TikTok ‘clan battles’ over music and poetry stoking tensions in Somalia

The contests are viewed on thousands of smartphone screens across Somalia and beyond, and usually feature two rivals who look like typical fresh-faced Generation Z influencers, Side-by-side on the screen, each of these digital gladiators performs to whip up their supporters, who respond with a blizzard of cute emojis and paid-for digital tributes…

The game might use the live battle feature of the voguish TikTok app, but the sentiments expressed by these 21st century adversaries stem from some of Somalia’s oldest, but also most divisive traditions, Using music, speeches, poetry and jibes, each player takes it in turn to extol the virtues of their own clan, and at times to mock or denigrate that of their opponent.

The winner is the player whose performance garners the most digital gifts, and the loser suffers the public humiliation of having to admit the supremacy of another clan, Such live online contests, which are known as “clan debates”, “clan wars”, or The Big Tribal Game, can attract tens of thousands of spectators in Somalia itself, but also around the world in the large Somali diaspora.

To the spectators, the contests are harmless fun and a chance for Somali youth to take pride in their culture and traditions, Yet in a country that from the 1990s has been torn apart by civil war often waged by clan-based militia, the sight of clans raising grievances and trading taunts about ancestors or battles is worrying, Many in Somali society are concerned that the heated bravado can at times cross a line into hate speech and is worsening clan-based tensions.

The contests’ popularity among the diaspora is also a demonstration of how the online world is allowing clan rivalries to be taken up by a new generation, whose own parents have often fled Somalia’s conflicts, Clans are still a key arbiter of many aspects of Somali life and identity, and they have played a significant role in politics.

Social media now gives Somali clan conflicts a global footprint, he said, “While regulations in countries like the US and in the EU aim to curb hate speech or incitement of violence, they are often broad and may not be well-suited to the nuanced clan-based content that emerges in Somali contexts,” he said.