What does RCTA mean on TikTok? The controversial 'race change' trend explained

21 July 2023, 16:48

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By Katie Louise Smith

On TikTok, the term 'RCTA' means 'Race Change To Another'. Here's what people are saying about it.

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Over the past few years on TikTok, users have come up with countless major acronyms that continue to go viral on the platform and sometimes become part of the internet lexicon. From 'OOMF' and 'NPC' to simply just 'W' or 'L', there's almost too many to count at this point.

Now, another has been popping up on people's For You Pages and it's receiving huge amounts of backlash.

'RCTA' has become a popular hashtag on the platform, with over 201 million views so far. There's also several variations of the hashtag including 'RCTA Exposed'. But what does it mean? Here's what you need to know about the current TikTok hashtag trend.

What does RCTA mean?

RCTA stands for Race Change To Another

On TikTok, the term 'RCTA' means 'Race Change To Another'. It refers to the trend of people attempting to change or transition to a different race from the one they were born.

A high profile example of this would be controversial 'influencer' Oli London, who previously underwent countless surgeries in order to look like Jimin from BTS. He also then began to identify as Korean, despite being of white British descent.

Alternatively, people are also using 'ECTA' which stands for 'Ethnicity Change To Another'.

However, these concepts are not completely appearance or surgery based. There's various communities on TikTok that believe they can change their DNA by manifesting and listening to 'subliminals'.

Why is RCTA problematic?

People have been quick to call out these kind of videos, and have labelled them problematic and troubling. On one viral TikTok, the caption reads: "Just a reminder RCTA isn’t valid and is racist."

The majority (but not all) of the RCTA trend features people attempting to 'change their race' to Korean or Japanese, due to their love/obsession of K-pop music, anime and manga, as well as other forms of entertainment and pop culture that originate from those two countries and cultures.

However, TikTok users have stressed that it is offensive and ignorant to do so while also sharing their experiences with racism and discrimination.

In an attempt to drown out the users who have been sharing genuine RCTA content on the platform, other TikTok users have been posting satire videos of them attempting to change their race.

The videos usually feature someone presenting fake make-up tips to make 'western features look Asian' as well as people trolling users by posting 'RCTA' videos full of racial stereotypes in order to troll the community.