You're no doubt familiar with Andrew Tate, the most controversial man on social media. His videos have been viewed billions of times. He has millions of followers around the world. The Daily Beast recently referred to him as “ The King of Toxic Masculinity.” Meanwhile, The Guardian believes he’s a misogynist. None of this has stopped Tate from amassing a cult-like following.
Best described as a cross between Jordan Peterson, Jean-Claude Van Damme, Dan Bilzerian and a subreddit forum, Tate is a retired American-British former kickboxing world champion. A truly interesting character, Tate has taken the internet by storm, much to the dismay of many left-leaning commentators. A man who is forever talking about “hacking the Matrix,” up until very recently, Tate appeared to have done just that. He managed to do what so many of us mere mortals have failed to do: outsmart the clearly biased algorithm. On Friday, August 19, however, one of the algorithm's most prominent gatekeepers shot back. Meta announced that it was banning Tate from both Instagram and Facebook. The 35-year-old, who had 4.3 million followers on Instagram, was accused of violating Meta's policies. A few days later, YouTube and TikTok kicked him off their platforms. A man who built his reputation online finds himself homeless. On TikTok, one of the most popular apps in existence, Tate had 1.4 million followers. His videos, which were humorous and not without controversy, have been viewed over 11 billion times. Some commentators argue that he was, up until very recently, the most dangerous man on TikTok. Whether or not that's true, Tate was certainly one of the more influential.
Named after his now deceased father, Emory Tate II, the first ever black-American grandmaster chess player, Emory Andrew Tate III spent his formative years in Indiana. Although his father was, by all accounts, a genius, he struggled to earn a steady income. When Tate’s parents divorced, along with his mother and Tristan, his younger brother, Andrew Tate moved to a council estate in Luton, England. To escape the poverty trap, Tate immersed himself in the world of kickboxing. A talented fighter, Tate would go on to win the kickboxing world championship not once but four times. After picking up an eye injury, he retired from the sport in 2017. Desperate to continue making money, Tate looked to the internet for answers. Fast forward to 2022, and Tate is everywhere. How did this happen? How did Tate, a once obscure individual, end up becoming the most talked about person on the planet?
The Hustler in Tate
The Guardian, no fan of Tate, recently ran a piece on the multimillionaire, accusing him of manipulating the algorithm and artificially boosting his explosive content. According to the report, the highly-coordinated effort involves “thousands of members of Tate’s private online academy Hustler’s University and a network of copycat accounts on TikTok.”
Last year, Tate started “Hustler’s University 2.0,” a questionable venture I have discussed elsewhere. The “university,” which now boasts 100,000 members, is, according to one commentator, best described as a pyramid scheme. Go online and Google “Hustler’s University review,” and you will find yourself bombarded with glowing appraisals of Andrew Tate’s creation. If many of the reviews strike you as inauthentic, that’s because they are. As Charles Floate, a Hustler’s graduate, recently noted, although dozens of websites have reviewed his university, “NONE are positive without an affiliate link (Where they will get 50% of your payments to Andrew for LIFE) trying to get you to click throughout.”
Whatever your thoughts on Hustler’s may be (the university even offers a PhD in "pimpin hoes"), one can’t help but admire the hustler in Tate. You don’t have to like him to respect him. His willingness to say what many of us are thinking but are too afraid to say deserves to be recognized, maybe even applauded. Raised in abject poverty, Tate now has a net worth of $250 million. He is very much a rags to riches story. Moreover – and this is a point of vital importance - the Tate we see today is not a product of the left, not the right. You see, Tate is a troll of epic proportions. He is, in many ways, a direct response to the far left -- the type of people who can't take a joke; the type of people who feign outrage; the type of people who preach a gospel of inclusion and compassion yet seek to destroy anyone who disagrees with them; the type of people who lack the capacity to think for themselves. In a recent interview with the investor and entrepreneur Anthony Pompliano, Tate, an unapologetic Trump supporter, spoke about the dangers posed by the left, including cancel culture, mask mandates and the herd mentality that has swept across the US. Tate urged viewers to wake up from their extended slumber. The man speaks a great deal of truth.
Unlike many others, Tate recognizes that human attention is a scarce commodity. This explains the braggadocios swagger and the questionable views. Tate, who now resides in Romania, is akin to a talented fisherman. He casts his rod, with the juiciest of bait attached, then waits for the feeble-minded fish to bite. Starved journalists and commentators on the left, some of whom possess the most feeble of minds, latch on, then write lengthy, totally predictable pieces about the provocateur extraordinaire. Lock up your daughters, they scream - and while you're at it, lock up your sons, too. In truth, Andrew Tate is just one man, but many in the media would have you believe that he’s a Machiavellian-like monster, desperate to destroy humanity. He's not. Tate was smart enough to monetize the madness. As influential as he is, though, Tate, like so many others, has found himself canceled, silenced by the Big Tech elites.