COID-19 and TikTok are probably the most searched keywords for 2020. It won’t be wrong to sum up the entire year with these two words because honestly, 2020 was a disaster and we are still recovering from it. Sigh!
While COVID-19 created havoc all across the world for the entire year, TikTok has been in the news for mixed reasons – both good and bad.
With not many avenues of self-expression left, millions of people resorted to Tiktok, the social media platform, to create and share videos and make the most of it during a pandemic. It doesn’t hurt that unlike its Facebook, Snapchat and Twitter, the Chinese-developed social media platform became popular with people from many backgrounds. It didn’t matter if you were a poor laborer or a social media influencer, both of them had the same shot at gaining a huge number of followers!
That was the beauty of TikTok. Or so it seems.
TikTok Gets Banned in China?
The Chinese-owned Bytedance, the company behind TikTok, definitely made a killing through TikTok during the pandemic. However, it lost millions of its users due to a ban in certain countries like India and Pakistan.
The app was at the verge of getting banned in USA as well and if you look at all of these countries, you’ll notice that the reason behind it is different for each country.
For USA and India, political grandstanding and posturing against arch-rival China resulted in a ban. In the case of Pakistan, the app was alleged as spreading obscenity and immorality with no checks whatsoever.
But did you know that China also banned its own creation? No? Apparently, a very famous TikTok star in Pakistan came up with this reason:
“China banned TikTok because of national security issues.”
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We had a similar reaction when we found out that this was an actual statement by none other than controversial TikTok sensation Hareem Shah.
Let’s take a look at the video.
Tiktok “sensation” Hareem Shah says China banned the application because of national security issues 😝😝 pic.twitter.com/unS1eUH5Jm
— Shahbaz Zahid (@shahbazzahid) October 12, 2020
Yes, TikTok is a Chinese-built platform. But would the Chinese government actually ban one of its biggest cultural and technological marvel, especially one that is responsible for burnishing China’s soft power? It is impossible that they will ban it in their own country unless they mess up big time.
But it looks like Hareem Shah seems unaware of such facts, hence, her slip of the tongue.
Hareem Shah gets trolled
But we know that Twitter never forgets such moments. Netizens took this chance to troll the social media sensation for not getting her facts right.
Here are some of the reactions.
https://twitter.com/IIvIIohsin/status/1315939063338328064
https://twitter.com/awbrgr/status/1315937631553884162
https://twitter.com/warhgyamulk/status/1315957375321477120
https://twitter.com/warhgyamulk/status/1315957375321477120
After such a calculated statement, I think she is eyeing ministry of climate change.
— Adil (@Adilkaan) October 13, 2020
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