselves. TikTok is a platform that obviously gets misused, but that’s something that happens on any social media platform.
Back in 2017, the Indian government initially said that it was banning the suicide ‘game’, which mostly targeted young adults and teenagers. It would reportedly lead them through a series of tasks which would emotionally isolate them, physically exhaust them, compel them into self-harm, and ultimately to take their own life.
However, the problem with the government’s remedy and claims of banning the Blue Whale Challenge was that it was not an app. The steps to ‘play’ this challenge could easily be found on the internet or any social media platform. “It is a game you can play over any medium that allows personal communication. It could be email, WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Skype… any means which allows you to communicate with individuals in a group setting,” Udhbav Tiwari, who was the Policy Officer at the Centre for Internet and Society had told TNM then.
TikTok on the other hand, is an app, and therefore can be subject to a ban. However, its format – short videos, lip syncing to popular dialogues and tunes, has been taken up by many other platforms due to its popularity.
Source: The News Minute