3 answers
★ Best answer
I'd say the whole thing is less of a double-edged sword than just... chaotic. Sure, young people pick up on it, but often only as shallow content snacks - the contexts and stories behind them get lost when everything's boiled down to 60 seconds. What I notice: For crafts-based traditions (craftsmanship, traditional techniques) it actually works better, because you can take that in visually pretty quickly. But with traditions that need more explanation or have spiritual roots, it falls flat.
TikTok has actually brought a lot of regional customs back into the awareness of younger people who would never have come across them otherwise. Obviously it's a double-edged sword - on one hand you get genuine education happening, but on the other hand these videos are often massively simplified or even distorted to go viral. For folklore it's probably a win if it stays authentic, but a lot of traditional stuff loses its cultural context in the process and just turns into "aesthetic content".
Regional customs need one thing above all: to be lived, not just consumed. And I'm pretty skeptical about TikTok for that reason - the platform can bring attention, sure, but often in a way that actually hurts customs more than it helps. A 15-second video of Oktoberfest or a funfair is quick to make, but it doesn't show why people do this stuff in the first place or what's actually behind it.
The problem isn't so much the superficiality itself (like the second answer suggests), but that TikTok often just distorts the customs. Trends pop up, suddenly everyone's doing "that one specific thing" and it gets commercialized before people even understand what it means. When someone makes their video with a filter and background music, that can come across pretty kitschy or even disrespectful - especially with customs that have religious or cultural roots.
What actually helps is people who still practice this stuff and pass it on - family, clubs, village communities. TikTok can at best be a door-opener if it's done well. But "done well" doesn't just mean going viral; it means actually explaining things and showing them respectfully. And that hardly ever happens.
Your answer
Log into answer.