Exploring Cyberbanging and Recruitment Among Canadian Street Gang Members on Social Media

• In Event: Gangs, Violence, and Deviant Behavior in the Digital Age

Abstract

This study explores the online behaviors of Canadian street gang members on Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube. While American and British street gangs have received scholarly attention, their online recruitment methods vary. Law enforcement and journalists claim street gangs increasingly use social media platforms for explicit recruitment. Some scholarly publications suggest a minority of street gangs utilize social media for recruitment but lack adequate context. Others argue cyberbanging—gang-related online content—indirectly recruits by glamorizing gang lifestyles. In an effort to examine the use of cyberbanging, and the indirect recruitment it inspires, the present study examines 59 social media user profiles linked to Canadian street gang members (23 Twitter users and 36 Facebook users), along with 10 YouTube rap videos produced by street gang members to assess the online behaviors of these particular social media users. The results suggest the most prominent type of cyberbanging content is the promotion of gang ideologies, with a clear presence of indirect recruitment techniques observed, like displaying drugs, weapons, money, illegal gains, boasting facets of gang lifestyles and other propaganda. This content, while considered cyberbanging, blurs the line between content defined as cyberbanging and that of online recruitment.

Author

• Francesco Carlo Campisi, Université de Montréal