Üsküdar University Faculty of Communication Lecturer Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal evaluated the impact of the TikTok application on children and the discussions on whether it should be shut down in Turkey.
2 out of 3 people are aware of TikTok's agenda
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal pointed out that according to current research, 36 percent of the population in Turkey (30 million people) has a TikTok account, stating, “Whether they have an account or not, a much larger audience can access short videos called TikTok reels. Due to its integration with social media applications like Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube, TikTok content circulating appears before all of us at any moment. When we look around us, we can see that 2 out of 3 people are aware of TikTok's agenda.”
Children are most exposed
Emphasizing that children are the most exposed to TikTok's agenda in the digital age, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal said, “Children's selective perception now appears to be directed towards social media videos. Children talk about these videos in their social environment, imitate the behaviors they see in the content, and internalize them by turning them into a form of entertainment. They take the behaviors they see as a kind of norm, in other words, as part of the social structure, and apply them. While the normalization of many inappropriate contents harms the social structure on one hand, on the other hand, there is a social media use that mosaics social integrity.”
Also preferred due to ease of use
Ünal noted that the TikTok platform has a series of editing tools that allow users to create engaging and entertaining video content, and said that thanks to the simple tools it contains and its ease of use, anyone can create short videos, and TikTok is a preferred application due to its natural and comfortable structure offered differently from other applications.
Measures must be taken for videos immediately!
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal also stated that TikTok is almost like a room in the homes of people from various cultures, and warned, “In fact, people present a reflection of their homes on this platform, but while doing so, in most examples, they spread inappropriate content as if they are unaware of being in a digital environment. There are privacy violations, inappropriate language, and behaviors that set a negative example, and these have the potential to transform the family perception. Children can be noticed by applying all the conversations and behaviors they see and hear there to their families at home and friends at school. Similarly, adult individuals can also increase the power of negative influence by shooting similar videos or sharing these videos. It is known that the negative influence of social media spreads 6 times more than the positive. Immediate measures should be taken for TikTok videos, which spread like a virus, harm social integrity, family structure, and values, and generally contain inappropriate content.”
Should TikTok be shut down?
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal stated that the agenda for the Chinese-based social media application TikTok is currently about its closure, and said the following:
“Shutting down a platform with 150 million users in the US and over 30 million in Turkey is a quite radical decision, but the costs and benefits need to be assessed carefully here. If the harms outweigh the benefits, legal measures must be taken. Misuse of social media applications is a kind of crime.”
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal pointed out the importance of enabling individuals to be conscious users, i.e., acquiring digital literacy skills, as a preventive measure, and said, “As another measure, legislation can be considered. Just as the social media law has been put on the agenda and work has begun, legal sanctions specifically for TikTok should also be addressed. While authorities are working towards its closure on one hand, TikTok officials are striving to prevent its closure on the other.”
Efforts to shut down TikTok have also started in Turkey
Explaining that recognizing this is not a battlefield, legal studies on what behaviors and shares will be considered crimes or what their sanctions will be in these platforms should be carried out within a legal framework with the aim of 'prevention', and that these efforts becoming supported by creating social perception is a process, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal continued:
“Regularly informing the public is important for this process to run smoothly. According to legal studies conducted in the US in 2024, the TikTok bill was signed by US President Joe Biden. Accordingly, if TikTok is not sold to an American company within 9 months, it will be banned, and downloading TikTok will be prevented.
We also see that efforts to shut down TikTok have started in Turkey. Officials stated that they are preparing a bill proposing that the TikTok application should be shut down on the grounds that it is a platform where images and behaviors inappropriate for Turkish family structure and culture are shared.”
Videos involving children
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal also emphasized that it should be evaluated whether generating income through videos on TikTok is a crime, as it can involve both obscenity and tax evasion, and whether there is child abuse in most videos featuring children, stating, “The place for this evaluation is the judicial authorities. Shutting down social media platforms will not directly lead to behavioral change, so work for permanent solutions should also be initiated.”
Assoc. Prof. Dr. Aylin Tutgun Ünal added that individuals can self-evaluate by asking themselves questions about the TikTok platform such as: “Why do we enter the TikTok platform? What is our purpose? Do the things we gain from the TikTok platform have a counterpart in daily life? What else can we do with the time we allocate to the TikTok platform? Does the TikTok platform benefit children? Is the TikTok platform very necessary in daily social life? Does the TikTok platform have a benefit?”
