TikTok's Ugly Truth: Suppressing Videos From Poor, Unattractive, And Disabled Users To Gain More Viewers

According to some internal documents obtained by The Intercept, the company behind TikTok – a hugely popular short video sharing app instructs its moderators to suppress posts from people who they deem too poor or ugly for the platform.

TikTok has around 800 million monthly users coming from all over the world and these documents have shed some light on the strategies ByteDance is adopting to achieve such a tremendous growth in a short amount of time.

On the platform, videos that show crooked smiles, slums, rural poverty, and beer bellies will not receive as much audiences as those deem appropriate.

In answer for the publicity of those documents, ByteDance’s spokesperson Josh Gartner said that some of the rules were no longer in use and others had never been applied.

Sources familiar with the matter said that the live-stream policy was created in 2019 and they were in use until late that year. Gartner said that some of these documents are for preventing bullying but he failed to explain why there is not a single line mentioning bullying in documents which are meant for preventing this practice.

Excluding Ugly And Poor Users From For You Section

The For You section on TikTok has long been the funnel with which audience discover new content and this is where ByteDance wants to limit the appearance of content featuring people too ugly or too poor to be featured. One of the documents talks about physical, environmental, and bodily features that are deemed too hideous.

TikTok has been keeping the criteria videos must meet to earn a spot in the For You section secret but another document does mention what it takes not to be featured. And as you have already known by now, content from poor, unattractive, or in any way, undesirable people are the ones to be excluded as allowing these videos on the section might decrease the number of short-term new users.

So here are the wording the documents use to describe who should be exclude and who can stay and get audience on TikTok. The “low quality” traits include “ugly facial looks,” “obvious beer belly,” “abnormal body shape,” and dwarfism.

The shooting environment also plays an important part in determining whether the videos can get popular. The criteria here are the backgrounds that look dilapidated and shabby, like rural fields or slums. However, if the area has some beautiful natural scenery, the video could probably be exempted.

Some moderators also said that besides suppressing videos from unattractive people, TikTok also forms a relationship with the popular users by guiding on how to bypass the safety rules, helping them have a higher chance of making videos that are allowed by TikTok’s guidelines.

The source said that video conference between these popular creators and the safety team is held regularly. TikTok also cheery-picks the influencers to inform about changes in the policies of the platform, making sure that these popular users do not violate any of the new policies.

Censoring Political Speech

ByteDance also has specific guidelines relating to political speech in the second document obtained by The Intercept. Any videos that affect national interests and honor or endanger national security will probably be censored. The Tiananmen Square incidents were cited as one of the examples.

The document also requires that moderators prevent any stream about the military, the police, and other state organs from going online for three days. Any users who document the police or the military activities will be kicked off for one day.

While TikTok has a harsh punishment for anyone expressing political speech, the penalty for racist content is much milder. All attempts to shame others for their sexual orientation, ethnics, and disability will result in the creators being banned for one month. After that, they can stream like nothing has happened.

TikTok also has punishments for those trying to promote its competitors and belittle the platform. The penalty for the former offense is to be banned forever while that for the latter is to be suspended for three days.

The documents also state that ByteDance's employees have to go on Instagram regularly, browse for popular content and reshare them on TikTok to make sure that the site always have appealing videos to attract users. Employees tasked with uploading nice-looking videos on the site usually browse hashtags like #BeachGirl to find such content.

Women who do not adhere to the modesty guidelines of TikTok may have their accounts banned. Bikini is allowed but only in swimming occasions only. If content featuring outline of female nipples, the account posting it will be banned forever.

TikTok’s Secret Rules

Those how have their accounts suspended or streams terminated might not receive any satisfying explanations on why their content is restricted. This comes as no surprise given the guidelines on political speech and bodily appearance are kept secret among moderators only.

The question here is who gets to decide how many wrinkles are considered too much and who can be called ugly, given the different standards of beauty in various parts of the world.

So if you hope to gain a reputation on TikTok, it seems whether your desire can come true or not is at the mercy of what the site’s moderators consider beautiful and appealing.

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