In the fall of 2023, I was in 9th grade, and my TikTok algorithm was set to funny memes and trends like Lebron James, Chipotle girl, the TikTok rizz party, brainrot, popular dances, and boy bands. My friends and I watched the 60-second videos on the bus to school in the morning, during lunch period, and even in school before the phone ban was implemented two years later. Then I’d watch more TikTok alone after I got home from school.
Scrolling TikTok and other social media took up more and more space in my life. I’d check my notifications as soon as I woke up; I’d pull out my phone waiting a mere two minutes for the bus to arrive, or if I felt awkward in a conversation. Scrolling and sharing content became the center of my life and the life of everyone around me: It was how we connected, and it dictated what we talked about.
Looking back, I can see my relationship to my phone was already an addiction. But I didn’t notice downsides until after my algorithm abruptly began pouring out gruesome content.
On October 7, 2023, Hamas attacked and retaliated against Israel, and then Israel attacked Gaza. My For You page on TikTok suddenly filled with videos documenting and talking about both the Hamas attacks and the growing crisis in Gaza. There was information pointing in all directions, making it harder for me to understand what was happening. The news my dad watches on TV was only describing what Hamas did on October 7, not Israel’s retaliation or the greater context.
I saw a few “Free Israel” posts, but my algorithm had way more videos of protests organized by the Free Palestine movement. Truthfully, I didn’t even know Palestine and Israel were both countries before October 7th. I decided to dig into the history, searching for more information on TikTok while also hearing more from friends and family.
I learned, mostly from TikTok, about Israel’s history of violently oppressing Palestinians since 1948 and even before. Feelings of disgust and uncomfortable fascination took over me: How could a nation be so systematically cruel and unjust? Many of my friends, especially those who are Muslim like me, were irresistibly pulled in by these videos of protests and news, as religion and culture were deeply tied into these opposing movements.
TikTok felt like a battleground—you picked a side, and the other side was your enemy, completely wrong. Your views on Palestine affected how you associated yourself in society and shaped your relationships. In my high school, everyone picked a side and quickly figured who to say “I’m pro-Palestinian” or “I’m pro-Israeli” to, and who to not bring up the topic with at all.
Learning about the history of the occupation in Palestine made me think more about my religion, country, and identity, and also about colonialism. Through TikTok I learned about boycotting brands, and about slogans used during rallies. This was my first experience of feeling drawn to a political movement, and it resonated with me to support fellow Muslims in their struggles against imperialism and expansionism. I did not attend any of the protests in New York, but I expressed my support for the Free Palestine movement online.
This new political alignment led me to monitor TV news more, which was also a way to connect to my dad who watches CNN, NBC, and ABC. The news he and I watched together in the mornings leaned toward support for Israel. The news he watched didn’t talk about Israel’s illegal occupation of Gaza and the West Bank before October 7th, but TikTok did.
This inclined me to dig deeper on TikTok. But the more I clicked, the more the algorithm delivered harrowing footage, like reels of mothers pleading from landscapes of rubble, desperately begging for money to save their malnourished children.
The terrible thing about TikTok is that once you engage with a certain type of content, it’ll keep pushing similar things on you. My page was flooded with videos of Palestinians describing bombings and starvation, and security footage of the Israeli Defense Forces abusing Palestinians. I spent way too much of my freshman year looking at my phone, feeling sick and suffocated as I watched people wounded, starving, bombed, and beaten.
TikTok didn’t feel enjoyable anymore, and videos with drastically different content mixed in a surreal and horrible way. A video of an American girl putting on her makeup is right above a video about a Palestinian girl who was starving. I tried searching and interacting with videos about movies and clothes I liked to shift my For You page. But the algorithm never took the hint.
Numb Was the New Normal
My empathy for the people in the videos seemed to die out as time passed. I reacted less to the same horrors, but I still kept watching. It was a habit to interact with TikTok for hours a day, and I wanted to be updated. It felt like my job to keep up with the fast pace of the internet and the world. It also felt like my obligation to support not only people of my ummah, or community, but anyone who is suffering.
Sophomore year, Trump was elected, and my For You Page featured new kinds of hell. Now, in addition to the genocide in Gaza, I was blasted with videos about Project 2025, ICE raids, Alligator Alcatraz, and most recently, the Epstein files. I began throwing my phone across the room in frustration and helplessness.
A few months into 2025, I came to the conclusion that TikTok was making me miserable. I had lost hope in the American government and accepted that we live in a world made up of two kinds of people: powerful oppressors and the oppressed.
So, in the middle of my sophomore year, I deleted TikTok in an attempt to gain some control of my slipping mind.
Watching endless 60-second bursts of suffering made me feel helpless, numb, desensitized. Sometimes I felt annoyed, and then I felt guilty for being annoyed and for my privilege and not doing more to help. As the war progressed, the app seemed to anticipate that users would have the reactions I was having: more videos opened with something lighthearted to engage viewers before switching to the pain and the pleading. It feels dystopian.
Early on, I did send some of the victims in the videos from Gaza the money I was saving up for my dream boots. But I didn’t have enough to donate to everyone.
I saw the damage to my attention span, too. It was harder to pick up a book than pick up the phone, so I’d surf TikTok all day and start my homework late with a mind buzzing with war and politics. I couldn’t even remember half of what I watched.
So, in the middle of my sophomore year, I deleted TikTok in an attempt to gain some control of my slipping mind. I wanted to escape that feeling of dread I experienced just hovering my finger over the app icon.
A day or two later, I redownloaded it. It’s where all other 16-year olds are, and I felt isolated without it. That began a pattern of deleting and then reloading the app. This lurching back-and-forth demonstrates how divided my mind and emotions are when it comes to the app: It is bittersweet, evil, and nostalgic to me. It’s ruining my perception of the world, and it’s where I feel connected and included.
Reclaiming My Mind
The algorithms really are like an addictive drug. Social media companies know that outrage keeps people watching and posting, and that our brains require more and more shocking content.
TikTok, Meta, and YouTube make more money when you spend more time online, and the algorithm of TikTok’s For You page in particular is designed to keep us scrolling. In fact, they just lost a big lawsuit from a teenage girl who said they harmed her mental health.
Furthermore, on all social media, AI-generated images are now common. It’s easier to get people angry and panicked when you don’t have to rely on what’s really happening, but can instead make up stories with photos or video to match. These false stories are already creating more anger, confusion, and chaos online. Phrases like “Death to Arabs” and “Hitler needs to return” should not even cross our minds, but TikTok throws them in our faces.
Other friends of mine who follow geopolitics also feel crushed and drowned by the horrifying world events that pour out of TikTok. To cope, we laugh about all the dumb things Trump says. Sometimes we do have to sit with the fact that these wealthy politicians hold tremendous sway over the rest of us. We try not to dwell on that fact and instead look for signs of progress that provide hope for humanity. It helps to just hang out together without phones, away from the constant buzzing of political events.
This past spring, Ramadan, the month of spirituality and focus, gave me an opportunity to reground myself in the world that’s close to me. I spent more time with my family and surrounded myself with my religion. I felt like I had some control over my well-being for the first time in a long time. Maybe it was hunger, but I didn’t reach for my phone every few minutes. I prayed with more sincerity and focus. Without my phone buzzing and pressing the weight of the world onto my hunched shoulders, I have more space and more focus to appreciate what’s in front of me and what I can control.
Recently, I left my phone at home and rode my bike to the park. I hadn’t ridden it in a while, and I felt like a kid again. I laid the bike on the grass and felt the sunlight warm my face. I noticed different birds chirping. I breathed in the air, I felt the grass, and I saw people enjoying just existing in the park.
I enjoyed existing in the park, too. It didn’t make me forget the faults of politicians or the suffering of people in Gaza and elsewhere. But I can know that all exists and even help without living on my phone. I recently picked one woman in Gaza to send some money to. I read the BBC and Al Jazeera more and seek out Palestinian journalists.
Scrolling less has cleaned my mind. I am better able to control the tide of my emotions and thoughts as I pray more, read more, study more, and pay closer attention to the actual world around me. To stand up to people abusing their power, we need our minds, our empathy, and our consciousness. I’m starting to feel more hope about casting my first votes when I turn 18 in 2028, and for my generation.