It's not just a TikTok thing, though. And isn't the fact that TikTok has gotten as large as it has (despite its current status of being run under US oligarchs for US users), and how many USAmericans decided to start using RedNote when it initially was banned in the US, also evidence to the claim that China is having a big cultural moment?

I can at least say anecdotally that random people I've met who aren't politically involved have been getting more into specifically Chinese cultural products. Games, movies, etc. And among my inner friend group (who, admittedly, are definitely much more inclined to support China politically, not just culturally) we make jokes about Chinamaxxing too.

Also, there is no equivalence between the relationship between TikTok and Chinese culture as a whole versus YouTube and Google products. "TikTok is to China as YouTube is to Google products" is not valid because TikTok is to China as YouTube is to the United States. And while checking how people feel about a country based on trends on social media wouldn't be the ideal way to gauge things (polls are obviously better) it still seems reasonable.

Those who haven't lived under a rock know TikTok is now under control of the USSA regime.
As they don't allow free media

That’s against my 7th Amendment rights!

It seems like the user who posted that article makes similar posts attacking China exclusively, day-in and day-out. 4000+ posts in the last year.

This particular post is a summary from a report from a large European think tank that's obviously quite pro-NATO and worthy of skepticism from any anti-imperialist audience. The report itself seems to cast an extremely broad net as to what should count as nefarious Chinese meddling:

However, China’s efforts today are about shaping public opinion at scale. In a wider casting of the net, Chinese FIMI now relies on a busy ecosystem of other actors. For example, Beijing uses research partnerships, business associations, cultural exchanges, diaspora networks and social media influencers—who may or may not recognise their role in communicating CCP narratives. These locally based people and organisations (such as, for example, a Polish influencer talking to Polish audiences) provide familiar cultural and linguistic references and possess legitimacy that Chinese authorities lack. They help embed Beijing’s narratives into debates that, at first glance, may seem unrelated to China, such as the future of European industrial policy, global governance or the economy.

The underlying logic runs as follows: influence the wider information environment first, allow preferred narratives to become familiar and “common sense” in everyday online discourse and then let those narratives travel—with the help of local intermediaries—into mainstream media agendas and, eventually, national politics.

According to this report, a Chinese academic who's just participating in a research program in Europe is part of China's "FIMI" (their buzzword for disinformation/propaganda) efforts. But that, and the examples cited throughout here (except maybe AI which I'm willing to say is a different kind of phenomenon) is just a normal part of a country integrating itself in the globalized world.

If Algerian students start coming to European universities, and Algerian traveling influencers start talking about how cool it is to travel to Algeria, and Algerian artists make media that is consumed in Europe, European people's opinion of Algeria will improve. And I think that it would be perfectly OK for that to happen, and for the governments of Algeria and Europe to try to cultivate that cultural exchange and bringing down of barriers. Same with literally any other country on earth (especially the ones that I'm very critical of, e.g. USA and Israel, because it still is cool for people to be less ignorant, although with the US particularly I think people are already extremely familiar with their culture and it dominates everything).

Why is it any different with China? Why are Chinese people treated with this suspicion? Why are we contributing to sinophobia by acting like it's crazy that young people kinda want to be Chinese?

who wouldn't trust some right-wing China bad think tank?

Is it Chinese propaganda that living conditions and future prospects in the Western world are really bleak and young people are coping by imagining how much better life would be in the biggest country in the world that doesn't seem to be suffering from those problems at quite the same level?

Its kinda insane they didn't come up with Kung Foo Panda first, and the music random chinese people show me seems so anemic.

It is also terrifying since China has been know to do "ethnic cleansing" from time to time

"I'm at a very chinese time of my life" sounds like something out of trailer park boys or Broad City.

US is not by any means as authoritarian as China.

To achieve that, the US would need a government that controls mass media, kills people just for protesting, disappearing enemies of the government in remote prison camps with no oversight or accountability, have mass surveillance everywhere, make books illegal, demonstrably suppress all ethnic minorities, threaten religious leaders for speaking ill of the government...

All run by a hardline government that has a strongman leader that people respect and a cabinet full of loyalists with competence in the task they're assigned.

Once the US achieves that last bit, THEN they'll be as authoritarian as China.

It wasn't before, but the USA is currently a fascist dictatorship and it's kinda hard to argue it gets more authoritarian than that. The few freedoms we still have are fading remnants that have yet to be snuffed out. Just because they have yet to build the firewall doesn't mean they won't.

The major difference between the two going forward is whenever or not the state steers the country, or the self interested oligarchs. It's very clear that China's industrial capitalism was more wise for the interests of their empire, while America can't compete so long as oligarchs steer the ship towards short term profits. This isn't to say that China is eternally better than the US, as imperial prosperity ebs and flows.

However, China is the safer bet going forward, especially if we see another red scare as Americans begin to realize that their empire lost. If people get distracted fear mongering about communism, they'll never fix the problems that actually made America fall behind. If I'm right about that, then the US is in for decades of decline.

Yeeeeep. The idea of swapping one imperialist crusher of human rights for another because of the embarrassment that the US has become is too stupid for anyone other than influencers to bite off on. I hope the next generations become better about seeing through propaganda like this.