Over the last few years with the rise of Tik Tok and short-form video content on the internet, a certain man has since risen to an absurd level of fame despite his outdated and controversial views. Andrew Tate, professional MMA fighter and human trafficker began his rise to fame after being featured in a select few TV shows following his winning of several MMA awards. His debut as a TV personality was cut short, however, after a video of him beating his girlfriend at the time with a belt began to circulate. Rather than public outcry, it was this exact abuse of women that led to his rise as an internet celebrity. His career began with abusing women which was readily accessible and consumed by his legions of fanboys. Now with his arrest by the Romanian government, his career is hopefully slated to end, all as a cause of his own hubris.
Who is Andrew Tate?
After his initial debut onto the internet, Tate introduced a ‘university’ to his audience, formerly known as Hustler’s University and currently known as the ‘Real World’. This online course was introduced to not only make money, but also distract from his human trafficking organization, in which he would manipulate and trap women into being webcam sexworkers. It can also be noted that this online business model fits many of the qualifications of a cult, namely the simultaneous exclusivity and belittling of its members as well as the recruiting and behaviour driven aspects of the program. In addition to this, Tate would often encourage his fans to promote him on various social media sites, namely TikTok and Instagram. Most of the work in his rise to fame was therefore perpetuated and maintained by his online audience, where clips of his podcast would be uploaded and garner millions of views. The result of this is clear; millions of men now feel comfortable enough to vocalize their misogynistic views, at least online.Â
Another factor in Tate’s success is the reason so many men rationalize and support his ideas- despite Tate’s proven record of sexual and physical assault against women. With Tate’s rise in popularity, we must consider what type of person is capable of falling prey to his manipulation tactics. Millions of men (and some women) have been convinced of Tate’s righteousness. This is because the structures of patriarchy provide an ideal of what it is to be a man, and they have been told that society is structured around them. However, the true masculine ideal can only be fully achieved in combination with extreme wealth. This ‘strongman’ image is only available to the elites of society, therefore to the average man it is completely unattainable. Yet at the same time, society expects them and bases their value as a human by their ability to be attractive, strong, and financially successful. This is essentially what Andrew Tate is selling – an image of ideal masculinity. His Hustler’s University is a prime example of this, as he teaches men how to be financially and personally successful by telling them how to be more like them – minus the international crime. These vulnerable and often young men want to improve on their life, and Tate’s lifestyle is something they deem desirable. But because they are not and likely will never be able to achieve it, they turn their lack of self-esteem into a hatred of those they perceive as the ones holding them down – such as women and leftists. Ultimately, this sense of entitlement they feel over perceived ‘lesser people’ turns into an undermining of the civil liberties and very humanity of others.Â
TikTok and the Alt-right Pipeline
The Alt-right in contemporary politics is often synonymous with the far-right, often encompassing ideologies such as fascism and anarcho-capitalism disguised as ‘libertarianism’. If you spend a lot of time on the internet, you’ve likely heard some of their slang, such as ‘redpilled’ ‘blackpilled’ in reference to the matrix, which is terminology adopted by the Alt-right with the explicit intent to use things like movie references to draw you further into what can be called a ‘decentralized cult’. This is a specifically online phenomenon fuelled by sites like Youtube (and later TikTok) in which people all over the world become manipulated into forming a cult-like community – only online. The leaders of this cultlike following are people like Andrew Tate, Ben Shapiro, or Stephen Crowder, and their followers are slowly fed increasingly reactionary content by algorithms until they finally stumble upon explicitly racist, misogynistic, or homophobic content. To learn more about this process in the early days of the internet, click on this link.
Now however, the Alt-right pipeline has found a new way of radicalizing youth through TikTok. It starts off seemingly innocuous, with niche content like ‘gymtok’ – but soon it turns sinister, with even seemingly harmless content leading to content recommending an increasingly toxic and harmful mentality which prioritises adhering to traditional standards over all else.
In just a few scrolls, seemingly harmless content such as this:Â
*Profanity disclaimer in second clip (specifically in the audio)*
Can lead to much more damaging ones such as this:
With Andrew Tate specifically, fans use hashtags such as ‘inspiration’ ‘advice’ ‘life advice’ to market to vulnerable people – who soon get pulled into the TikTok pipeline of reactionary content. This is ultimately a spread of dangerous ideas and the result of it can be seen in an increasing number of domestic terrorism – specifically ones committed by white supremacists radicalized by internet hate groups against minorities. The damaging and hateful ideologies advocated for by people like Andrew Tate directly result in these crimes. These people have blood on their hands, and sites like Youtube, TikTok and Instagram only help the spread of their hate by not being more strict in stopping the spread of misinformation.Â
What we can do
It can be hard for individual people to independently recognize implicit bigoted bias in the media we consume, especially when we are consuming a lot of it and are not aware of the sort of content that could be potentially damaging or misleading. Therefore, it is important that we are all contentious consumers of the content we find online. Critically thinking about media is an important part of modern media consumption. When you learn a new concept ask yourself, where did this source get their information? What bias could this media have? And most importantly, what does my reaction to this information say about myself and society at large? Always be sure of the reliability of your sources and if you see something, say something. Report any misinformation or hateful content you see online. For example, when Andrew Tate says women are bad drivers, ask yourself where you have seen this information to be true. Just a simple Google search would reveal that in fact, women are on average better and more cautious drivers than men, and often pay lower insurance rates because they are less accident-prone. Being sure of the reliability of the media you consume is the best way to avoid the manipulation tactics of the extreme right.
