By: Matthew Du, Staff Writer

Picture this: after a long day, you sit down and load up TikTok to relax only to discover that the app has been banned by the government. The app you love and have been using for the past five years is unusable. How would Mills students react to this ban, and what does this ban mean to them?  

TikTok, the short form content social media app owned by the Chinese tech company, ByteDance, is known for their viral videos, memes, dances, songs, challenges, and life hacks. On April 24th, 2024, Congress passed the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications (PAFACA) with bipartisan support before ultimately getting it signed by then President Biden. Motivated by concerns that the Chinese government might access and utilize American data with malicious intent. The act would require TikTok’s company, ByteDance, to sell the company (which also includes Capcut, the TikTok alternative Lemon8, AI math homework help app Gauth, photo editing software Hypic, and more) or face a nationwide shut-down in the United States. The ban also planned to restrict app stores and the internet from hosting TikTok, as US government officials believed that the Chinese government would use it as a forum to manipulate their users, spread misinformation, and rig elections. 

The legislation had been set to take effect by the US government on January 19th, but a surprising turn of events took place. 

After going dark for about 14 hours on Saturday, TikTok as of January 20th, has received an extra 75 days to sell at least 50% of the company due to a deal with recently inaugurated President Trump. TikTok is still usable if the app is already installed, but it has been removed from both the Apple and Google Play Store. 

Regardless of its enacted date, this ban would affect nearly over 170 million monthly users as TikTok is the fifth most used social media, just behind bigger social media platforms like FaceBook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, and Snapchat, according to SearchLogistics. 

The TikTok ban doesn’t just affect content creators, it will affect Mills High School students as they have been using the app for years with TikTok being a part of their daily lifestyle. 

Many have argued the TikTok ban is a violation of the American people’s First Amendment Constitutional right. 

Senior Ameena Stringer (12) voiced, “I do see it is wrong because America’s pushing for them to sell it, but if they don’t sell it, they’re just trying to hush, hush, take TikTok…A lot of people aren’t finding out more and more of the truth of this country.”

She added, “What’s so wrong with it? It’s just like Instagram. It’s just like YouTube. It’s just another social media source that you get information.” Stringer also believes the government will use the TikTok ban as a catalyst to restrict free speech on other social media platforms. 

Freshman Patrick Olila (9) expressed, “I feel like it’s a very negative thing for the people of America because people use TikTok as a way to speak their voice, speak their opinions, and taking it away is a violation against the First Amendment.” 

Olila added, “If America has the right to take away American people’s platforms then slowly they’re gonna be allowed to take away everything they have to use our First Amendment.”

I interviewed a lawyer and asked him whether the ban violated the First Amendment rights or not. 

Lawyer David Loy of The First Amendment Coalition said, “The Supreme Court said that Congress was within its power to prevent that or guard against that risk of a large amount of private data collection by what they call a foreign adversary.” Loy then went on to say, “The Supreme Court is the ultimate decision maker on what the Constitution means and how it applies. The Supreme Court held that the ban does not violate the First Amendment.” 

Loy said in his opinion, “I think that while there may be a risk of improper use of our collection of data, I think there are ways to address that without banning the platform entirely.” 

Loy explains, “There’s always risks of data collection and improper use of personal data on any digital platform whether it’s Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, and all these platforms vacuum up lots of data.” He believes that some of the data being collected should be restricted to prevent a nationwide ban. 

Loy mentions that if the platform is free, that just means you were the product. 

While most students feel sad about the ban, some students see the ban as a way of limiting their phone use and a way for growth. 

Freshman Messiah Lacsamana commented, “I feel that it [TikTok] is beneficial to a lot of people…people on TikTok procrastinate from the work that they need to do. It’s becoming a part of everyone’s everyday life. Some people wake up and start just scrolling, not even doing anything beneficial.” 

The dances and the trends will be greatly missed by everyone if TikTok does end up getting banned later on and it will mark the end of an era.