TikTok has updated its community guidelines to ban an array of anti-LGBTQ+ content, including deadnaming transgender people.
The social media platform announced the changes on 8 February following ongoing pressure from LGBTQ+ charities such as GLAAD and advocacy groups like UltraViolet.
TikTok said the new guidelines will be “adding clarity on the types of hateful ideologies prohibited on our platform,” which will now see deadnaming, misgendering and using a trans person’s pre-transition name banned.
Content that “supports or promotes conversion therapy programs” will also be explicitly restricted under the new rules.
“Though these ideologies have long been prohibited on TikTok, we’ve heard from creators and civil society organisations that it’s important to be explicit in our Community Guidelines,” said a statement from Cormac Keenan, the platform’s head of trust and safety. “On top of this, we hope our recent feature enabling people to add their pronouns will encourage respectful and inclusive dialogue on our platform.”
GLAAD claimed the updates incorporate recommendations it made to TikTok in 2021 as part of its Social Media Safety Index, which at the time said the app is “effectively unsafe for LGBTQ users.”
Happy #SaferInternetDay! Today we're announcing updates to our Community Guidelines to further support the well-being of our community and the integrity of our platform. Learn more in our Newsroom: https://t.co/CyMJ6EI2CT
— TikTokComms (@TikTokComms) February 8, 2022
Sarah Kate Ellis, GLAAD’s President and CEO, praised the social media giant for taking these steps to “prioritise LGBTQ safety”.
“When anti-transgender actions like misgendering or deadnaming, or the promotion of so-called ‘conversion therapy,’ occur on platforms like TikTok, they create an unsafe environment for LGBTQ people online and too often lead to real world harm,” she explained in a statement.
“TikTok’s move to expressly prohibit this harmful content in its Community Guidelines and to adopt recommendations made in GLAAD’s 2021 Social Media Safety Index raises the standard for LGBTQ safety online and sends a message that other platforms which claim to prioritise LGBTQ safety should follow suit with substantive actions like these.”
Other confirmed policy changes will see “the promotion of disordered eating” banned on TikTok, as well as using the app to commit crimes – among other things.
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