The average Australian TikTok viewer spends around 17 hours per month on the app – and with a growing amount of political discussion happening there, the addictive clock app will inevitably impact Australian politics. But with weird-ass memes, disinformation, unhinged comment sections and unfiltered live streams all ‘normal’ parts of the TikTok landscape, what does this mean for the way young Australians understand and interact with politics? And, more immediately… could TikTok determine which party ‘wins’ the youth vote and perhaps influence the 2022 federal election?
Here are all the factors at play – for better and for worse.
How Many Australian Voters Are On TikTok?
If we look at the numbers it is clear that Tik Tok has influence over its users. They spend more time on the app than any other platform: up 40% to an average of 23.4 hours per person, per month. By comparison, Facebook is down 3% to 17.6 hours, while Instagram sits at 8.3 hours per user per month. Is this influence enough to turn into actual votes?
A common misconception is that Tik Tok is just for younger people. While this was was true in the earlier days of the app, TikTok now has 7.38 million Australian users over the age of 18 (reaching 37% of the 18+ population) – these are all eligible voters.
But even Australian users under the age of 18 who consume political content on TikTok can influence votes. Dr Aaron Martin is a professor at Melbourne University who has researched how media and social media affects politics. He says: “There’s direct and indirect effects. Let’s say a 15 year old is on Tik Tok and they tell – there’s some sort of indirect effect through that.”
@peter.malinauskas Campaign = launched #auspol #auspolitics #southaustralia #auspol2021 #adelaide #election ♬ Drop It Like It’s Hot – Snoop Dogg
The Official Party Accounts
While TikTok has a policy banning official political advertising, Australian politicians are posting on the app from official party and individual accounts to reach younger voters. Dr Martin calls the migration of pollies to platform ‘inevitable’. “Politicians have to use whatever tools are at their disposal. Previously, you just had a kind of megaphone, which was major newspapers and TV networks. I think it’s such a natural extension of the fragmentation of the media that politicians are on Tik Tok.”
The Liberal Party, Australian Labor Party, Australian Greens and many independent candidates have all set up Tik Tok accounts, but not all of them are exactly hitting the mark. Labor and the Greens seem to be leading the pack on engagement, with the ALP official account racking up 71,900 followers at the time of writing and appearing all over the #auspol popular page. Federal Labor MP Julian Hill has one of the most popular Tik Tok pages out of all the Australian politicians, with 147,000 followers and 2.2 million likes at the time of writing. Honourable mention goes to new SA Premier, Labor’s Peter Malinauskas who launched his campaign in February with a thirst-trap video set to Snoop Dogg’s Drop It Like It’s Hot.
In general, Labor appears to best understand the nuances of what content is popular on TikTok. Their official account did not start posting about Anthony Albanese’s election promises until March, instead preferring to create memes using trending sounds. Think: videos of Scott Morrison being flushed down the toilet for “World Toilet Day” or a compilation of the Prime Minister “pretending to be someone else” to the Curb Your Enthusiasm theme song. In short Labor gets Tik Tok. And Australian users reward them with more engagement, followers and video shares, which could lead to more voters.
the Liberal Party TikTok account has not cracked the algorithm yet. They're post a lot of videos that are clearly custom made for the platform but none of them are going viral pic.twitter.com/pDrzuVxQfU
— cameron wilson (@cameronwilson) April 21, 2022
The Liberal Party, on the other hand, isn’t doing quite as well. When Scott Morrison joined the app quietly in 2021, he received quite a bit of backlash. The Prime Minister chose to disallow any duets, stitches, mentions, saves or even comments on his uploads – despite coming from the party of “free speech”. If the PM joined the platform to have more communication with young voters, he’s essentially kicked himself in the foot by cutting off any chance of two-way communication with them. The official Liberal Party account is trying to replicate the ALP’s comedic style with videos of Albanese’s mishaps – but they just don’t seem to be hitting the mark.
In the 2019 election (pre-TikTok) Australians aged 18-34 were significantly more likely to vote for Labor – in fact, the Liberal vote for under 35s was at its lowest ever level. Pairing this data with the two parties’ differing approaches to TikTok, it could simply be that Labor has always understood young voters better and the app is a natural extension of that knowledge gap.
The Unofficial Accounts
Although official accounts are doing ok on Tik Tok, it’s the not-so-official accounts that are arguably making the biggest impact. These political ‘stan’ accounts (run mostly, but not exclusively by young men) have essentially yassified politics on the app — making them appear more accessible, bite-sized and entertained, without necessarily getting deep into the policies. The stan accounts that Zee Feed was able to find were overwhelmingly pro-Labor. There seem to be very few conservative political stan or meme accounts in Australia (although there are lots of US and UK-based conservative commentators and meme accounts).
One of the bigger accounts is Gen Z for Albo, an Albanese stan account with millions of likes and 44,900 followers, including the official ALP account. The young man behind Gen Z for Albo, Lachlan, said he started the TikTok account to bring awareness to happenings in Parliament. “It’s not like a lot of young people are sitting watching the House of Representatives. Unless you’re watching nightly news, you don’t get to actually see what happens in the chamber and that’s where a lot of decision making happens. So I just wanted to rebroadcast important stuff that happened in Parliament and also bring awareness to the stuff that was going on.”
@genzforalbo no one cares what ur even saying bro 🙁 #fypシ #auspol #scottysgottago #albo4pm ♬ original sound – Gen Z for Albo
Lachlan’s dedication to essentially being an unpaid, unofficial social media rep for the ALP is quite impressive. He posts to the account almost everyday and holds regular live streams where he discusses the latest AusPol news. All this without ever being officially contacted by the ALP, bar a few comments of encouragement from Labor MPs. Does Lachlan view what he’s doing as ‘work’? “Yes and no. I never had the intention of making a living from it, but now the level it’s at, and now that we’re rapidly approaching the election, it is a heavy workload. But I still don’t consider it work because I am already on Tik Tok, pretty much all day, every day.”
He does have political ambitions though, admitting he would “like to get into politics as an elected official” one day. “But right now I’m just doing my bit to change the government.”
TikTok stan accounts definitely help a politician’s ‘street-cred’, but they also change the way we think about politicians. The transformation from political figure to meme can completely override their actual actions. At the end of 2021, TikTokers flooded the platform with pro-Gladys Berejiklian content after the New South Wales Premier stood down over an anti-corruption investigation. Being credibly accused of corruption should have seen a downfall in support for the former Premier, but it actually resulted in a new group of young fans thanks largely to TikTok. Triple Js program Hack spoke to Angus Dunnachie, the 22-year-old creator of a viral video showing ‘Gladys’ hitting the clubs after resigning. When asked about the ICAC inquiry into the politician, Angus said: “No one is perfect”.
@hotmessgladywrap #glady #gladys #gladysberejiklian #gladysberjiklian #gb #dom #dominic #dominicperrottet #perrottet #gladysberejiklian #gladybutterchicken #fyp #funny #fup #funny #fyp #fyp #fypシ #fupage #fypagee #fyy #fyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy #fypシ #fypシ゚viral #fypdongggggggg ♬ I miss the old Kanye – sonya
Algorithms & the Future of Politics
The incredible power of the TikTok algorithm made researching this article kind of difficult. At one point, Zee Feed’s For You Page was dominated by Albanese stan accounts – and it took a long time to correct! The app very quickly creates an echo chamber that affects which political or politician accounts you will even come across. Dr Martin says this is particularly dangerous. “The platform was obviously not designed for politics. And it’s a bit like Facebook and Twitter, but to a greater extent – it doesn’t allow for any sort of serious form of political communication. While it’s an inevitability [that politicians come to TikTok], I think it’s not helpful at all, especially to democratic politics.”
Gen Z For Albo’s Lachlan is fully aware of the influential power he holds. “Because we consume so much media and we consume so much from content creators, young people are more likely to be attracted to creators in general. And they’ll take what they say as gospel.” He is clear in his intention: to help elect a Labor government.
If you are curious about a party or politician, and engage with the content you find, the algorithm will continue to serve you more of the same – effectively shutting off exposure to the alternatives within the app. That might be fine when it relates to dancing videos or cooking recipes, but what happens when that process begins in political content for a 12 or 13-year-old who hasn’t firmly established their views yet? How well informed will they be of all options once they’re actually able to vote? The content creators that Lachlan says young people should trust are not always transparent about their motivations. Australian unions have already been called out for running political messaging on TikTok without the legally required disclosures.
Gen Z is the first generation develop their political opinions in such an intense echo chamber on social media platforms. On TikTok, it’s clear that young users will be increasingly exposed to creators whose goal is politically persuade – some official and some unofficial, some honest and others malicious. Over the long term, will this create first-time voters with more extreme alliances to the left or right of politics? We won’t see the impact in the 2022 election… but in 2025, with first time voters who’ve spent years learning from 7-second videos, we’ll get our first signs of exactly how TikTok has changed Australia’s political landscape.
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