Lev M. Velázquez Barriga*
Yes
Recently, a Spotify statement circulated that generated conflicting expectations and positions regarding freedom of expression; In it, the platform audiostreaming most listened to in the world declared his decision to withdraw songs that glorify or promote activities related to drug trafficking, cartels and violence
but, unfortunately, it was an apocryphal text. In reality, the rise to the technology giants of the corporation founded by Daniel EK has a history very far removed from the official versions that present it as a precursor of the fight for the rights to free access to digital products.
This platform is not subject to ethical determinations, it is precisely due to the precariousness of the artists, the bio-profitability of their bodies and minds, the monetary dispossession of the creators who give life to the app and its construction as a global oligopoly of the music industry, whose decision-making power over who is or is not consolidated at the top of fame is mediated by commercial agreements with transnational brands and the political, economic and ideological interests of the dominant classes. , whatever their activity, regardless of the relationship they have established between legal and illegal economies; Such is the case of forced displacement through cartels acting in the form of private armies to facilitate extractivism.
Hence the enormous growth of the musical genre narcoparamilitary called warlike
It is no coincidence that the massification of its content is promoted following the consumption patterns intentionally induced by the cultural industry; At this very moment, several of its most representative performers are occupying the first five places on the list of the Top Mexico Spotifyare young people under the age of 28 sponsored to wear brands that make them look like juniors wealthy, inciting other youth to join the activities of the hitman, consume and traffic narcotics, normalize forced prostitution and money laundering.
One might think that these are anomalies out of control in the free market, foreign to the reproductive logic of capitalism; but this is not the case, they are deliberately contributing to developing the collective imagination of a base of social support with which the labor, ideological, consumer and legitimization demands of criminal violence, pertinent to sustaining the narcoeconomicswhich no longer refers only to the transfer and distribution of drugs; In addition to the activities mentioned in the previous paragraph, it spreads to the control of mining, agribusiness and monocultures, land collection, kidnapping, extortion, piracy, organ and human trafficking.
These imaginaries spectacularizing capitalism goreare a phenomenon that has become globalized with the same legitimizing purpose of narcoculture. Interactions between singers warlike and Latin trap music allow us to reach unimaginable numbers of consumers; The cases of the Mexican Featherweight and the Colombian Karol G are revealing, both have reached first place in the Top Global Spotify; their collaboration in Qlonawith 1.14 billion views, has easily exceeded the total number of inhabitants of the American continent and Oceania, combined.
TO The Bichota (as the Antioquia singer is known), the cultural industry has built an image of a liberating icon for her to place her among the five most listened to in the world, seeking to invalidate the depth of feminist demands; However, the lyrics of their interpretations have little or nothing to do with the demands of women’s movements and much more to do with reinforcing the objectifying, hypersexualized and profitable image of their bodies.
A few days after releasing his collaboration in +57in which his countryman Maluma also participates, topped the first place in the Top Songs Colombia, surpassing the population of that Andean country in reproductions; The reference is relevant because we are not only dealing with a commercial product in itself, this song hypersexualized a 14-year-old girl, it served as an instrument of necro politics to normalize sexual tourism and pedophilia, being Medellín and other Colombian cities, the most worrying red flags on the continent in forced prostitution, especially of minors. Although the strong campaign -57
undertaken by Internet users of the virtual network, managed to modify part of the original lyrics so that it now referred to an 18-year-old girl, but the rest basically remained the same, it is still a provocation for international sex tourism to come to the tolerance zones for illegal economies controlled by cartels.
The symbolic production of languages of this music industry is an entire educational system that acts and becomes widespread with worrying efficiency; It quickly materializes in habits and habitats of violence, anti-values and undesirable social practices; creates the disposable inputs of active and reserve bodies for the reproduction of capitalism gore. The big brands and the digital giants of audio streaming are not going to do anything to stop the necroeconomiesare as responsible for promoting them as the cartels. What are we, critical educators, social movements and citizens, who, from any space, are busy making this an increasingly better world?
* Doctor in critical pedagogy
X: @levmx66
