[aikendrum]

I've seen several of the creepy / disturbing live videos described above - the begging family and the baby with the large deformed head specifically. Each have been shown multiple times, despite immediately reporting them. So this isn't a unique artefact of OP's experience. There clearly are ways of bringing these videos, which are clearly pretty far outside any normative preference pattern, to the front of the algorithm.

Shouldn't have to point this out - but I do not search for, like or watch anything remotely similar on Tiktok.

[godmode2019]

These videos are punishment for watching videos flagged as unapproved.

Think about what you watched right before these videos, its coded to being a feeling a disgust so you assioate that with the previous videos.

YouTube does the same thing with ads of kids dying in hospital, screaming for help on the start of 'controversial' content. Most of the time it makes you click back and watch something else.

[aikendrum]

That's a hell of a claim. Any citation for that? I could see Tiktok doing something that extreme, but it would be incredibly bad press for youtube. Simpler explanation might be that lower priced ads run against dubious content and that those tend towards the more spammy and extreme.