TikTok is the Smallpox of the 2020s

In the 18th and 19th centuries, smallpox was more than a disease—it was a weapon. European colonizers intentionally spread it to weaken and destroy Indigenous populations. The infamous case of Lord Jeffrey Amherst in 1763, when British forces distributed smallpox-infected blankets to Native communities during Pontiac’s War, stands as one of the most notorious examples of biological warfare in history. Smallpox was terrifying not only because of its lethality, but because it struck at the heart of populations with no immunity. It reshaped the demographic and political order of North America for centuries.

Biological warfare did not end with the colonial period. The 20th century brought industrialized efforts: the Japanese Imperial Army’s Unit 731 conducted horrific experiments during World War II, weaponizing plague and anthrax. The United States and the Soviet Union pursued their own offensive bioweapons programs well into the Cold War, stockpiling pathogens with the potential to devastate civilian populations. The logic of such programs was clear—disease could be used to destabilize entire societies more effectively than conventional warfare.

Today, the battleground has shifted from bodies to minds. Social media platforms—TikTok foremost among them—serve as delivery systems for disinformation and psychological contagion. Where smallpox spread through blankets and close contact, TikTok spreads through algorithms designed to maximize engagement. What once took weeks to devastate a community can now happen in hours, with a video or meme reaching millions before fact-checkers or educators can respond.

The analogy is not metaphorical flourish. Both smallpox and social media weaponization exploit vulnerabilities: biological susceptibility in the first case, and cognitive-emotional susceptibility in the second. Both create dependencies: populations weakened by disease became reliant on colonial powers, while users conditioned by TikTok’s endless scroll become dependent on an algorithm that thrives on outrage, spectacle, and division.

Weaponization of social media takes many forms. Disinformation campaigns around elections, climate change, and public health spread faster than corrections. Extremist groups use TikTok’s short-form videos to recruit younger audiences with humor and cultural references. State actors experiment with algorithmic nudges to destabilize adversaries, just as Cold War militaries once experimented with viruses in clandestine labs.

Universities are not insulated from this epidemic. Students now arrive on campus carrying not only smartphones but cognitive frameworks shaped by algorithmic feeds. Professors struggle to compete with the authority of viral influencers. Entire institutions have found themselves dragged into controversy over short clips that strip away context but ignite outrage. The terrain of higher education is increasingly defined by psychological contagion, much as earlier centuries were defined by outbreaks of smallpox.

If smallpox forced the development of public health measures, TikTok and other social media platforms demand the development of new digital immunities: critical media literacy, institutional resilience, and transnational cooperation to blunt the impact of algorithmic manipulation. Without such measures, the scars may not appear on skin, but they will mark a generation in cognition, behavior, and trust.

Just as history judges the weaponization of smallpox as a crime against humanity, it may one day judge the weaponization of social media in the same light. The question is whether societies will act before the damage becomes irreversible.

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Sources

• Alibek, K., & Handelman, S. (1999). Biohazard: The Chilling True Story of the Largest Covert Biological Weapons Program in the World. Delta.

• Crozier, A. (2022). “Colonialism, Contagion, and the History of Smallpox in North America.” Journal of Colonial History, 23(3), 245–268.

• DiResta, R. (2018). “The Information Wars.” Foreign Affairs, 97(6), 146–155.

• Lakoff, A. (2017). Unprepared: Global Health in a Time of Emergency. University of California Press.

• Meselson, M., et al. (2000). “The Sverdlovsk Anthrax Outbreak of 1979.” Science, 266(5188), 1202–1208.

• Zuboff, S. (2019). The Age of Surveillance Capitalism. PublicAffairs.