Goodbye TikTok: Cultural Reflections in an Unsettled Time

• In Event: 20420 - Section on Sociology of Culture Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (90 minute): Table 8: Narratives

Abstract

In January 2025, TikTok, a popular video application with over 170 million American users, was temporarily banned in the United States. In the week leading up to the ban, many users—facing uncertainty over the apps’ future—created ‘Goodbye Videos’ that directly addressed the potential end of TikTok in a reflective manner. Culture—our toolkit of values, beliefs, practices and symbols—becomes more explicit in unsettled times (Swidler 1986). While we may utilize cultural resources subconsciously in our day-to-day lives, periods of uncertainty or major change prompt us to reflect on implicit norms and routines. TikTok Goodbye Videos can help us understand how users make sense of their online experiences and provide insight into the often implicit norms of social interaction on TikTok and other social media platforms.

In this paper, I analyze a dataset of 80 TikTok Goodbye Videos. The sample is temporally bound, capturing videos algorithmically shown on my For You Page (“FYP”) leading up to the ban deadline (January 13th – 18th, 2024; 64 videos) and directly after service was reinstated in the U.S. (January 19th – 21st, 2024; 16 videos). This sample is not representative of the entire TikTok user base; rather, this dataset showcases a slice of the numerous, overlapping communities on the app. This data illustrates a range of emotions and opinions from TikTok users—both creators with substantial followings and users who rarely post—about the proposed ban. TikTok Goodbye Videos provide insight into how some users think about TikTok as a space vis-à-vis other social media platforms.

Author

• Mallory Harrington, University of Minnesota-Twin Cities