The Abortion Debate Is Taking Over TikTok

Allison Schuster

Politics, Americas

That's what Generation Z is debating.

The Chinese-owned social media app TikTok, which temporarily banned a U.S. pro-life organization, is becoming a major conversation hub in the abortion debate.

Many young American adults have begun using TikTok as a platform to present political opinions, increasingly on the topic of abortion. 

Live Action, the organization banned briefly by the app late last month, dominates as the largest pro-life page. 

“Live Action joined TikTok in 2019 as part of our ongoing efforts to reach the upcoming generation with the truth about abortion and to continue to establish ourselves as digital leaders in the nonprofit space,” Alison Centofante, Live Action’s director of external affairs, said in an email to The Daily Signal. 

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TikTok, which allows users to post short videos ranging in length from a few seconds to a minute, has risen in prominence as it opened a new channel for conversation. 

The Chinese company ByteDance owns TikTok and developed the app from an older one, Musical.ly, after buying it in August 2018. 

ByteDance’s ownership prompted skepticism among those concerned about China’s reputation for stealing data. Last month, the Interior Departmentdecided to halt the use of nearly 1,000 drones because some of the parts were manufactured in China. 

Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., joined Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., in requesting in October that the U.S. intelligence community conduct a security assessment of TikTok. No findings have been announced. 

TikTok has grown in popularity over the past year. ByteDance said in July that TikTok had 1.5 billion monthly active users and 700 million daily active users across its platforms. Musical.ly had about 100 million monthly users.