TikTok is stopping customers looking for “skinnytok” – a hashtag which critics say directs individuals in direction of content material which “idolises excessive thinness.”
Content material related to the hashtag contains movies exhibiting individuals’s work-out routines or what they eat in a day.
TikTok mentioned it had “blocked search outcomes for #skinnytok because it has change into linked to unhealthy weight reduction content material.”
Individuals utilizing the hashtag will now be redirected to psychological well being assist sources as a substitute.
Tom Quinn, from the consuming dysfunction charity, Beat, welcomed the transfer saying “skinnytok” and associated content material may have “devastating” impacts on “struggling” individuals.
Nonetheless, he confused there was extra to do.
“We all know that customers will fairly often discover workarounds to content material blocks and there’ll nonetheless be damaging content material which is not shared below the “skinnytok” umbrella, which TikTok and different social media platforms should now deal with,” he instructed BBC Information.
Based on the US-based Nationwide Alliance for Consuming Issues, the skinnytok hashtag has greater than half one million posts related to it.
It says the hashtag contains content material reminiscent of low-calorie recipes which on the face of it seem to advertise wholesome way of life recommendation.
However the organisation says, in actuality, it “glorifies thinness and vilifies weight acquire” and “promotes disordered consuming behaviours.”
The development has precipitated explicit alarm in France, the place consultants have warned of how social media can push susceptible younger individuals in direction of creating consuming issues.
“The sufferers are utterly indoctrinated — and my 45-minute weekly session isn’t any match for spending hours day by day on TikTok,” the nutritionist Carole Copti instructed the AFP information company.
The blocking of the hashtag has been celebrated by France’s digital minister, who wrote on social media that “skinnytok is over” due to lobbying by European politicians.
In its assertion, TikTok mentioned it often reviewed its security measures to “deal with evolving dangers”.
“We proceed to limit movies from teen accounts and supply well being consultants and data in TikTok Search,” it added.
It’s not the primary time TikTok has been compelled to take motion over content material which raised physique picture issues.
In March, it blocked so-called “chubby filters” – a viral software which made individuals seem chubby.
