Nebraska Sues TikTok For Claiming To Be Family Friendly
from the the-biggest-scourge-is-the-dancing-kids-app dept
Another day, another dumb lawsuit against TikTok.
We’ve seen school districts and parents suing TikTok on the basis of extremely weird claims of “kids used TikTok, some bad stuff happened to kids, TikTok should be liable.”
But in the past year, it seems that a bunch of state AGs have decided to sue TikTok as well. I’ve lost track, but in the last year or so, I believe Arkansas, Indiana, Utah, Kansas, and Iowa have all sued TikTok using some theory or another about how “kids like this app” must violate some law. It’s impossible to keep up with the state of all of these lawsuits, though I know that Indiana’s lawsuit was tossed out, though somehow Arkansas’ lawsuit has been allowed to proceed.
Perhaps buoyed by the success in Arkansas, Nebraska has also jumped into the state fray, suing TikTok for being “deceptive” in claiming the platform is family friendly. You can read the full complaint here or embedded below.
Like the other lawsuits, this one is a hodgepodge of moral panic and conspiracy thinking. It has all the hits: mental health! eating disorders! suicide! China!
But the key to the complaint is that by saying that it’s a family friendly app, while the moral panic narrative says “bad things happen to kids on TikTok,” it allows Nebraska’s AG to claim that this is a “deceptive” practice by the company:
Despite such documented knowledge, Defendants continually misrepresent their platform as safe and appropriate for kids and teens, marketing the app as “Family Friendly” and suitable for users 12 and up, reassuring parents, educators, policymakers, and others….
Of course, the end result of nonsense lawsuits like this is that no website will ever do anything in the future to try to be “family friendly” again, because if something bad then happens, AGs will go hog-wild in suing.
It’s so incredibly misdirected and short-sighted.
Like all the others, this is really a lawsuit about politicians not liking the content on TikTok, not liking that the kids these days like TikTok, and not liking that TikTok happens to be partially owned by a Chinese company.
But they can’t quite come out and say that, so they have to come up with some nonsense way of bringing these lawsuits. “Omg, we have to protect the children” appears to be one of the more popular ones, despite the near total lack of any evidence of any inherent harm in TikTok (or other social media) on kids.
Yes, some kids are suffering from mental health problems. And yes, there are some discussions on TikTok that are disturbing. But most of that disturbing content remains protected speech under the First Amendment. Just because people with mental health challenges use TikTok does not mean that TikTok magically causes those mental health challenges.
Like so many state AG cases, this whole thing is really about grandstanding by the AGs who hope to be elected the next governor or senator of their state.
This is yet another example of why KOSA is so dangerous. It empowers state AGs to sue websites in new ways. The state AGs have made it clear with most of these lawsuits that they don’t care what’s actually happening or what actually makes sense. They want to get headlines for taking on the big bad Chinese company that is poisoning our kids’ minds… so that they can get headlines and name recognition to line them up to run for higher office.
Filed Under: deceptive practices, family friendly, michael hilgers, nebraska, social media, think of the children
Companies: bytedance, tiktok
Comments on “Nebraska Sues TikTok For Claiming To Be Family Friendly”
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Ackshually ...
Section 230 would shield TikTok, but the platform has encouraged people to be their worst selves. Like challenges that have led to injuries or deaths, the videos that teach you how to steal a Kia with only a screwdriver, the fight porn and shoplifting porn genres, etc.
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Hey now, the sport lockpicking community and ESPECIALLY the Lockpicking Lawyer would like to remind you that they do NOT do those Kia stealing videos.
Or endorse them, even if there’s a video of someone unlocking a lock with another lock…
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“but the platform has encouraged people to be their worst selves. Like challenges that have led to injuries or deaths, the videos that teach you how to steal a Kia with only a screwdriver, the fight porn and shoplifting porn genres, etc.”
You mean people spoke. Your issue seems to be that people say and do things that you personally don’t like. Sounds to me like you want the government to force tiktok to censor speech.
Let’s look at the group suing tiktok. They want to create a christian national state where they commit mass genocide. They believe that child rape should be protected. And their “best” presidential candidate cheats on his wife with porn stars. Let’s also not forget all the encouragement they have for murdering non whites whenever possible for any reason.
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I wouldn’t be on TikTok if that is what I wanted. Second, if that was what I wanted, I would flat out state that as my argument. I do not want the government to censor speech. That position is not open to your misinterpretation.
This is also true: In a free speech culture where electronic information costs nearly zero to generate, can replicate infinitely and travel instantaneously, it’s a bad idea to defend indefensible ideas because ultimately all you will get is indefensible behavior.
Because of this, most appeals to free speech are moral hostage-taking.
Like, what you wrote here: You mean people spoke. Your issue seems to be that people say and do things that you personally don’t like.
Taking free speech for hostage right there. See, this is not about free speech — we’re talking about ideas that were performed and found their audience, so the censorship point is moot — it’s really about extracting concessions.
You want indefensible conduct validated by forcing me into two choices: concede the argument or demand censorship.
I will say this: Videos of stolen cars, fights in progress and shoplifting mobs are also crimes. Also, attention is reward. The algorithm does intuit that there’s an interest in these videos, but doesn’t discern between interest as an event, interest as “porn” (as in lurid fascination), or motivation on the part of the curator or subject of the video to gain clout.
Do you believe it’s fair for me to point to the arguments you’re not making that you condone criminal conduct? It sounds to me like don’t have the intelligence and/or courage to justify indefensible criminal conduct so you resort to hostage-taking.
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No one is asking you to defend indefensible conduct. You’re being asked whether you think TikTok should “censor” videos based on whether those videos display indefensible conduct—which would, by definition, include videos that provide commentary on such conduct even as the commentary denounces that conduct. To wit: If TikTok were to fully ban homophobic speech, should it also ban videos that call out homophobic speech while displaying/repeating that speech?
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I don’t participate on TikTok directly and what I see is screenshots/videos on the other four websites. Or news about TikTok.
I’d want to know, first what is TikTok’s TOS and what content is grounds for blocking and reporting. Second, what does TikTok have in place for trust and safety matters? Third, with TOS and trust and safety in place, where does TikTok range from censorious to permissive?
What does it take to get for content to get blocked on TikTok? Also, what sorts of filters and warnings does TikTok give its users the chance to engage or disengage with objectionable content?
TikTok does have some control over who and what it allows and disallows on its platform. TikTok is also not the only game in town, and even censorship is a cat-and-mouse game where users find ways to get around takedowns. Now when government decides to censor, they also have the monopoly on violence so the threat and impact are far worse.
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“I don’t participate on TikTok directly ”
.. and yet you are somehow adversely affected by its existence? Please explain.
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“I will say this: Videos of stolen cars, fights in progress and shoplifting mobs are also crimes.”
So videos of police showing stolen goods should be banned on tiktok?
News videos the the j6 insurrection?
Hell with your logic the fast and the furious would not be allowed to be shown on tiktok.
You are so set on censoring content that you haven’t taken the simplest step back to think about how it would work. Which would be censoring all legal speech because it’s impossible to tell the difference.
Lastly. No where in the rest of your bs did you say what you actually wanted. You just whined and pounded the table because I rightly pointed out that to achieve what you want would be censorship, literally. So I will assume that you do want censorship because that is the only thing that would come from what you want and you haven’t argued otherwise.
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If you’re able to answer these questions yourself, answer them.
Here’s why I’m giving you responses you don’t want.
There’s a bad-faith rhetorical ploy here called shadowboxing. It’s a combination of begging the question and strawmanning. You want to hear me take the other side of the argument, the straw man, that you’ve already concluded with the premise. It gives the illusion of winning a debate.
Again, since I am here and can make my own arguments without needing you to figure out my thoughts for me — and by the way I don’t want, need or welcome it — let me save time and bandwidth by saying that censorship doesn’t belong in the conversation to begin with.
Since we are both arguing about content already out there in the world, censorship is a moot point. All your ideas found a platform and their audience. What’s seen can’t be unseen, the bell can’t be unrung.
Second, free speech includes positive rights and negative rights for creators/performers, platforms and audience. The positive right is a right of action to perform (creator) or to receive (audience), and the platform to choose whether to convey that information. The negative right is the right to not perform (under coercion or against their personal values), to not platform, and to not reward the creator with attention.
If you are for free speech, you’d respect the rights of others to choose not to platform you or pay attention to you. Because the positive aspects are common courtesies, not essential obligations. You’re not owed a platform or an audience, you still got to figure that out yourself.
I’m against censorship for ethical and practical reasons. The practical reasons are that effective means of preventing information from getting out, or punishing people for information that does get out — like shit governments do with laws, courts and folks with badges and guns because, you know, monopoly on violence — are counterproductive. They backfire, and only serve to agitate people to find out what is being hidden, and information that wants to be free will be free.
With digital communication being nearly zero cost, nearly instantaneous to transmit, and easy to replicate and share, there’s a different problem from censorship. It is what information does get out there. This poses an ethical quandary: In an ecosystem of information abundance, the risk is allowing information that destroys the ecosystem that makes free speech possible in the first place. If we constantly defend indefensible speech, only indefensible speech will be produced. Or, if you say “Yes, it’s free speech” you will get more of it whether you want it or not. And by indefensible, I don’t just mean divisive speech. I mean going toward moral event horizons, like CSAM, how to commit crimes, genocide apologetics, etc.
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Lol…
You keep moving the goal posts here and not touching on your original words at all.
“Section 230 would shield TikTok, but the platform has encouraged people to be their worst selves. Like challenges that have led to injuries or deaths, the videos that teach you how to steal a Kia with only a screwdriver, the fight porn and shoplifting porn genres, etc.”
Let’s focus back on that first sentence. Where you appear to be suggesting that 230 shouldn’t apply because people said things YOU disagree with. Again here, you want the government, in this case nebraska, to punish tiktok for not censoring speech.
As for the rest of your original comment. Every single one of those things is protected speech. You are welcome to disagree with it, but it’s not illegal.
“mean going toward moral event horizons, like CSAM, how to commit crimes, genocide apologetics, etc.”
And now we go back your latest comment. Where it appears you are coming full circle and you are equating non criminal activity with criminal activity.
“gain, since I am here and can make my own arguments without needing you to figure out my thoughts for me — and by the way I don’t want, need or welcome it — let me save time and bandwidth by saying that censorship doesn’t belong in the conversation to begin with.”
That’s your fault. Maybe you should speak fucking clearly so you don’t leave open your argument and intent open to interpretation.
You could of simply argued that tiktok has a right to moderate how it sees fit and should better moderate content, but you haven’t. Instead you posted on an article about the govern suing tiktok and clearly suggested that not moderating content how you wish should see them punished by the government and if they have to moderate content to your desires or be punished by the government then what you are asking for is government censorship.
“how to commit crimes”
And? You used the kia video as an example. It isn’t a crime to expose how criminals can do things. If your idiotic idea was enforced it would be illegal to teach cyber security for example. Maybe you should place the blame of theft of the maker of a the car with security so bad it was bad years before they released it.
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Every accusation a projection.
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Absolutely. We don’t allow other criminals to show off their loot from burglaries, so we shouldn’t allow LEOs to show off their loot from civil asset ‘forfeiture’.
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And if the Platform hadn’t been TikTok, it could have been Vine (if that still existed) or YouTube. Your point?
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As recently as the 70s, trade unionists and black folks were having shootouts with the KKK.
The liberals back then were really bad at selecting what they remembered correctly.
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And that’s equal to or worse than, you know, the actual fucking Klan?
Have more complex thoughts than saying “liberals” and hoping to score points?
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I’m just hoping the liberals do a little better job this time around of choosing what they see and remember.
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Your discomfort with your own values systems is also entertaining to me on a visceral level. Small price to pay for privilege in the grand scheme of things though.
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arent you the same dude that flooded a chat?
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troll
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I don’t think you know enough about our individual value systems to conclude that we are uncomfortable with them. You certainly haven’t pointed to any part of our actual values yet.
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So, teenagers acting like idiots. I remember that in the 90s.
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Teens have been doing that since long before the internet existed. Neither TikTok specifically nor social media in general have been shown to increase this behavior, either. The incidents often reported in the media are often grossly exaggerated in terms of how many people actually participate in these sorts of challenges, too.
I’ve seen several videos of that sort of thing that do so to a) make consumers aware of the flaw so they don’t put too much stock into the car, lock, or whatever, or b) to call out manufacturers or designers for allowing such security flaws in the first place. There are also a number of hoax videos of that sort that don’t even work and so, if anything, just make potential car thieves less effective on average.
Basically, there are examples in that genre that are not really objectionable.
Far from unique to TikTok. Not to mention how much of it is staged. If anything, I’d say it’s often a good thing because it causes a lot of criminals to out themselves to the authorities.
Seems like they need to sue their governor for being a pedophile and abuser.
https://nebraskaexaminer.com/2024/04/24/pillen-vetoes-nebraska-child-sexual-assault-and-abuse-proposal/
The family friendly party of “grab em by the pussy” should sue themselves before trying to sue anyone else.
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Pedophilia is like half the Taliban’s thing. They’ll probably just give him a raise.
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A child bride and a cow.
The state of Nebraska has an illegitimate Taliban government.
If your kids are sharing or engaging with “not-family-friendly/*” content on TikTok, it seems more like a you problem.
/* Whatever the fuck “family-friendly” means, as if it were some well-defined term of law.
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In GOP circles, it means straight, white, Christian, Confederate, and hateful of anyone who’s not.
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So for instance:
“Kill the queers” would be a family-friendly statement to the GOP.
“Maybe don’t kill the queers” would be a statement that indicates a need for a ban by the GOP.
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A bit extreme with the example, but you’re not wrong.
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We’re talking about extremists. Best to not sugarcoat it.
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even they will target the people they want alive to be next
There's no question kids are suffering from mental health problems...
…and nobody should be surprised by that: look at the country we’ve built for them:
So imagine being a kid in the middle of all this. Unless you happen to be in an already-wealthy family OR you happen to be incredibly athletically talented, you have no shot. You will spend your life in debt, you will spend your life in fear, you will spend your life trying to deal with one threat after another than never needed to exist.
It’s our fault. We did this. And — and I write this with great sadness — it’s probably going to take a revolution to change it. I hope not: revolutions are messy, lots of people die, lots of things get broken. But societies in this state rarely fix themselves without major upheaval.
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Try $4T. That’s how much we’ve deferred with decades of trickle down economics. With the election of Ronald Reagan, the American public decided they would rather let rich people stash money in Panama than pay for infrastructure.
In fact, mortgaging the future was so popular with the boomers that Bill Clinton’s “third way” was essentially just right wing trickle down economics combined with moderate social liberalism.
We didn’t do this. The fucking Nazis did this, propelled largely by the most selfish, psychopathic generation in human history.
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“It’s our fault. We did this.”
I like the spirit of responsibility displayed here but …
I also realize that the general public has been blamed for the transgressions of the overlords, like for-EVAR!!!
Gaslighting is awesome and sometimes humorous, although I think most folk are getting tired of the bullshit.
The rich oligarchs are responsible even though they probably deny it. I did nothing wrong will be the common refrain.
Because Nebraska believes “family friendly” = “good babysitter”. 🤦♂️
“I don’t participate on TikTok directly and what I see is screenshots/videos on the other four websites. Or news about TikTok”
So everything you think you know is gotten from a third party?
That renders your point moot as you don’t actually know anything.
Get a room man…
So, if a politician claims to be “Family Friendly”, but does anything in their life that kids shouldn’t be around for, or their administration deals with anything inappropriate for children, then we can claim damages, yes?
Doesn’t this mean they won’t claim to be family friendly? Not that they won’t do anything to try to be family friendly.
It’s the claim that creates the supposed ‘liability’. Not the actions.
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Let me guess, you’re celebrating this lawsuit like the anti-230 shill that you are. Fuck off.