atomicpoet on Nostr: It’s funny when people say TikTok brain rot should be banned. I realize all these ...
It’s funny when people say TikTok brain rot should be banned. I realize all these arguments also applied to rock music. Let’s go back in time for a bit.
When rock music first emerged in the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s, what did people complain about? They said it appealed to base sexual desires, encouraged drug culture, and made the generation self-centered.
We laugh at those complaints now, dismissing them as moral panic, but you know what? They were right. Rock music did usher in a sexually permissive culture—it paralleled the free-love era. It glorified promiscuity and groupies.
Looking back, it’s frightening how normalized it was for rock stars to prey on underage girls. Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13-year-old cousin. Elvis met Priscilla Presley when she was far from legal.
This wasn’t even that long ago. Twenty years ago, there was a movie called Almost Famous, and one of the main characters was a teenage girl groupie. It wasn’t framed as creepy. It was just a story.
And the drugs? Oh, the drugs. How many people got into drugs because they went to a rock show? How many died because drugs were romanticized in rock culture? Even the rock stars themselves—so many died young. The “27 Club” exists because so many musicians didn’t make it past that age, succumbing to addiction and its consequences. Alcohol, too, counts as a drug in this equation. A lot of lives were lost because rock culture made substance abuse seem cool.
But here’s the thing: alongside all this negativity, rock music brought incredible self-expression. One of the originators, Little Richard, was not only a musical icon but one of the first gay figures in the public eye. Later, artists like Elton John, Freddie Mercury, and Boy George expanded representation for LGBTQ+ communities. Rock also created opportunities for women—Joni Mitchell, Kate Bush, and Madonna thrived because of it.
I’m not excusing the negative aspects, but we have to acknowledge that rock music fundamentally changed society. It shaped the current political climate. Those who grew up in the rock era, the “Me Generation,” got older and carried that self-focus with them. We even coined terms like “yuppies” to describe them. These are the people who came from the culture of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, and they shaped the world we live in now.
Yet despite all this, do I think rock and roll should’ve been banned? No. You can’t ban a culture. Try, and it finds a way to thrive.
Now, let’s bring this back to TikTok. I’m not a fan of the platform—I think it’s caused plenty of harm. Has it caused more harm than rock music? No, not even close. But yes, TikTok has shortened attention spans. The algorithm has contributed to depression and social disengagement. It’s caused real problems.
At the same time, it’s expanded the possibilities for self-expression. People are creating things with short-form video that were unimaginable even 20 years ago. The genie is out of the bottle. The US government can ban the platform, but they can’t ban the medium. People have discovered a new way to express themselves, and they’re not going to stop because TikTok is gone.
So the real question is: how do we make this better? How do we encourage the positives of this new form of expression while addressing the negatives? Can we guide it in a more positive direction? I don’t know. But banning TikTok won’t make the medium disappear.
We need to be thoughtful and recognize that a new art form has arrived. Where it goes from here, I don’t know. But it’s not going away just because someone tries to ban it.
When rock music first emerged in the ’50s, ’60s, and ’70s, what did people complain about? They said it appealed to base sexual desires, encouraged drug culture, and made the generation self-centered.
We laugh at those complaints now, dismissing them as moral panic, but you know what? They were right. Rock music did usher in a sexually permissive culture—it paralleled the free-love era. It glorified promiscuity and groupies.
Looking back, it’s frightening how normalized it was for rock stars to prey on underage girls. Jerry Lee Lewis married his 13-year-old cousin. Elvis met Priscilla Presley when she was far from legal.
This wasn’t even that long ago. Twenty years ago, there was a movie called Almost Famous, and one of the main characters was a teenage girl groupie. It wasn’t framed as creepy. It was just a story.
And the drugs? Oh, the drugs. How many people got into drugs because they went to a rock show? How many died because drugs were romanticized in rock culture? Even the rock stars themselves—so many died young. The “27 Club” exists because so many musicians didn’t make it past that age, succumbing to addiction and its consequences. Alcohol, too, counts as a drug in this equation. A lot of lives were lost because rock culture made substance abuse seem cool.
But here’s the thing: alongside all this negativity, rock music brought incredible self-expression. One of the originators, Little Richard, was not only a musical icon but one of the first gay figures in the public eye. Later, artists like Elton John, Freddie Mercury, and Boy George expanded representation for LGBTQ+ communities. Rock also created opportunities for women—Joni Mitchell, Kate Bush, and Madonna thrived because of it.
I’m not excusing the negative aspects, but we have to acknowledge that rock music fundamentally changed society. It shaped the current political climate. Those who grew up in the rock era, the “Me Generation,” got older and carried that self-focus with them. We even coined terms like “yuppies” to describe them. These are the people who came from the culture of sex, drugs, and rock and roll, and they shaped the world we live in now.
Yet despite all this, do I think rock and roll should’ve been banned? No. You can’t ban a culture. Try, and it finds a way to thrive.
Now, let’s bring this back to TikTok. I’m not a fan of the platform—I think it’s caused plenty of harm. Has it caused more harm than rock music? No, not even close. But yes, TikTok has shortened attention spans. The algorithm has contributed to depression and social disengagement. It’s caused real problems.
At the same time, it’s expanded the possibilities for self-expression. People are creating things with short-form video that were unimaginable even 20 years ago. The genie is out of the bottle. The US government can ban the platform, but they can’t ban the medium. People have discovered a new way to express themselves, and they’re not going to stop because TikTok is gone.
So the real question is: how do we make this better? How do we encourage the positives of this new form of expression while addressing the negatives? Can we guide it in a more positive direction? I don’t know. But banning TikTok won’t make the medium disappear.
We need to be thoughtful and recognize that a new art form has arrived. Where it goes from here, I don’t know. But it’s not going away just because someone tries to ban it.