Something to consider—those fighting for the cartels are all cowards of one variety or another.
If you have the stomach to watch the narco execution vids listening to the final interview of the condemned people tell the real story of getting involved with them. They do not recruit by winning the hearts and minds of the locals. They ransom their families and give them a few bucks to do as the cartels wish. Hard to say what the locals will think but after seeing a few videos out there of locals catching and lynching sicarios it would appear they are getting fed up with it.