[diabeticApe]

Obviously its alot more than that. Its about having the ability to control public discourse in its favor. A path that could have drastic consequences to those that the chinese government has already decided should be put under subjugation. For starters there are the Tibetans, the Christians, the Uyghurs, Hong Kong's activists, Falun Gong practitions, journalists, etc. Australia already had issues around that when chinese officials were sent after Australian protesters of chinese decent to shut them down. As if they were criminals engaging in criminal acts in a location subject to its jurisdiction. Its not just about Taiwan. Its about who the party deems undesirable. US citizens potentially pose one of the largest obstacles to its foreign policies. Instead of sending armed troops to dissuade them through military intimidation however, they can just put on a demonstration of force and pit us against each other. The abilities that TikTok provides the government are not limited to dissuading the US from defending Taiwan but things like sowing division in democratic countries, curating data to enact targetted propoganda campaigns, curating data to go after political opponents, tracking and hunting of dissident journalists, etc. "Knowledge is power" is the common expression but more accurately, applied knowledge is power and this gives them knowledge that they are applying. This in and of itself is not too different from what the snowden revalations revealed about the US other than perhaps the extent to which compliance is mandatory. However the biggest point of contention is arguably more in how the knowledge is being applied. Should we empower a government that has a track record of kidnapping falun gong practitioners and harvests thier organs or silencing critics that they deem difficult to manipulate or the government that has a track record of racist policing and military intervention over false pretext? If we can agree that the Taiwan issue is not a false pretext and that the average US citizen is better informed about our previously hidden activities abroad and about the social plights of their fellow americans of different racial and socioeconomic backgrounds would that be an improvement? I think so and in my opinion a future with that type of US righting its wrongs and setting the example would be preferable to one where they give the reigns to the ccp . even better would be where the reigns were given to the international community as a whole but the details of that are a whole seperate diacussion. i do agree however that the worst possible outcome would be one in which we go to war and somebody pushes the nuclear button out of preassure, insecurity, spite, miscalculation, technological distortions, equipment failure, hacking, manipulations, subversion, extremism, terrorism or any other one of the million things that could go wrong and lead to everyones untimely demise.