Is YouTube Worse than TikTok?

Whilst they may not be directly controlled by the CCP like TikTok is, they definitely cooperate closely with the Red Slave Masters.

From The European Conservative

By John Mac Ghlionn

YouTube is owned by Google, a company that removed the “don’t be evil” clause from its code of conduct—which helps explain its current algorithmic setup, best described as evil.

With all the focus on TikTok, an undoubtedly dangerous app, it’s easy to forget that other problematic apps and social media platforms exist. Take YouTube, for example. On close inspection, YouTube actually appears to be worse than TikTok. 

One-third of the world’s population uses YouTube, the most popular streaming platform in the world. According to researchers from the Australian Institute for Suicide Research and Prevention (AISRAP), frequent users of YouTube report higher levels of anxiety, depression, and loneliness than those who rarely or never use the popular platform. The researchers Dr. Luke Balcombe and Dr. Diego De Leo found that the most negatively affected individuals were those under the age of 29 years. In the U.S., 96% of Gen Z users (born between 1997 and 2012) have a YouTube account.

Worryingly, the researchers also found that YouTube was doing nowhere near enough to prevent the promotion of suicide-related content. The YouTube algorithm, according to the authors of the study, pushes recommendations and suggestions based on previous searches, which can send users down an endless path full of gory content and videos describing the best methods of committing suicide.

More recently, researchers at the Tech Transparency Project (TTP), a research initiative of Campaign for Accountability (CfA), a nonpartisan, nonprofit watchdog organization, found YouTube algorithms regularly steer accounts for young users toward content on guns, mass murderers, and individuals like Jeffrey Dahmer, the notorious serial killer and sexual deviant. Specifically, according to the researchers, YouTube recommends “hundreds of videos about guns and gun violence to accounts for boys interested in video games.” Some of the recommended videos give explicit instructions on how to convert guns into automatic weapons; other videos depict graphic school shootings. Not surprisingly, the gamer accounts that viewed the YouTube-recommended videos were served a considerably higher volume of gun- and shooting-related content than those who didn’t view the recommended videos. The authors highlighted the fact that many of the videos actually violated YouTube’s own policies on firearms, violence, and child protection. Moreover, YouTube failed to take any apparent steps to age-restrict them.

YouTube also operates YouTube Kids, a video app and website for children that, according to its website, offers “a more contained environment for kids to explore.” However, another TTP study found this “contained environment” to be incredibly dangerous. Boasting 35 million weekly users, YouTube Kids regularly recommends videos on cocaine and crystal meth to children as young as 3, according to the study. References to both drug making and drug dealing are common. Furthermore, YouTube Kids also provides content on dangerous diets, firearms, and skin bleaching—again, to children as young as 3. 

Some readers will be shocked by the findings. Don’t be. After all, YouTube is owned by Google, a company that actually removed the “don’t be evil” clause from its code of conduct—which helps explain its current algorithmic setup, best described as evil. 

One of the authors of the Australian Institute for Suicide Research and Prevention study, Dr. Luke Balcombe, told me that YouTube is actually worse than TikTok, “because it has a larger and more diverse user base, a longer history and more legacy content.” Additionally, he added, it possesses “a more influential and personalized recommendation algorithm, and a more complex and opaque content moderation system.” Although TikTok also has its own challenges and controversies regarding its content and algorithms, it is geared more to short videos between 1 and a half to 10 minutes. Meanwhile, YouTube allows videos to run for up to 12 hours. YouTube isn’t just the most popular streaming platform in the world, it’s also the second most used search engine (after Google), and host to numerous social media communities. Videos are more likely to go viral on YouTube than TikTok, and many of these videos tend to contain very questionable content. Although TikTok is guilty of promoting dangerous content, Dr. Balcombe doesn’t think the Chinese app possesses “the same scale and scope of impact as YouTube on mental health and social issues.”Unless urgent action is taken by governments around the world, Dr. Balcombe believes that the “YouTube problem” will only get worse. 

Which brings us back to the title of this piece: Is YouTube worse than TikTok? The answer appears to be yes. As bad as TikTok is, it does at least possess a 12+ rating (although children younger than 12 find ways of accessing it). However, YouTube, via the aforementioned Kids, snares children from a young age. After spending a few years digesting questionable content on YouTube Kids, children then “graduate” to arguably the most dangerous platform in the world, YouTube. To make matters worse, in the U.S., Google and other Big Tech companies are actively trying to kill legislation in multiple states designed to make online environments safer for children. YouTube, a “Made in America” platform, is causing real damage to children of all ages. It’s time for lawmakers in the U.S. and beyond to push back. Time is of the essence.