[close04]

The condescending tone was completely unnecessary given that you failed to even comprehend my point. Your leg to stand on is that TikTok's (China's?) "shit" smells the worst as such "we" have the moral high ground. A slightly less smelling "shit" is shit nonetheless. The world isn't binary and not being the worst doesn't make you good. But I see a strong sense of nationalism and patriotism that prevents you from even looking further than "they're worse so we must be good".

[hh3k0]

> The condescending tone was completely unnecessary given that you failed to even comprehend my point.

Apologies, I didn't mean to sound condescending.

> Your leg to stand on is that TikTok's (China's?) "shit" smells the worst as such "we" have the moral high ground.

That isn't the point, really. It's just that TikTok is in a whole different league. A quote from the Reddit comment I've linked prior:

> For what it's worth I've reversed the Instagram, Facebook, Reddit, and Twitter apps. They don't collect anywhere near the same amount of data that TikTok does, and they sure as hell aren't outright trying to hide exactly whats being sent like TikTok is. It's like comparing a cup of water to the ocean - they just don't compare.

> The world isn't binary and not being the worst doesn't make you good.

Nobody said that. The issue is that TikTok is "essentially malware that is targeting children".

And pointing that out doesn't suddenly make me a fan of Facebook. Your point is a false dilemma.

> But I see a strong sense of nationalism and patriotism that prevents you from even looking further than "they're worse so we must be good".

I'm not American but German.

[close04]

> It's like comparing a cup of water to the ocean - they just don't compare.

The comparison is disingenuous because it makes it look like the current US based social media scene is as harmless and unassuming as a cup of water. When they appeared they were the ocean. What they were doing then was just as unacceptable as what TikTok is doing now. And they were still "shoved" down our throats with the same tricks of the trade TikTok is using now. We just raised our baseline and the unacceptable became acceptable.

How about if we say it's like a sea to the ocean? They still "just don't compare" but both are able to easily drown the world's population and for a ship on that water for all intents and purposes they're the same.

Let's not delude ourselves, this isn't about "too much data is being collected" or the gratuitous "but but but children" remark. Between all the US-based big-tech companies and the NSA/Five Eyes, the US has enough data to blackmail children for decades to come (see? the children argument works both ways). No, the problem here is that someone other than the US is doing it and could get an upper hand.

Facebook and Alphabet have probably collected more info about the people of the world than any other companies in existence and all of it can/is being shared with intelligence services if demanded. Isn't this collecting an ocean of data about your children? [0] I could dig up 1000 stories like that. But you're not worried because you were educated that some countries doing it is OK and China's explicitly not on that list.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24091006