Week 6: WW3 + @thehypehouse + continental drift
I’m Kira & this is my weekly highlight of notable TikTok trends and creators.
Just as it’s in the news, it’s on TikTok: this week we’re talking about World War 3. An unknown number of videos have been posted with the hashtag #ww3, but the number of views on these videos has exploded: from 172 million (Saturday at 2am), to 411 million (Saturday at 10pm), to 625 million (Sunday at 5pm), to 870 million views (Monday at 8pm).
Most of these videos, as one would suspect, try to make light of the situation. In response to the possibility of a draft, some girls express their sudden enthusiasm for cooking and cleaning. Others turn the tables by sneaking over the border to Mexico, extol the unexpected benefits of being drafted, or (intentionally) confuse the military draft with the NFL draft.
The most common type of video exasperatedly declares that Gen Z is not prepared for a war. Many imagine how they would react in boot camp or the trenches, joking about how their contribution would be doing TikTok dances as a distraction. Others parody what video gamers raised on first-person shooter games would be like in a war. Some point out their closest experience with war is a Camp Rock march or Hamilton song.
What does this tell us overall? For one, that TikTok’s young audience is paying attention to what’s going on around them and thinking about how it might affect their lives, using humor as a mediation. It would be wrong to interpret this humor as a lack of concern. Active duty service members have posted their reactions to the news, often to comments of “stay safe.” Many captions and comments express genuine fear and confusion as to what may happen, acknowledging that making light of the situation and joking about dying may be a symptom of Gen Z’s poor mental health.
The prevalence of these WW3 memes also serves as education. There are videos that break down the latest events, comparing them to the motivations of WWI and WWII. Some commenters say they had to look up what was going on after seeing the news all over TikTok. One video points out how the Iran attack may have been Trump’s response to his impeachment. So in summary, the American youth of TikTok are using the platform to show that they’re aware of and vehemently against any idea of a war.
The New York Times recently profiled @thehypehouse, so we’ll do the same and fill in some of the gaps.
So what (or who) is the “Hype House”? To put it formally, it’s a collection of ~19 TikTok creators that are loosely associated with each other, often filming videos together in a large LA mansion. (Only a handful of its members actually live there.) The @thehypehouse account itself posts videos, but it’s just as common that its members post TikToks on their own accounts.
The NYTimes article covers the motivation behind these “collab houses,” namely as a way to increase viewership and creativity. What the article misses that I want to discuss is the possible darker side of the Hype House, both by exploitation of its female members and the message it sends to its young viewers.
One glaring problem with the Hype House is that basically all of its members are white or very lightskinned. Other people on TikTok have dubbed it the White House for this reason.
But it’s bigger issue is not with race, but gender. (This four part series, which coined the hashtag #usingherforhype, made some good points that I will use.) The Hype House was the brainchild of three male members and, by my count, the current gender breakdown of its members is 6 girls to ~13 boys. Hmm.
Let’s take stock of these ~19 members, ordered by the number of followers they have, bolding the names of the girls:
15.6m – Charli D’Amelio
9m – Addison Rae
8.4m – Chase Hudson
7.6m – Avani Gregg
5.6m – Dixie D’Amelio
4.1m – Ondreaz Lopez
3.2m – Tony Lopez
2.7m – Alex Warren
1.3m – Nick Austin
1.1m – Kouvr Annon
989k – Daisy Keech
832k – Thomas Petrou
639k – Ryland Storms
606k – Jack Wright
535k – Hootie Hurley
371k – James Wright
198k – Patrick Huston
125k – Calvin Goldby
Does anything strike you as odd? Does it seem weird that of the top five most popular creators, four are girls? Keeping in mind that the Hype House was started by three guys, its members are 70% guys, and its most popular creators are girls, it’s not hard to believe that these (less popular) male creators are using the Hype House as a way to leech off of the popularity the girls have accrued for themselves.
So let’s bring it back again to Charli D’Amelio, who you may recall from Week 3 of this newsletter. She is by far the most popular creator in the group and one of the youngest at 15. She and the most popular guy in the group, Chase (aka Lilhuddy), allude to having some sort of relationship. Whether they’re dating or just “besties” is kept (intentionally) vague, with many videos ending in a near kiss or joyful embrace.
But something strikes me as odd. He is 17 to her 15, a non-negligible difference at that age. She has twice as many followers as he has. He is named the “brainchild” of the Hype House. He’s terrible at dancing, which is her main type of video. The constant stream of slightly suggestive videos, like him looking at her cleavage or leaning in close as she giggles and pulls away, leads me to think that she’s being used as a prop to get more attention sent his way. And regardless of if it’s a real or synthetic relationship, he has more to gain from their association than she does.
What message does this send to young viewers who stumble upon the videos by those in the Hype House? On some level, the Hype House represents the dream: a big group of friends spending their days in a sunny LA mansion, goofing off and making videos with no parents in sight. But its lack of diversity, imbalanced ratio of guys to girls, and reduction of their most popular member to arm candy sends the wrong signals about the path to success.
The award for Best Music Video goes to this captivating dance montage to the (surprisingly real) song The Sid Shuffle made to promote the 2012 movie Ice Age: Continental Drift. Such commitment! Such friendship!
The award for Most Realistic Expectations goes to this model, who explains how there’s a true difference between catfishing and simply not looking your best 100% of the time.
The award for Best Photo Collage goes to this gem. This is a good example of a pretty popular trend, which uses a filter called “Hand Gestures” that recognizes the user’s hand shape, takes a snapshot, and puts it in a collage at the top of the screen. What’s fun about these videos is how frustrating it is when TikTok doesn’t recognize the hand gesture, and how little time they have to move into place once it does!
That’s all folks! See you next week!