Anna Rinaggio, Campus Carrier opinions editor

Trends are a huge part of today’s culture. Especially on social media, we all love to put our own spin on viral Tik Tok sounds, new fashion styles and popular slang. While this is a great way for people to share creativity and grow closer with their community, there is often something we forget to do when participating in trends: acknowledging the creators. 

We’ve gotten a bit better about crediting artists when it comes to things like sharing photographs or visual art, but we are still lagging on crediting the creators of trends. It seems that when we are looking at a concept rather than a physical piece of media, we tend to forget that there had to be someone who came up with that concept. They deserve just as much credit as any other content creator does. 

This becomes even more of a problem when you realize that these unacknowledged creators are often black creators. Usually, the trend starts with a person of color and becomes crazy popular when a white person with a lot of followers participates in it. More often than not, the white creator does not acknowledge the original creator in any way, and the original creator never receives the credit they deserve. 

One example of this is the Renegade Tik Tok dance, which was quite literally everywhere on Tik Tok in 2019. It gained popularity when Charlie D’Amelio posted a video of herself doing the dance, prompting her millions of followers to follow suit. What went unnoticed for a while, though, was that the dance was actually created by Jalaiah Harmon — a black teenager. It took a long time for Jalaiah to get any sort of recognition for her choreography, and even though she did eventually get the credit, how many people actually remember her name over Charlie D’Amelio’s? 

The big issue with not giving credit for these trends to the original creators is that without the credit, they don’t get to capitalize off of the trend. On social media, going viral means you get a massive influx of followers, which is usually accompanied by new opportunities to make money, such as through brand deals and partnering with other popular artists. What often happens, though, is that the original creator is not credited, and more popular — oftentimes white — content creators can use the trend to their own advantage, leaving the original creator in the dust. 

It is therefore imperative that we continue the trend of crediting the artist so that all content creators can get the recognition they deserve. White content creators often get the credit for creating or popularizing trends that were not theirs to begin with, and since Tik Tok makes it difficult to find the original creators of things like dance choreography, the issue just continues to perpetuate. This issue can easily be solved, though, if content creators would simply tag or mention the name of the original creator of the trend in their video. That way, they can still participate in the trend without leaving room — intentional or not — for viewers to assume that they are the original creator. 

We also need to remember that this rule extends to trends beyond popular dances. It includes fashion trends, slang, sound bites and music, too. If you’re participating in a trend and making it a big part of your personality or lifestyle, do a quick Google search and see if you can find out who created it. Simply acknowledging the original creators of things like this can go a long way. Assuming that we as a culture continue to get better about crediting artists and creators, you should hopefully be able to find the answer without too much trouble.