TikTok in trouble again with an 'offensive' Holocaust trend

Trouble doesn't seem to be ending for the short-video sharing app TikTok. After a ban in India and a possible ban in the US, TikTok has landed in yet another trouble. But this time, it is a TikTok 'trend' that has crossed a line.

In a recently started TikTok trend, the users have started to dress-up and do a roleplay of Holocaust victims. The participants of the trend are recording short videos telling their made-up stories of how they survived the Holocaust, or how torturous the situation was during that time. 

Some of them have gone to the limit of wearing the inmate uniform and/or also one of the armbands marked with the Star of David that Jews were ordered to wear. Some can even be seen sporting fake bruises and scars.

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However, while it has become popular on the ByteDance-owned app, this trend has attracted a lot of criticism from the non-TikTok users. The Auschwitz museum, which is at the site of the former Nazi death camp in Poland, took to Twitter to condemn this new trend. Calling it 'hurtful and offensive', the museum authorities said, "Some videos are dangerously close or already beyond the border of trivialization of history."

“Some were not created to commemorate anyone, but to become part of an online trend. This is very painful.," the statement read.

However, the authorities have also acknowledged that they understand that the intentions behind these videos were not to hurt anyone. “But we should discuss this, not to shame & attack young people whose motivation seem very diverse,” it added.

The museum has requested youngsters to be more respectful towards the victims and their stories as "the stories of people who were imprisoned and murdered in Auschwitz are incredibly tragic, painful and emotional".