The way the US government is going after TikTok is not optimal. The "think of the children" rhetoric in particular is the same type of alarmism that has been used to justify recent authoritarian laws that dictate what children are allowed to be taught in schools or what medical decisions their families can make for them. It's an ugly trend in American politics that is not popular with young people, and more generally harms the image of the US as a free and liberal society. If the US government really cares about how social media impacts the mental health of its people, they should invest far more into mental health programs and universal healthcare in general. If the US government really cares about the privacy rights of its people, they should implement laws that regulate what kind of personal information a company is allowed to collect and mandate full transparency around how that information is used. If the US government really cares about how social media influences politics, they first need to ban "dark money", then more strictly regulate how elections are run, in particular limiting the length of political campaigns and setting standards for political advertizing. Going after TikTok specifically, while not addressing the structural issues, gives the impression that the true motivation is tech industry protectionism and anti-China posturing. It feels like there should be more constructive ways to celebrate democracy and resist China's global export of authoritarianism than going after a short video app that for the most part just makes a bunch of people happy.