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I click “Install” and then “Sign in with Google”. Seconds later, I am a TikTok user, one of the nearly nine million in Romania. I choose the content that interests me from a list, to keep my profile as neat as possible – daily life, entertainment, education, to help the algorithm. As it happened, TikTok had other plans for me: before I realized, I got sucked into a genuine propaganda hole.
I kept reading about TikTok, about the data it collects from users, about the fake news and propaganda of extremist parties that widely circulate on the platform, or about the populist posts certain politicians share indiscriminately. I also knew about the live streams of people who never stop talking, those who become overnight experts on pretty much anything, or about views and comments that flow in the thousands, exceeding the engagement that any other social network has to offer. I never imagined, however, that such content would literally flood my page as soon as I signed up.
Nicolae Ceaușescu, Corneliu Zelea Codreanu and Ion Antonescu, trending on TikTok
The last speech Ceaușescu delivered was the first video I discovered after my first scroll on TikTok. A few lines from what would become the current anthem of Romania, proclaimed by Ceaușescu in the Palace (the present-day Revolution) Square on December 21, 1989, were circulated on thousands of feeds, judging by the number of views. This speech, used in dozens of videos, is accompanied by emojis with applause and regrets, sad music in the background, subtitles with special effects or phrases like “Romania’s last patriot”, and inevitably hundreds of comments like “things were much better under Ceaușescu compared to today🥺”. This, however, is not the only speech that revives the dictator’s memory in the mind of TikTok users from Romania.
Speech after speech is filtered and modified in CapCut, turning Nicolae Ceaușescu into a kind of influencer/tiktoker who basks in popularity and praise across comments. These videos exploit and amplify nostalgia for the Ceaușescu regime (even among those who were not born at the time). The dictator’s pathetic tone and his communist slogans are romanticized, along with the idea that only such a leader and such a regime could save us, as communist nostalgics still believe our country risks losing its economic and political foothold as long as others keep “interfering with our domestic affairs”.
One scroll away from Ceaușescu I come across another well-known figure from Romanian history - Corneliu Zelea Codreanu. The former head of the Legionnaires, a violent, anti-Semitic, ultra-nationalist and anti-democratic extremist, Zelea Codreanu is now trending on TikTok. His profile paints the image of a cool, charismatic character. His videos are edited in a typical Gen Z manner, with specific tunes, emoticons and the typical jargon. The comments the profile attracts are much in the same vein, and many of them are simply “TLC”. At a first glance, it looks like teenage slang, but in fact the three letters are the Romanian abbreviation for “Long live the Legion and the Captain”. It’s the kind of comment we’re seeing more and more frequently on TikTok, on websites and blogs of neo-legionnaires, some linked to AUR.
Another figure of the turbulent period before communism that appeared in my TikTok feed is Ion Antonescu, presented as a great patriot and elevated to the rank of national hero. The historical truth (that Antonescu was in fact a war criminal who had close ties to Hitler and Nazi Germany and facilitated the Holocaust in Romania) is left out. Instead, a bunch of supporters applaud his Nazi policies, elevating him to the rank of national hero.
Politicians and influencers, following in the footsteps of Ceaușescu and Zelea Codreanu
Narratives similar to those of Ceaușescu, Antonescu or Zelea Codreanu are also exploited by extremist politicians, current or former members of AUR and S.O.S. Romania, independent candidates or members of non-parliamentary parties. These historical figures seem to have been brought back to life to complete the full circle of extremism. Rather, extremists resort to discourses that were successful and popular at a certain point in history and provide them with continuity, because they know they will sit well with the public in times of crisis. Historian Oliver Jens Schmitt, the author of the volume “Codreanu. The Rise and Fall of the Captain”, argues that extremists offer people an easy code for interpreting reality and a kind of self-esteem that every society needs. When existing parties or social currents fail at that, it opens up a very vast space for extremist rhetoric.
This exact space is well managed on TikTok, and not just by older or newer political figures, but also by micro-influencers or faceless influencers who have mustered communities of thousands of people around the conspiracy theories they promote. One such account is that of Ion Dragoş Horeaba, also known as the Dictator. Horeaba regularly posts videos with dramatic music, always accompanied by a Breaking News headline animation running on the screen. His posts are visually overloaded with text in all caps and emoticons. There are actually two videos running separately at all times, one depicting him, the other the topic he’s discussing. The post is always accompanied by an urge to subscribe to his Telegram channel, where he claims people can access uncensored videos. He claims the channel currently has 2,000 subscribers, and when it hits 100 thousand, he will found a political party.
Horeaba is one of the people who promote pro-Russian narratives in Romania. There are 20 pages bearing his name and the same profile picture on TikTok. The first two on the list have 41 thousand and 35 thousand subscribers, respectively, over 2 thousand and 1 thousand posted videos, respectively, with an aggregate number of 1.4 million likes.
I came across this influencer through a video where he called a famous Romanian performer the “globalists’ baby soother”, because he was vaccinated, had Covid and because he climbed on stage at a concert in Chișinău, wearing the flag of the Republic of Moldova on his shoulders. I soon found out that the video was merely the tip of the iceberg, and that in fact, false narratives and conspiracy theories are running rampant on his profile. One of the false narratives he promotes is that natural disasters are caused by European Union leaders, who cause fires and floods at their whim. Another idea he endorses is that the European Union is dragging us from the pandemic into the war, although on the other hand he questions the seriousness or even the existence of the war in Ukraine. Apart from this kind of videos, many fostering pro-Putin, anti-Semitic or racist ideas, I discovered one in which he urges people that, every time the authorities or the media announce something, to do the exact opposite.
TikTok, a mental health hazard
It's September 29, 11:39 PM. You’re lying in bed with the light off and you’re glued to a screen where colors keep flickering, special effects keep popping up when you least expect, and everyone seems to have something important to say. The room fills up with dramatic music, alert sounds, cat memes and strange, low voices, all mixing in the dark, to the extent that when war sirens start blaring, your brain cannot tell if the sound is coming from outside or from your phone. The message on your phone reads “September 30, Romania will officially enter the war. Thank you, Romanians, for your ignorance and arrogance”. The message startles you, you are frightened, this time you don't read the comments linked to the video, because you want to get rid of the state of panic gripping you. So, you swipe instantly to a video of a cute piglet eating a croissant. The panic gradually dissipates. Quiet sets in. Time to sleep.
Of course, nothing the TikTok video had foretold actually happened, of course. What did happen, instead, was that your mind took this piece of information, processed it and neatly stored it among other panic triggers that will immediately activate, maybe even on the next swipe. This state of panic, experienced constantly in the long term, ends up shaping a person's daily life, mixing perpetual anxiety with a distorted sense of reality. Psychologist Maxim Orîndaş, the co-host of a mental health show on TV8 (Republic of Moldova) and a creator of online content on social media, told Veridica.ro that panic induced by stimuli such as dramatic music, fast actions or special effects, can trigger phenomena that can affect the human brain in the long run. One such stimulus is emotional desensitization, by means of which a person can become unresponsive to real problems, because the brain gets used to a high level of stress and anxiety. In those real-life situations where the threat or the problem is real ad which require an actual response, the person will treat this episode with apathy.
This is not the only issue associated with content similar to the one found on TikTok. The constant onslaught of false or partially true narratives and conspiracy theories circulating on TikTok can give rise to a false perception of the world around you, of other people, and ultimately of yourself. The result, Maxim Orîndaș argues, is the loss of confidence in institutions / figures of authority and shaping one's own version of the truth. When someone is constantly exposed to fake news that confirms what he already believes, his beliefs take deeper root, and he becomes less prone to embracing new ideas.
The Moldovan psychologist also warns against the dangers of another effect, called cognitive distortion or the illusion of truth, which is manifested by a tendency to trust information only because we have been exposed to it recurrently. This phenomenon occurs because familiar information is perceived more easily and appears more reliable, and politicians frequently use this strategy to get their messages across. For the same reason, celebrities are often involved in spreading messages because they are familiar figures and inspire confidence.
The most vulnerable to the harmful effects of TikTok are young people. Several US states have recently sued the platform, claiming that its algorithm can cause anxiety, depression and dysmorphophobia.
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TikTok is now one of the apps running on my phone. It always has a selection of videos ready for me to sift through whenever I log back in. A video about Diana Șoșoacă, a priest's live stream, an influencer's daily vlog, a pro-Putin video, a meme, a live video published on the SOS Romania profile, a conspiracy theory about the EU, an influencer's video, a motivational live video, a meme about Nicușor Dan, a video about nightlife in Moscow, a live stream of someone singing with a picture of a church in the background, a video offering medical advice and then another live stream of a fitness workout, interrupted by a sudden post about Ceaușescu. These videos flood my TikTok feed day by day, and there are probably several thousand users like me out there, exposed to the same type of content. Each swipe leaves behind an extra view on the platform, and outside the platform, it plants an idea that takes deeper roots from swipe to swipe, to the point that it grows beyond a simple idea, becoming a voting option.
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