Something strange is happening on Mexican TikTok. In a recent story published in the online tech news site Rest of World, Mexico City-based staff reporter Daniela Dib writes that users in the Mexican state of Culiacán, have been posting cryptic references to turtles, pizza slices, and something called “the unalived (Dib, 2024).”
When crises arise in the real world, digital communities will often arise alongside them (Roth et al., 2024). And Mexico, it turns out, those communities are using pizza emojis as a tool for conflict journalism.
TikTok is an interesting choice of venue for these posts. The app tightly controls content, boosting high performing viral videos and screening for objectionable content like, say, footage of Mexico’s cartel wars, using an algorithm that scans for prohibited words and removes posts it deems contrary to its community standards (Dib, 2024).
In Mexico, some of those words include “balacera” (shootout), “tortura” (torture), and “narcomantas,” a reference to the messaged scrawled on cloth banners the cartels display in public spaces (Dib, 2024). It stands to reason that TikTok can be an especially frustrating platform for everyday citizens who want to document the humanitarian fallout of the shootouts, torture, and psychological warfare of Mexico’s ongoing cartel violence — which has claimed the lives of about 30,000 people every year since 2018 (CFR, 2024).
So instead, they’re turning to code words and emojis to help inform Mexico and the world.
Say a Mexican TikToker wants to post about a recent act of torture “tortura” in their community, they might use the similar word “tortuga,” for “turtle” to avoid triggering a post removal. If they wanted to write about violence committed by the followers of imprisoned cartel kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, they could use a pizza emoji, which sounds a little like “Chapiza.”
In this new code, the disappeared are “levantón” or “picked up” and the dead are no longer los muertos, they’re “los desvividos” — “the unalived” (Dib, 2024).
A History of Censorship and Resistance
Citizen journalists and humanitarian activists have long used tactics like these to evade censorship on TikTok.
The company, which is based in China, has an app for Chinese users, which is heavily censored, and an app for the rest of the world, which is less strictly regulated (Dia, 2024).
At least, in theory.
That was put to the test in 2019 when a then 17-year-old American TikTok activist named Feroza Aziz began using her make-up tutorials to raise awareness of the Chinese state-sponsored repressions of Uyghur Muslims in its Xinjiang province (Kuo, 2019).
Her viral post begins with, “I am going to teach you guys how to get long lashes,” and then pivots to “you’re going to put [the eyelash curler] down and use your phone … to search up what’s happening in China, how they’re getting concentration camps, throwing innocent Muslims in there, separating families from each other, kidnapping them, murdering them, raping them, forcing them to eat pork, forcing them to drink, forcing them to convert.”
TikTok responded by banning Aziz’s account, telling the BBC that one of her videos violated rules on terrorism-related material, while Aziz pointed out that her account was only suspended after she posted about Xinjiang (Kuo, 2019). TikTok eventually unblocked her, citing “human moderation error” (Al Jazeera, 2019).
Digital humanitarian communities
How did we get to a place where teenagers are using TikTok to take on the Chinese government and everyday Mexicans are conducting on-the-ground local war reporting on the app using emojis and cryptic references to turtles?
Well, it’s complicated.
For one, humans are social creatures. About 5.52 billion of us are online now — and 5.22 billion of those are using social media (Statista, 2024).
We’re also economic creatures. Decades of neoliberalism has diminished many of the institutions we once used to gather, debate, discuss, and support one another — including much local media and sectors of the humanitarian aid industry (Roth et al., 2024).
But within that vacuum, we’ve still found ways to share the things we care about — from choreographed dancing to our local latest cartel assassination in the digital sphere. Call it a “labour of love” or the “immaterial labour” of humanitarian activism and citizen journalism, but it’s found a permanent home in our shared online spaces (Roth et al., 2024).
TikTok is one such space. And that is because it is a remarkably good place to connect with the broader world. Even if, for now, many of its users have to hide content behind censor-approved make-up tutorials and pizza emojis.
References:
Al Jazeera. (2019, November 28). Tiktok apologises for removing viral Uighur “makeup tutorial. https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/news/2019/11/28/tiktok-apologises-for-removing-viral-uighur-makeup-tutorial
Ani Petrosyan, & 5, N. (2024, November 5). Internet and social media users in the world 2024. Statista. https://www.statista.com/statistics/617136/digital-population-worldwide/
Council on Foreign Relations. (n.d.). Criminal violence in mexico | global conflict tracker. Council on Foreign Relations. https://www.cfr.org/global-conflict-tracker/conflict/criminal-violence-mexico
Dib, D., (2024, October 24). Mexican tiktokers have code words to report on narco-violence without getting banned. Rest of World. https://restofworld.org/2024/mexico-tiktok-code-words-violence/
Kuo, L. (2019, November 27). TikTok ‘makeup tutorial’ goes viral with call to action on China’s treatment of Uighurs. The Guardian. https://amp.theguardian.com/technology/2019/nov/27/tiktok-makeup-tutorial-conceals-call-to-action-on-chinas-treatment-of-uighurs
Roth, Silke; Purkayastha, Bandana; Denskus, Tobias (eds.) (2024): Handbook on Humanitarianism and Inequality. Cheltenham: Edward Elgar.
Fascinating post. It reminded me of the quilts of the Underground Railroads in America, where a homemade quilt hanging out of the window indicated a safe house for slaves seeking refuge. Elaborate designs are said to have held valuable information like where to go, what to look out for and where to find food, water and shelter.
Replacing elaborate quilting techniques with emojis, this TikTok trend works in a similar fashion, hiding covert messages about what is really going on. However, movements and trends on TikTok are more of a here-and-now thing because when China or America decide to turn off the app, there is no evidence left to act as memory. Yet, the quilts remain tangible evidence of a past not to be forgotten.
References
Bryant, M., (2019) Underground Railroad Quilt Codes: What We Know, What We Believe, and What Inspires Us, FOLKLIFE, Retrieved from: https://folklife.si.edu/magazine/underground-railroad-quilt-codes
What an interesting read! Using emojis to avoid censorship is truly a form of creative activism, or artivism! In China, feminists used a rice bowl and a rabbit to expose sexual harassment. ‘Rice’ sounds like ‘me,’ and ‘rabbit’ is pronounced ‘too.’ Many clever emoji puns show how we can use creativity to challenge social injustice.
This was a fascinating read! It really highlights how TikTok has become a powerful tool for modern, mobile journalism—especially in places where traditional reporting is restricted or dangerous—while also showing the challenges users face under the platform’s own censorship rules.
I’m always amazed by the creativity of activists who find ways to work around these restrictions, whether through code words, symbols, or emojis. It reminded me of “May 35th,” the clever workaround for June 4th, the date of the Tiananmen Square massacre, since Chinese authorities often ban any references to the event. It’s incredible how people always find a way to speak the truth!