Don’t inquire myself as to the reasons. However, while i sat on my rooms floors, ears ringing to the echoes off my today-ex-boyfriend’s wobbly voice telling me he planned to break one thing of, We lower my cell phone and, once punctually purging they of all proof of my personal defunct dating, established TikTok.
Immediately the For You Page, blissfully unaware of what had just happened, served me with a video from a couple adorable gays filming an adorable skit for their lovable lovers webpage. Clearly, despite its recognized omniscience, TikTok’s algorithm had not been listening in on my calls, nor had it been reading my texts.
When I next loveandseek Гјyelik iptali braved the app three weeks later, nothing had changed. There they were, taunting me again: boyfriend memes, couples’ skits, soppy compilations of Ian and you will Mickey away from Shameless. The FYP had been there for me in the darkest depths of the pandemic, but now it had forsaken me; left adrift and single in the depressing sea of #relationship TikTok. Well, I thought, if it isn’t the consequences of my own actions? Up until a few weeks prior I’d been in a (seemingly) happy relationship, so videos that spoke to that experience were exactly the sort of stuff I’d eagerly engaged with. TikTok was only doing its job, but for obvious reasons I desperately wanted out of this nightmarish pit of romantic content.
I started initially to inquire how long it could do the formula to help you suss away just what had taken place on the other side from the brand new screen (tl;dr sweetheart: moved, heart: broken) and you will punt me personally to #SingleTok in which I belonged. So i setup an easy try out: Day-after-day I might carry on TikTok and browse the new FYP for about half-hour, overlooking relationships-styled blogs and you can twice-tapping anything to create having breakups or becoming single. In the process I might try added ways to push brand new software regarding the best assistance. With some luck, I might be able to get back my personal feed in order to a spot in which We would not must hurl my personal phone across the room. I can manage dropping the new sweetheart, however, We wasn’t about to let TikTok forgo a combat.
Date One to
My first proper reunion with the For You Page was rough. During the 30 minutes I spent scrolling, I came across a nauseating 19 videos about relationships – including at least three couples’ accounts. Only one (a melancholy Brokeback Mountain clip) seemed to capture anything resembling my current mood. As I waded through the thick sludge of content I noted down details of offending videos for later reference – we’re talking five skits with captions containing the phrase “if the boyfriend,” three couples bragging about their gender lives, and not one but two Mickey and Ian slideshows. As a result of my thorough note-taking I was perhaps guilty of letting those TikToks play all the way through, and the app possibly misread the watch time as a massive thumbs-up, curating even more scenes of romantic idyll I didn’t want. Needless to say I came away from the experience feeling emotionally drained, but unsurprised. This was not going to happen overnight.
Go out One or two
For my second dive into the murky waters of the FYP, I needed a change of tack, so I resolved to mark a note on a piece of paper whenever any #relationship videos flashed up, and to swipe past them without hesitation. Once again I spent half an hour scrolling and once again I was made to feel worse for it. I’m unsure how many clips I got through in total, but 42 of them literally had the word ‘boyfriend’ in the goddamn caption. I fell back on the sofa, groaning. Try as I might to steer the algorithm towards memes regarding the becoming contributed on the and away from skits from the spooning, TikTok wasn’t hearing me.