TikTok suggestions for a teen who is flirting with toxic ideology?

Post date: 2022-11-25 03:34:47

My 13yo has become obsessed with a TikTok personality who espouses a lot of toxic ideas. I feel comfortable having conversations with him about misogyny and more generally why this guy is a scam artist, but I would also like to direct him to some entertaining TikTokers who aren't pushing a lot of toxic masculinity. Interesting topics could include logicical fallacies and how they work, US History

I thought it was just about getting rich quick and we'd been talking about that — he's obsessed with wealth, which is exhausting but also I think appropriate at that age and I feel okay about talking him about money. But this TikTok guy also apparently converted to Islam because he felt that Christianity tolerates too much mockery and dissent; he says that real men step up and do hard things and if you don't you're not a man you're just a little bitch; real men don't get depressed, they man up and stop dwelling on it. And he likes women! He really does, heck there are some things that he trusts women with that he wouldn't trust men with (Surprise! It is taking care of babies! He respects women so much that he would never let anyone but a woman take care of a baby. Sigh)

He also has a whole website where you can buy a $50/mo subscription to learn how to get rich from a "Very Successful Faculty of Millionaires" who all go by their first name only. The site is full of language about breaking "free of the matrix" and "taking the red pill" ... so many red flags. Obviously, I am not going to sit back and tell him to listen to more positive voices and call my job here done, but I would love help identifying other more positive voices on TikTok. Some specific topics that either I know he would be interested in or I'd like to interest him in include:

* Logical Fallacies and how they work
* US History (especially with a heavy lefty bias, if I'm being honest, but he's genuinely interested in understanding the complexity of Christianity and the ideology that drove early puritan culture in New England)
* Science — physics, chemistry, biology. Right now his science class is doing physics, lots of motion and momentum stuff.
* Masculinity from a non-toxic perspective — something to directly counter this red-pill stuff
* The science of building muscle, basically any strength training that doesn't come with a lot of vitriol
* The science of dog training and teaching dogs new tricks. Understanding clicker training and positive reinforcement for dogs.

Who do you recommend on TikTok for content around these themes that will be appealing to a younger teen?

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