Last week, rumors circulated on TikTok warning of imminent school shootings. The rumored threat went by several names, including the “TikTok Shooting Challenge” and a “National Shoot Up Your School Day” message, allegedly encouraging students to attack schools on Friday, December 17.

While some parents panicked and school officials scrambled to reassure their communities, law enforcement investigated and found no evidence that the threat was credible. This is not to say that police, schools, and social media companies are strangers to threats; indeed, they happen routinely. However, they are almost always ambiguous, nonspecific, and deemed what’s called “nonactionable.” The president of the United States, for example, gets about six to eight threats each day, or thousands each year; when we add in prominent politicians, celebrities, and others, it adds up to tens of thousands of threats each year, few of which materialize. In my high school, fire alarms were routinely pulled right before big tests. Nevertheless, school shootings, though statistically rare, are a real concern, and school districts across the country understandably responded by increasing police presence and security measures.

Fortunately, as many people had predicted, December 17 came and went without a school shooting, proving that it was indeed the hoax and rumor it seemed likely to be (though of course true believers and the conspiracy-minded would claim that a real plan was deterred because so much attention was paid to it, in the same way that end-times believers claim that their prayers averted the doomsday they claimed was imminent). Nevertheless, about a dozen students were arrested for sharing threats on social media last week, though it’s not clear whether that material included the most recent TikTok videos.

Scarelore: Fear Sells Fear Itself

One curious aspect of this TikTok threat was that finding actual examples of the trend seemed to be difficult or impossible. You’d expect to find the threats well documented—it is social media after all—with dozens of screenshots and videos detailing the threats. When pressed, TikTok said it could not find any evidence of those specific threats trending on its platform.

Instead, most of the coverage was not of the posts themselves but of the reaction to the posts. In other words, the stories were about the stories; like Kardashians, who are famous for being famous and making news for making news, there was little substance behind it. In a series of tweets on December 16, TikTok addressed the issue:

We handle even rumored threats with utmost seriousness, which is why we’re working with law enforcement to look into warnings about potential violence at schools even though we have not found evidence of such threats originating or spreading via TikTok. We’ve exhaustively searched for content that promotes violence at schools today, but have still found nothing. What we find are videos discussing this rumor and warning others to stay safe. Local authorities, the FBI, and DHS have confirmed there’s no credible threat, so we’re working to remove alarmist warnings that violate our misinformation policy. If we did find promotion of violence on our platform, we’d remove and report it to law enforcement. Media reports have been widespread and based on rumors rather than facts, and we are deeply concerned that the proliferation of local media reports on an alleged trend that has not been found on the platform could end up inspiring real world harm.

Social Media Challenges and Folkloric Dare Legends

We can place the latest TikTok challenge in the same context as previous viral threats such as the Blue Whale Game and the Momo Challenge, both of which I’ve written extensively about. The Blue Whale “suicide game” was claimed to be a hidden online social media group game that encouraged children to kill themselves. Within the group daily tasks are assigned to members, who have to do different tasks for fifty days. They include self-harming, watching horror movies, and waking up at unusual hours, but these gradually get more extreme and end in suicide.

I described the Momo Challenge in a 2019 article, featuring a mysterious and terrifying online figure known as “Momo,” whose creepy image is that of a bug-eyed, reptilian-visaged woman in the Japanese horror tradition. The targeted teens are sent violent or gruesome images by Momo through an app or social media and encouraged to reply. They are threatened if they don’t and forced agree to conduct a series of violent and bizarre tasks—resulting in death.

Thus for the most part people aren’t panicking over the posts themselves, which seem elusive and ambiguous (as was case with the Blue Whale Game and the Momo Challenge), but instead the idea or premise of posts—that evil people on social media would plan to shoot up schools or even encourage others to do so. As journalist Joshua Bote noted:

It seems as if even students, the same ones who apparently spotted the first inklings of school violence on their social media platform of choice, only heard about this so-called challenge because of parents and administrators, who likely first heard about this not on TikTok but on the breathless, anxiety-inducing coverage that they’ve seen circulating on news sites and non-TikTok social media platforms. For what it’s worth, every TikTok I’ve seen in the past 24 hours about this “challenge” is not of people sharing and circulating credible threats but of students sharing their plans to skip school, people posting screenshots of local news stories and their anxieties.

It’s a classic example of the famous Franklin D. Roosevelt quote, “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.”

This viral rumor panic demonstrates a confluence of several trends. Like both real and rumored videos (for example, the Ice Bucket Challenge and the Blue Whale Game, respectively) it involves a call, prompt, or “challenge” to act or do something. Most of the time the act is harmless, silly, or fun (remember planking and flash mobs?) but sometimes it involves Jackass-style stunts and assaults that are potentially harmful such as eating Tide detergent pods or slapping strangers. This also connects with folkloric challenges or “dare games” (Bloody Mary being a famous example, along with ghost hunting legend trips).

As noted, this is part of a long history. Not only were there warnings about the Blue Whale Game and evil clowns threatening schools in 2016, leading to some school lockdowns, but in April 2021 dozens of viral TikTok videos shared by young women offered dire warnings about abductions at Target stores. A year earlier, in July 2020, warnings and rumors circulated on social media when furniture seller Wayfair was accused in social media posts of trafficking children through listings of products with inflated prices and common names. And a few years earlier, in 2018, rumors of roving bands of abductors using plastic zip ties to identify their victims circulated on social media. They warned people about plastic zip ties being found on their vehicles, doorknobs, fences, mailboxes, and elsewhere, marking them as being targets and in imminent danger.

Common Themes

The common folkloric themes in these rumors are clear. They include: 1) Reflecting social anxieties, such as kidnappings, school shootings, fear of crime, fear of others, and general Stranger Danger; 2) Highlighting threats to children (and women), who are assumed to be the most vulnerable in society; and 3) Reflecting fear of social media effects and influence, especially with parents concerned about kids’ unsupervised use of social media apps and sites. These scary media stories are very popular because they are fueled by parents’ fears and wanting to know what their kids are up to. Are seemingly innocent role-playing games and entertainment leading to unspeakable evil, in the form of Satan or even death? We saw the same fears decades ago about Dungeons and Dragons, heavy metal music, and violent video games. Now it’s online games and social media.

Motivations

The motivations for sharing the videos are mixed and at times overlapping. Most kids and parents who share the warnings do so out of altruism. They may in fact be skeptical about the truth of the claims but dutifully share them assuming that it’s better to be safe than sorry. For others, there’s a copycat or bandwagon effect. These viral videos garner attention, outrage, and sympathy, but even more important, the people sharing them are rewarded in the ultimate social media currency: Likes, Shares, and Followers. 

Urban legends and rumors will always be repeated; it’s the incentive to tell a sensational and dramatic story. As for the origins, it’s difficult or impossible to know where it came from, and it’s quite possible that it’s a prank or even a misunderstood comment taken out of context. It’s tricky because sometimes, on rare occasions, dangerous people do post valid threats and warnings on social media. After mass shootings, it’s easy to dig into posts and find potential “missed red flags.” The problem is that nonviolent people, trolls, etc., post identical messages, pranks, and memes, so it’s not predictive. The question is not “Is this scary event possible?” because of course it is—anything is possible. Rumors and legends often involve things and events that people can believe might be real, might be a genuine threat to the health or safety of themselves or their loved ones. All urban legends have an element of superficial credibility about them; that’s why they are widely shared and warned about.

Responding to the Scare

The mere fact that news organizations and school officials comment on the rumors often lends credibility to the stories, and authorities should be careful about legitimizing these sorts of moral panics. Police, teachers, and others issue statements to address rumors but often end up legitimizing the stories and making them more credible. Parents and others who might otherwise recognize the rumors as bogus may say, “Well, I thought it was a hoax, but even the police are commenting on it, so there must be some truth to it!”

In fact, often authorities will be pressured by parents and others to address rumors and stories even if there is no evidence for them. People take a “better safe than sorry” approach to sharing these stories, and it ends up doing more harm than good if there is no underlying threat, as is the case here. It’s also common for journalists and others—even when a threat is recognized as bogus—to spin the panic into a “teachable moment” to remind kids about the dangers of peer influence, the perils of online predators, bullying, and so on.

TikTok’s response was accurate: the biggest real-world concern is likely the threat of copycats, who may ironically be inspired to do something violent not because anyone or any video actually or directly encouraged him or her to do it, but because they keep hearing warnings about it. Sharing, and commenting uncritically on, these warnings may do more harm than good.

The best way for parents to cope with these rumors is to not share them and calm their children’s fears if they hear them. Parents do not need to have a somber, serious sit-down discussion with their kids; instead, it can be as simple as acknowledging the rumors and saying in passing, “You know it’s just a joke, a rumor. There’s no truth to it.” Parents should trust that their children are media savvy and smart enough not to do whatever a stranger tells them.