Banning #SkinnyTok Won't Fix the Problem of Viral Harm

Hashtag bans are symbolic and have limited reach. We need to treat the systems, not the symptoms.

- Chew Han Ei

When TikTok recently removed the #SkinnyTok hashtag worldwide, its move was met with global relief, especially in Europe.

When used in searches on the platform, it had become a gateway to extreme dieting videos, "thinspiration" content, pro-ana (pro-anorexia) sites and dangerous messaging aimed at young users.

It should not have taken this long—two months—for TikTok to remove it. EU regulators had lobbied against it, and experts had flagged content like this for years.

But while the tag may be gone, the content persists, remixed under different names, embedded in the latest trends and still circulating widely.

It is clear that hashtag bans like this one are limited and symbolic tools, and are an inadequate response to the way harmful content morphs and spreads.

You can remove a word from search, but the ideas behind it will continue to show up on feeds, especially if they attract clicks.

It's not just limited to TikTok. In 2016, the A4 Waist Challenge went viral on social media platforms like Weibo and Instagram. It involved girls placing a piece of A4-sized paper in front of themselves to see if the paper could hide their entire waist.

That trend faded with time, but returned with a vengeance in another guise—as SkinnyTok—almost a decade later.

This is what happens when we treat symptoms, not systems.

SINGAPORE IS ESPECIALLY VULNERABLE

We are especially vulnerable to the emergence of dangerous viral trends in Singapore, where our youth are organically attached to mobile phones and constantly plugged into these platforms.

We have one of the highest mobile penetration rates in the world, about 10 million mobile subscriptions serving a population of just under six million. Our youth are cyborgs, webbed into a Matrix-like environment that is shaped by algorithms optimized for engagement.