“They know that it works because we are looking for ourselves” – LGBTQ+ TikTok Users' Perceptions and Experiences of Queerbaiting

LGBTQ+ people often find refuge and community in online spaces. However, with the increasingly monetized experience of social media creation, these spaces are sometimes infiltrated by non-LGBTQ+ people in order to profit off of a new audience. We found that on the social media platform TikTok, there is a large diversity of experiences LGBTQ+ people have with this phenomenon, which is sometimes referred to as queerbaiting. Despite the differences in experience, reactions are often very similar. Typically there is a feeling of deception or disappointment followed by acts of disengagement, such as swiping away from the content or blocking the creator. We attempt to capture these tactics as recommendations for technology design.