In 2016, reality television star Andrew Tate stirred up controversy on the U.K. edition of Big Brother, when after six episodes, he was removed from the house, and videos surfaced online of him allegedly assaulting a co-star. In 2022, Andrew and his brother, Tristan, were arrested in Romania for the alleged human trafficking of 34 women, and now face separate charges of rape, sexual assault, and forming criminal organizations. In addition, they both currently face allegations of sexual assault in the U.K. The brothers have yet to face sentencing for any of these crimes. What has been delaying their trial, and how has this situation gone unchecked for so long?
Andrew and Tristan were due to begin their trial in Romania on October 31, 2024. Yet, as has happened numerous times before, their lawyers have delayed the proceedings on the grounds of inadmissible evidence, causing Romanian judges to push the trial back further. The brothers are best known for their podcast Tate Speech, as well as being the CEOs of Hustlers University, a program where men pay for a subscription service that alleges to make them self-made millionaires. They profit off of these young men, while fueling a fire of misogynistic ideology, with public statements such. “I’m a realist and when you’re a realist, you’re sexist. There’s no way you can be rooted in reality and not be sexist,” said Andrew during an interview with a fellow Youtuber. It is worth noting, however, that Andrew claims he made himself a millionaire via a webcam business he was operating, wherein he would recruit the women he dated into the adult entertainment industry to work for him. In a now deleted website post, he recalls “My job was to meet a girl, go on a few dates, sleep with her, test if she’s quality, get her to fall in love with me to where she’d do anything I say and then get her on webcam so we could become rich together.”
The brothers have gone notoriously viral across social media in recent years, but were banned on platforms such as TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook in 2022 for promoting hate speech. Even so, their content and ideologies are still readily available and easily accessible across all of these platforms. As researcher Ellen Chloe Bateman describes, online algorithms will often take note of an internet user’s relative age and gender, and expose young boys to the Tate brothers’ content. “Violence against women gets normalized, embedding itself into the psyches of young men through images and memes, in a ‘culture of intense competition and one-upmanship.’” As quoted in the BBC in 2024, Deputy Chief Constable Maggie Blyth spoke to this impact in a report into violence against women and girls: “We know that some of this is also linked to radicalisation of young people online, we know the influencers, Andrew Tate, the element of influencing of particularly boys, is quite terrifying.”
As the brothers broadcast their views about women, researchers believe that it may also have an equally harmful impact on men. Listeners may adopt ideas about needing to present a strong and powerful image at all times, creating fear within men that they are somehow inferior for struggling, and that they will be judged for talking about it. Men’s mental health has long been a grey area within our healthcare system. According to the Men’s Health Network: “From a young age, boys are often taught to be resilient, strong, and independent. Expressing emotions or admitting to struggling is frequently stigmatized and equated with weakness or vulnerability. As a result, many men adopt a ‘suffer in silence’ mentality, believing they should handle issues independently. Public figures like the Tate Brothers can promote such mentalities. Especially as this is ‘Movember,’ the month-long campaign advocating for men’s health, it is important to highlight the importance of mental health awareness for men. People of all genders deserve to feel safe, seen, and valued for being exactly who they are, without having to put up a strong front or experience gender-based oppression.
