They say the TikTok algorithm (like any other social algorithm) feeds you the type of content you eat up. To a degree that's true. But it has been two and a half years and TikTok still wants to show me women losing their babies at all gestational phases and postpartum.
It makes me sick as a woman, mother, human, and marketer.
When I lost my first pregnancy in 2o23 I found myself in a dark place. I'd never felt so emotionally and physically destroyed. Nobody talks about losing their babies and that's okay, I get it. It hurts. It's deeply personal.
You don't owe anyone your story.
But I needed to hear I wasn't alone and what better place than the internet?
I needed the space to feel my pain without shame and not to be told or asked things like:
- everything happens for a reason
- one day it wont hurt anymore
- just try not to think about it
- what's wrong with you?
- stay positive
I started watching other women's stories of loss. The content gave me comfort at that stage in my healing journey. You could blame me here and say it's my fault for engaging with this content.
But there comes a point in my path where that same content was no longer helpful. I was aware I'd sent signals to the algorithm that I might want this content and so I started to click and report I was not interested in seeing more content like this.
The weird thing is TikTok began to bombard me with video after video of pregnancy loss. I got so much more loss content after reporting I didn't want it that it started to seem like the algorithm counted that as an engagement signal.
I started to take breaks from the app after a mass reporting spree and hoped it would be fixed when logging back in months later.
My hypothesis was as follows:
- If I report but remain on the app then the app sends me more sad content because I stay regardless.
- If I report but then leave for an extended period then they are losing an active user and need to fix my feed.
During my second pregnancy, TikTok knew where I was at in my pregnancy and began sending me content about premature babies not making it and stillborn babies.
Then, when I delivered my baby boy, TikTok began to feed me tragic content about babies dying from SIDs. All happened either immediately upon opening the app or by video #3 or #5 after scrolling.
I know it's dumb of me to have kept using the app but I was stuck breastfeeding for 8 to 9 hours a day and enjoyed the content I saw 95% of the time when it wasn't morbid. I get reporting I didn't want more content like this but it was like clicking on a button that does the opposite of what you want it to.
Eventually, I switched to watching Reels.
I never had any problems on there.
Only TikTok.
The other day, I got curious what would happen if I log in to TikTok. It has been roughly 6 months of not using the app. What do I see? Tons of content about horrible things happening to babies and small children around my son's age.
If I want to remain sane I cannot use this app.
I refuse to believe that this is too big a problem to fix due to the sheer volume of content pumped out every minute. I refuse to believe it because their algorithm is so smart it's why they're so addictive, the content usually has copy and tags signaling the category it falls into, and I've flagged I don't want it.
I'm no engineer but that's a pretty simple equation of conditional logic, no?
If content containing [terms or hashtags affiliated with content here] gets flagged as do not show me more like this then do not show more like this.
So anyway, that's my rant for today.
Fuck TikTok.
