Most of these articles single out TikTok when they apply to all big tech companies. Clearly the call should be for better privacy protection laws that protect all citizens from all present and future tech companies.
Other platform owners are bad, I don’t need them to be equal to China before doing something about it.
I agree. But by the same token, we don't need to do something about the others before doing something about TikTok. Where would we be today if we accepted the argument that before addressing tobacco companies we must first address alcohol companies, and before addressing alcohol companies, we must first address tobacco companies?
Arguing that X shouldn't be regulated because Y is not yet regulated is never a legitimate argument.
> Arguing that X shouldn't be regulated because Y is not yet regulated is never a legitimate argument.
Either you've got the question wrong, or your position is more disagreeable than you think. It seems to me that the question is whether Chinese X should be regulated when American X is not regulated. It is still technically X vs Y but the justification is far less obvious to me (when compared to justifying that we can regulate tobacco despite a lack of regulation of alcohol).
For example, imagine if your email password was given out to two individuals - one is your significant other, and the other is a random dude on the internet. In theory, good password hygiene should be maintained no matter who the individual is. In practice I would be (and should be) vastly more worried about this random dude than my partner.
Trying to figure out a generalized solution for big tech may prove to be too hard, and is frankly a waste of time when there's a credible geopolitical threat on our doorstep.