Your TikTok Addiction is Your Fault (but not in the way you think)

we're inadvertently enabling modern drugs

The rising TikTok addiction is widely discussed on Substack and in the news. In these articles, they highlight the clear addictive patterns and negative side effects TikTok users face. I myself have felt the TikTok addiction. For the first few years that TikTok was popular, I resisted the urge to download it because I knew I might become addicted. But at some point, I caved. And man is that TikTok algorithm fantastic. I can lose hours on end, or every

time I go to the bathroom I have the urge to pull out my phone and scroll TikTok. For some time, TikTok filled my free moments, and it still sometimes does. You yourself may or may not face a similar predicament, nonetheless, it’s a widely growing issue. But I don’t want to discuss the issue itself, there are many articles that already do that well. I want to focus on the creators, the enablers, of the drug. 

When we discuss societal issues we say the organization or perhaps the CEO is at fault for the problems. We fail to call out that the problems were also enabled by every employee at the company. We say “they’re just doing their job”, and “everyone needs to make money”. Sure this is true, but the statements seem to suggest the employee doesn't have free will. That society pressurizes them into having to take these jobs. And that may be true in some cases, but definitely not when it comes to companies like TikTok. 

TikTok employees are making the conscientious choice to work there and enable their products. The research is clear that the product is addictive and overall not a benefit to society, it’s a drug. Generally, we try to stop organizations that create and promote drugs that hurt society. Yet companies are exempt from this because they are working within the law. Sure they’re not cooking drugs and selling them. But they’re still creating a highly addictive product and trying to get users hooked. And every employee is inherently responsible for this creation. 

The TikTok algorithms team’s goal isn’t to show you the best videos, it’s to keep you on the app as long as possible. The metrics the team will have will be things like average user session time and they’ll try to maximize this metric at any cost. When I was in college, I considered working at TikTok. At the time, I thought it was a great company, as it is financially successful. Many of the current engineers at TikTok probably think the same. Yet, we all need to realize the work we do has an impact. If you are an employee of the company, you are enabling its results. 

The employees aren’t the only enablers. The investors are as well. They’re funding the company, thus making the results possible. TikTok is a private company, so in this case the enablers are the VCs. All investments inherently support the company invested in, thus if you own Facebook stock or UnitedHealthcare stock, even if through an index, you’re enabling the company. Most people invest in the S&P 500, or some such index, as it’s the “rational” action to take in a capitalist world. Yet they don’t realize or internalize that they’re enabling a variety of companies, many of which they probably don’t support. 

Every company is inherently made possible by its employees and investors. Neither wants to change the way things are because it’s not “rational”. But these so-called “rational” decisions lead to a world of TikTok addiction, Opioid epidemics, JUULs, etc. So these actions are obviously not rational. They may be financially rational for the employee or investor, but not for society. Thus meaning the enablers value their own financial success more than the well-being of society. However, I don’t think the people themselves are actually aware of this tradeoff or that they’re responsible as enablers. Nonetheless, if we want to do our moral duty to ourselves and society, we must understand that we are all enabling the drug.

To kill the drug, you must stop enabling it, it’s the correct decision.

-Ajay