Tiktok Holocaust
Tiktok holocaust — yet another trending thread where users are pretending to be holocaust victims. They are doing this mainly by applying makeover (fake bruises, injuries and cuts). They are acting out scenes where they play Holocaust victims arriving in heaven. In other words, they are talking on the camera as if they are dead.
In some of the footages, they are also wearing striped uniform of Star of David.
Holocaust in a Retrospect
Holocaust dates back to the era of World War II. During this era. German Nazi Regime persecuted 6 million European Jews. Hitler — the anti-Semitic Nazi leader, deemed the Jews an inferior race.
During the rule of Nazi, the ruler consistently killed the Jews. But, Hitler’s “final solution”, later called the Holocaust, came to culmination under the cover of World War II. This occurred with mass killing centers constructed in the concentration camps of occupied Poland.
Intention of users behind the Tiktok holocaust
The users have claimed that the intention of making such clips was to educate people about holocaust. They have given the view point that it is a creative way of informing people about the incident.
Some of the users remarked about having grandparents who were the survivors of the concentration and Aushwitz camp. Therefore, they have a close association with holocaust and World War II.
The creation of violent content that may be potentially disturbing has also happened before. In April, this year, a trend on the topic of domestic violence went viral. In these clips, creators pretended to be battered women or abusive boyfriends.
The reason was also identical to the one mentioned above. They claimed the intention to be raising awareness in this case too. People use Tiktok platform to white supremacist and anti-Semitic hate speech
Reaction of the audience to such videos
Unfortunately, such TikTok clips will fail to give space to the complexity of such issues or honour the victims adequately. Despite this, the feedback of the audience is positive and it attracted audience on social media.
This feedback still cannot overshadow the criticism it has received. “People ought to be properly imparted about the Holocaust. They should not make it into a disgusting trend. Briana commented, (a viewer of mainly Jewish content on Tiktok.
“Our obsession with trauma porn [when discussing tragic histories] has only motivated a desire to dramatise these narratives.[…] It can be very triggering for people who have family that either survived or was lost in the war.”
To sum up, this trend is used by users who are not Jewish or are too young to get popularity. But, unfortunately, this, doesn’t serve the purpose of paying tribute to the victims. Rather it seems that they are mocking the victims. They critics also remarked that people should be imparted about Holocaust. But, these videos are not at all the way to make people aware.
What actions does the Tiktok administration take?
In the United States last week, TikTok banned more than 380,000 videos for violating its hate speech policy.
The app also claimed in a blog post that it had taken action on content such as race-based harassment. Moreover, it also had a zero-tolerance policy on organized hate groups and on content that denied ‘violent tragedies’.
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TikTok administration assessed Holocaust videos. Thus, Tiktok decided they do not violate its community guidelines as they don’t meet its definition of hate speech. Shortly, they don’t incite violence against or dehumanize a group of individuals on the basis of protected attributes.
The major take away from this is that the audience and the users should be sensitive towards the sentiments associated with such incidents. The creation of such content can also be judged in terms of the moral grounds.