“Narcomarketing” in TikTok: Mexican Cartels’ new Strategy to Recruit Youths

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – In Mexico, the social media content of activities performed by alleged organized crime groups is not exactly new, since it has been circulating on such sites for years. The most recent platform: TikTok.

But there are some differences between the early years and the present, according to an article in the American daily The New York Times (NYT).

Cited by the international newspaper, Ioan Grillo, author of “El Narco: Inside Mexico’s Criminal Insurgency,” said that this content has been shared for at least ten years when the famous “war on drugs” was being implemented in Mexico during the six-year term of Felipe Calderón.

However, he explains that at first, the videos were crude and violent — images of beheadings and torture that were posted on YouTube, designed to strike fear in rival gangs and show government forces the ruthlessness they were up against.

Now, the text points out, as social platforms evolved and cartels became more digitally savvy, the content became more sophisticated.

For example, they recall a video that some months ago circulated widely on social media showing members of the brutal Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) wearing fatigues, holding high-caliber weapons and cheering their leader, with dozens of armored vehicles, branded with the cartel’s Spanish initials.

TikTok received these recordings after a boat chase went viral in the United States. As video shares increased, more similar videos began to be recommended to users. And that’s when videos with exotic animals and samples of extravagant riches became popular.

NYT also makes mention of the Cartel TikTok, a genre of videos depicting drug trafficking groups and their activities that is racking up hundreds of thousands of views on the popular social media platform.

For instance, a video which attracted more than 500,000 likes before it was removed, shows a farmer slicing unripe seed pods in a field of poppies, presumably to harvest the resin for heroin production.

“Here in the mountains, there are only hard workers,” says a voice-over. “Just good people.”

However, the article warns, “while Mexico is again poised to break homicide records this year, organized crime experts say the Cartel TikTok Cartel is only the latest propaganda campaign designed to mask the bloodbath and show promise of infinite wealth to attract young, disposable recruits”.

They then quote Alejandra León, an anthropologist at Spain’s University of Murcia who studies the presence of Mexican organized crime groups on social media. The cartels “use these kinds of platforms for publicity, but of course, it’s hedonistic publicity.”

And while some of these materials seek to spread terror, others seek to show young people, particularly those in rural areas, the benefits of joining drug trafficking groups – money, luxury cars, women, and exotic pets.

“It’s about the dream, it’s all about the hustle,” Ed Calderon, a security consultant and former member of Mexico’s law enforcement told the NYT. “That’s what they’re selling”.

According to Falko Ernst, senior Mexico analyst for the International Crisis Group, a global think tank, some of the TikTok videos may be produced by cartel members themselves, especially young hit men or “sicarios” keen to show off the spoils of war. Although in any case, he points out, the ultimate goal is the same: drawing in an army of young men willing to give their lives for a chance at glory. The gangs, Ernst stressed, depend on this “sea of youths”.

On the other hand, the Times points out, although the circulation of this type of video on the Internet is not new, TikTok has given a new scope and twist to the genre of narcoculture.

“The message has to be quick, it has to be engaging, and it has to be viral,” said Ms. León, the anthropologist. “Violence becomes fun, or even put to music”.

On the other hand, according to the article, when TikTok was questioned about its policy regarding videos, a spokeswoman assured that the company was “committed to working with law enforcement to fight organized criminal activity” and that it removes “content and accounts that promote illegal activity”.