This is probably the worst argument for banning tiktok. You can choose to delete the app. You can choose to not look at your phone.
I use the app "minimalist phone" as well as screen time restrictions. You can do the same.
I use the app "minimalist phone" as well as screen time restrictions. You can do the same.
These are not remotely the same outcome. And especially for very social teenagers, the compulsion to reinstall an app may come from the feeling of missing out on the trends that your friends are plugged into. You don't want to use the app, but you don't want to isolate yourself either.
Sure we can ditch our friends and find a self-selected community of app-ditching new friends, but this group will be small, not all go to the same school, and not share various other common interests beyond "quitting popular app". If you connected with your old friends over fashion and volleyball, you might not be able to get the same connections in this group.
"The network effect" is such a powerful moat for social networks for this reason!
It's kind of like saying "why elect a government that feeds the poor, when you can just feed them yourself". Collective action is a different bargain.
If TikTok is addictive on large scale I think it is as good argument as all other arguments and should be taken, as well as all other arguments, into consideration.
Sports betting apps are worse for society than betting parlors.