Is TikTok really becoming a free speech platform? Or just pretending to?
In this episode of Stay in the Gray, Ryan Lafield breaks down TikTok’s latest PR stunt—restructuring its U.S. Content Advisory Council to “embrace free expression.” But behind the headlines? It’s business as usual: censorship, algorithmic suppression, and selective enforcement based on follower count.
🎙 Topics in this episode:
– Shadowbans, content flags, and false guideline strikes
– Why TikTok punishes small creators but protects big accounts
– ByteDance, China, and political content they don’t want you posting
– 500 million+ videos removed in 2024—and what they’re not telling you
– The push for U.S. regulation, digital tariffs, and actual accountability
From personal censorship experiences to big-picture geopolitical influence, this episode hits harder than any community guideline ever could.
If you’ve ever felt silenced online, this one’s for you.
Hit play—and then share it before they decide it’s “misinformation.”
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Make it make sense. TikTok, unless you're a part of
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their influencer elite class or you bring in a lot of ad
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revenue, you're held to a different standard.
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The rules do not apply equally, they apply algorithmically like
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that. TikTok is not becoming a free
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speech platform, it's becoming a controlled speech flat platform
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with just better PR. True free speech doesn't mean
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you're safe when you're popular, It means you're equal when
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you're not. Hey guys, May the 15th, it
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reached 100° here in Dallas, TX. The summer is upon us.
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I'm fed up with TikTok and so I feel like a few things need to
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be said. I want to talk about the
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hypocrisy. I want to talk about the fact
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that they're a Chinese company. I want to talk about all sorts
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of taking advantage of the people that use it and the money
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that's spent on it. I'm talking about this app that
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has the kids taken by storm, talking about the app that made
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Addison Rae famous for lip syncing and her sweatpants, and
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they're now pretending that you're the next Free Speech
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frontier. They've restructured their US
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Content Advisory Council to look more diverse and not in the
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usual DEI checkbox kind of way. This time it it includes
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Libertarian and conservative voices to add on to their
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already liberal voice. And to that I say, adorable.
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We're going to take a real look at what what's actually going
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on. Let's roll.
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Tik Tok's content Advisory Council now features names like
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David and Serra. I think I said that, right?
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And Corbin Bartholed and these guys openly advocate for free
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speech. The headline reads like a win.
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TikTok moves toward open dialogue.
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The translation TikTok is scrambling to avoid another U.S.
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government crackdown. Because, let's be honest, they
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don't care about your voice. They care about not getting
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banned. the United States makes up quite a bit of that platform.
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There's a reason this move and their strategy is happening
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right now. Tik Tok's parent company, Byte
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Dance, is under fire, the result of the Supreme Court ruling and
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TikTok ver. TikTok V.
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Garland upheld the constitutionality of federal
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law. the US government basically said sell it, we'll shut you
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down. Suddenly, magically, TikTok
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became the champion of American values.
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Please, this isn't freedom. This is survival instinct in a
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suit. Here's where it gets personal to
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me. I'm a smallish podcast.
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Got a base. I'm always trying to grow that
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base like anybody would. I've been flagged repeatedly on
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TikTok videos, pulled down strikes against me, suspensions
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for a couple of days, community guideline strikes and then no
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explanation. Occasionally they'll say you
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know, drug policy was was broken when all I did is bring
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awareness to an opioid problem we have in this country.
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But apparently I'm pushing drugs.
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That's the point. Context is void.
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There's no human review right away.
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It's just a bot that can't tell satire from sedition.
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And don't even try and write them to explain.
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I've done this many times. It's a fucking quest.
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Frodo had an easier time getting a Mordor.
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It's about context. I would love to explain.
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Hey look, I think you your algorithms misread what I was
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trying to say. I was simply saying that we need
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to be aware that there's a drug issue.
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Having a picture of somebody using drugs is called impactful.
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It's an aesthetic. It's a visual effect, if you
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will, to try and get people to pay attention.
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That's what you want on your platform.
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I thought, no breaking anything. I'm not saying, hey, check this
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out, this looks fun. Make it easier to get a hold of
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somebody if you're going to do this.
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And meanwhile, there are literally live users side by
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side that do these live, you know, and they they come in
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together. Both their accounts are on the
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screen and they're arguing mostly these days about
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politics. When you had leading up to the
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debate, you had for a while, it was Biden and Trump.
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Then you had Harris and Trump people arguing and the
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backgrounds were red and blue for the different parties.
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And then you had people coming in and typing in and saying
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whatever. And I tell you what, they use
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language and tone that Tarantino would cringe cringe at.
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I mean F bombs and slurs and just unfiltered chaos on these
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debates arguments. No flag, no ban, no nothing.
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They get away with it on the live shows but I call someone
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daft in a comment with text to someone responding to my video
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and boom violation. Make it make sense.
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TikTok. Unless you're a part of their
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influencer elite class or you bring in a lot of ad revenue,
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you're held to a different standard.
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The rules do not apply equally. They apply algorithmically like
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that. They say they're fixing it.
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They say they're adding in a footnotes to allow context.
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Really. Then why is my context buried
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even after my appeals are approved?
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I'll submit an appeal and 90% of the time, about 5 minutes later,
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they're like, yeah, OK, click. They bring it back, but the
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view's dead, the reach gone. It's like starting all over.
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It's like Tik Tok's algorithm holds a grudge because I may or
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may not have broken their rules. And then you have to dig out of
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the hole and get people to to to start viewing again.
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Here's the kicker. When once it happens that there
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is no way back, there's not. You can't reset.
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It's not a redemption. TikTok doesn't say we're as
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sorry. Maybe we'll toss it out to a few
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more people for you. The account is just quietly like
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throttled, sitting in void somewhere until you again, work
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your way back out. It's like starting over and it's
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frustrating. And this is from the platform,
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by the way, who admittedly brags about how much it censors.
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Check this out. 2024 alone, TikTok removed over 500 million
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videos for violating its policies.
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That's half a billion videos not flagged or reviewed, just
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yanked. Removed.
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But tell me again how they're becoming a free speech platform.
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They've also poured over $2 billion into trust and safety.
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What does that buy you exactly? Endless hate speech refreshers?
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Implicit bias training in course materials so watered down it
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could have been written by HR bot in San Francisco.
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They claim they're fighting anti-Semitism and Islamophobia,
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which fine, great, but what are they really finding?
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Context, nuance, and anyone who doesn't fit with their
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ideological playbook. Because what looks like safety
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on the surface often just means more ways to censor the wrong
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opinions. Let's talk about China.
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I've been waiting for this. Is it a conspiracy lane?
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I don't know. Is it?
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TikTok is owned by Byte Dance. Byte Dance is based in China.
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It's no secret that China US relationships aren't the best.
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TikTok is no different. Do you really think that that
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government wants free speech flourishing through their
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platform from the USAI? Don't think so.
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They claim political content violates their rules.
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And besides those live debates I just mentioned previously, let's
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talk about their hashtags. Hashtag politics. 4.5 million
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posts. Hashtag politics TikTok 316
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posts #tik T.O.K politics and reverse it. 30 posts.
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And that's just what they didn't scrub.
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So either they're incompetent or their no politics rule means no
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politics that make China look bad.
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They want us fighting. They love watching our country
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yell at each other and hate our president and love our
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president. Trust me, I've seen creators
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silenced for daring to mention Taiwan, the CCP, or anything
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that disrupts their narrative. Meanwhile, domestic outrage and
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culture war content push it, promote it, let it burn.
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Let's not ignore the timing either.
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The moment the US ramps up tariffs and cracks down on
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Chinese tech, TikTok starts spreading around like it's the
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Statue of Liberty. We're out here taxing EVs and
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semiconductors, and what we need to be doing is tariffing digital
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propaganda while we're at it. Tik Tok's idea of free speech is
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to post anything as long as it's not inconvenient for Beijing.
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Tik Tok's pretending they're the problem and the solution.
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They censor speech and create councils to review the
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censorship. They build algorithms to flag
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nuance, then act shocked when the creators leave.
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And now they want to say we're becoming a platform for open
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debate. What they really mean is we'll
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tolerate more opinions as long as it doesn't interfere with our
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revenue or Beijing's mood. So no, Tiktok is not becoming a
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free speech platform. It's becoming a controlled
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speech flat platform with just better PR.
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And if you've ever had content flagged for literally nothing,
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then you already know this and you're frustrated like I am.
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So much so that I felt like I needed to do a show about it.
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True free speech doesn't mean you're safe when you're popular.
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It means you'll equal when you're not.
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If you've ever felt shadow banned, silenced gas lit by a
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robot, you're not crazy. You're not alone.
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Go on TikTok, try and find me there if you if you want, stay
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in the great podcast. You already know that.
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And you know, hit, hit, hit likes, share it, you know, move
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this around and let's stand up to this a little bit.
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They're not going to like this. I don't plan on promoting it
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there. But again, we're all in this.
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I mean, we're, we're Americans. And yes, it's TikTok, but it's
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still an example of being taken advantage of with an addiction
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in this, in this world, which is social media, scrolling through
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shorts and reels and all these things.
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And if we're going to be on that platform, then we need to know
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what's going on. We need to feel comfortable with
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it. And we need to know that our
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opinions are equal to anybody else's.
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And that's all I'm fighting for. We didn't even get into the fact
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that China could be spying through TikTok.
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That's another show. Let's not start a digital war
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with China. I'm staying in the great
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podcast, but again, share it, tag it.
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Hit me up on YouTube and TikTok and hit me up on Instagram and
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Facebook and all the above. X, I'm flying around X like it's
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that place is insane. That's a whole other topic.
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Free speech is definitely allowed there, let me tell you.
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And adding on to all of this is a personal experience I had.
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I mentioned to you guys before that I've gone through scammers
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and one of them, the main one, started on TikTok where they're
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feeding on people like me, people like us who are
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complaining and who are Privy to their hypocrisy and the way that
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they run things. So when someone approaches you,
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when all you're trying to do is grow your account and they say,
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hey, I got you, I'll make your account great.
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There's a way to do it. And you're unfamiliar with
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TikTok, say you've just got on it, I don't know, about a month
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prior, which is what happened. And you go, all right, this
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sounds great, go ahead. No terms or nothing.
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I thought it was a quick tweak and then you find yourself in
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the hole in this pit that you can't climb out of because it's
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almost like they can impact your account.
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This guy, I'm not so sure it's not a group of people and I'm
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not so sure that they aren't affiliated with TikTok in some
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way. I'm not making that claim.
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I'm just saying it's a possibility.
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But when you come at me and you say I can do this and you look,
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there's no way this person or this group has 600 followers
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with one post. There's something that they're
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doing, there's some way around it.
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And, and when I went to report them, TikTok said we, we find no
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violation. So either TikTok is aware of
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these or they want them or it's a way that TikTok makes extra
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money, which wouldn't surprise me or they just don't care
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because somehow this other person may be bringing in some
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sort of revenue. But we have to be careful of
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severe things as well. Not just I'm mad that you gave
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me a strike because I called him a Doo Doo face.
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There are some legit scammers and legit fraud going on on
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TikTok. And if you aren't aware of it or
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you fall into it like I did, be out of desperation to grow with
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the goal of monetizing, then it's your easy prey.
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And I was easy prey. And I swear if I ever find out
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who this was and I never will, I've thought about putting
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together some investigation. I've got a lot of records of
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transactions that took place and we'll see.
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Is it worth it? I don't know.
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Maybe you just need to learn from these experiences and move
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on. So heed my warning.
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But but that's it. I mean, it's a lot.
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There's a lot to it. And I just want everybody to be
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aware and to think about TikTok before parading around throwing
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all your information out there. So again, if you ever felt
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Shadow banned, silenced, gas lit by a robot, you're not crazy.
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You're not alone. Share this tag TikTok in it.
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Let them know. Let them know we see it.
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Let them know we're done pretending that we don't.
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So until next time, stay pissed, stay loud, stay inquisitive,
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please stay laughing, stay in the grave.
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Love you guys.