Ban-Aid

 I am aware of Tik Tok. I know of a group of pre-teen girls who are going to have a long soul-searching challenge trying to find something to fill the void in their lives left by the absence of this social media platform. I have heard of a number of adults who have used the application to promote their businesses who will be sad and frustrated by the government's ban. 

If you were even more off the social media grid than I am, this past Saturday night the plug was pulled on for American users on the video-sharing site. This was done voluntarily by the owners of the company that runs the app posted a pop-up that stated: “A law banning TikTok has been enacted in the U.S. Unfortunately that means you can’t use TikTok for now.”

Which reminds me of a joke: A man goes to an appointment with his doctor for a pre-op exam for a hernia. After the poking and prodding was over and the surgery was scheduled, the man is buttoning his shirt as the doctor asks him if there were any questions or concerns ahead of the procedure. "Well Doc, I was just curious, when it's all over, do you think I'll be able to play the violin?"

The doctor looks at his patient, puzzled, then replies, "Sure. I don't know why not."

The man hops off the exam table and says, "That's great, because I never could before."

That's pretty much how I feel about Tik Tok. I never had any real interest in posting "funny" bits of video for the distraction of my friends and a group of faceless strangers who might encounter them. Instead I feel much more comfortable right here forcing those friends and faceless strangers to wade through my opinions and fascinations right here. It's all I can do to come up with pithy posts once a day. I can't imagine having to spend time editing video and coming up with amusing situations to share with the world. 

But I do confess that the faintest whiff of censorship gets what little hair I have to stand on end. I might just have to open up a protest account just to pretend to have a feeling about this matter. Of course, on the back end, we have the announcement from the head of "Truth" Social who seems to be willing to give the Chinese-owned Tik Tok a ninety day extension that could give them a chance to sell off the American end of their business. The former game show host and dictator for a day seemed willing to waffle on his own stance which previously favored a Tik Tok ban. 

Which, as the squirrely nature of this affair makes another swing back to having the felon in charge of his own social media site forgive the supposed trespasses of Tik Tok, makes me want to stay as far away from it as possible, offering to set up my own pretend web site that will not actually host user's videos, but will rather send them real-time weather updates for their zip code. Because that seems more important than dancing in front of your mailbox.