The Andrew Tate discourse has now reached the “‘left eating itself “stage, with some ostensible leftists blaming his success on the failure of leftists and feminists to speak to the desires and insecurities of 14-year-old boys.
On Twitter, self-described “libertarian socialist” and “ultrafeminist” Vaush, the YouTube livestreamer, laid out the case against the “unnecessarily repellent” left.
Others concurred:
Some called explicitly for an “alternative Andrew Tate.” In a reply to Vaush, one wrote,
But the idea of an alternative or “leftist Andrew Tate” is a contradiction in terms. Even aside from the trafficking allegations, Tate is a douchebag, a manipulator, a sociopath. He wins over teenage boys by playing the bad boy and exploiting “girls” the way many adolescent boys wish they could. He plays to their insecurities, telling them that, yes, indeed, they are the victims of an evil feminist conspiracy. He feeds their persecution complex. He attracts would-be bullies by being a bully himself. In short, he represents everything that leftists and feminists are or at least should be against. What would a leftist or feminist Andrew Tate even look like?
Some on Twitter pointed out the absurdity.
But if we don’t need an “alternative Andrew Tate,” we do need alternatives to Andrew Tate. We need to put forth a healthy vision of masculinity to combat the toxic masculinity that Tate embodies. We need to promote a non-exploitative sexual and social ethic. We need to address the problems faced by young men without telling them that they’re the biggest victims in the whole wide world.
Of course, to no small degree, this is what the feminist left is doing already.
Could we do a better job of it? Of course we could. Would it be helpful if there were a number of charismatic “good guy” celebrities out there embodying feminist ideals? There are a few, but of course, there could be more.
Should we beat up on ourselves because we have no “Andrew Tate” of our own? No. We don’t need one, and frankly, neither do the 14-year-old boys of the world.
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Thinking of what @Pope said
It’s easier to learn skills when you feel you can ask questions. But some boys are taught that they lose status by asking questions, which is a great pity.
About that “no ass-wiping” flex. Yes, they actually think it’s a flex. Kevin Samuels started off giving self-improvement and style advice to Black men, but he remained largely unviewed and poor. As soon as he switched his grift to bashing Black women, he became a “top G” overnight and crowned “the Godfather of the Black Manosphere”.
@Sheila
This is definitely one of the issues. A lot of boys are more worried about looking like they don’t know all the answers than they are about being actually ignorant, and they’ll buy into anyone who sounds “smart” as a result. Ben Shapiro and Jordan Peterson owe a huge chunk of their fanbases to that.
Beats me. The only Vaush I know is the fishwoman from Warcraft III.
I have seen this said online a lot but everything simply refers to him as “black” and African-American with Tate Son (the scumbag) referring to himself as “half-AA”.
I do agree though a number of Black women noticing the discrepancy between allegedly progressive men’s views on race and gender and responding accordingly.
If a boy is looking for someone to tell him nothing is his fault, it’s the mean women/poc/whatevers keeping him down…they won’t gravitate to someone who isn’t telling them what they want to hear. I can’t see it, anyway. But I’m in a bummer mood today.
@Steph Tohill
“Tate Son (the scumbag) referring to himself as “half-AA”.
— He does that for online street cred (in the jargon of his fanboys he qualifies as both a Chad and a Tyrone) and as a sort of dog-whistle p-own that “libtards can’t criticise me otherwise they are racist”. In other words, it’s another grift.
“I do agree though a number of Black women noticing the discrepancy between allegedly progressive men’s views on race and gender and responding accordingly.”
— The Black Manosphere does not identify as progressive. They are openly claiming conservativism, patriarchy, right-wingery and for those who vote – Republican. The “progressive” black male space does not identify as Manosphere.
As far as misogyny in progressive POC activist spaces, an anonymous commenter on page 1 of this thread posted this link: https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/courtney-desiree-morris-why-misogynists-make-great-informants
It’s an interesting read.
@Mediocrites, Love Is All We Need
Aha, I can believe both of these reasons, especially one to cover the other.
I wonder if the real root situation is no one teaching them how to properly wipe as a child without getting shit on themselves and/or leaving bits behind due to impatience or lack of awareness of a child’s unique anal anatomy. And then they give up and go, “might as well not do it at all, neener neener.”
I watched the video of this guy, @Love, and to be honest I have no idea why that specifically was problematic content? He seems like a personal hygiene version of “Dad How Do I?”, which could be very useful. Why was he not popular? (I understand that he later switched to misogyny, wherein there is a problem.)
@Anonymous: Thank you for the link to the article in the anarchist library. The whole library is a fantastic place of questions and ideas. You have given this internet stranger a great gift.
BigTittyDemon, he was unpopular because men didn’t want to hear about their own faults, didn’t want to improve or take accountability. But as soon as he started bashing black women and blaming everything on them, he went viral. Did you know that welfare TBMOTH/took the black man out of the home? Did you know that weaves and wigs TBMOTH? That black womens’ attitudes TBMOTH? That black womens’ obesity rates TBMOTH? Everything TBMOTH except BM themselves.
“Black Manosphere does not identify as progressive. They are openly claiming conservativism, patriarchy, right-wingery and for those who vote – Republican. The “progressive” black male space does not identify as Manosphere.”
I was summarising for brevity. What I meant was more black women noticing that a lot of black men can be absolutely “right-on” on matters of civil rights, specifically race related civil rights but turn into the same bigots they despise when gender is the topic under discussion.
My broader point being people keep making the mistake of thinking this fondness for incredibly patriarchal, misogynist alt-right content is specific to white boys and men. This could not be further from the truth.
(I am still seeing AT as birracial until I see otherwise!)
@LoveIsAllWeNeed
I have frequently asked those saying this – how can welfare remove you from a home where you are present and playing and active role. I have yet to receive an answer to this question.
“My broader point being people keep making the mistake of thinking this fondness for incredibly patriarchal, misogynist alt-right content is specific to white boys and men.”
— Only very young and very naive white people can think this. And that too, for only a very short time.
“I have frequently asked those saying this – how can welfare remove you from a home where you are present and playing and active role. I have yet to receive an answer to this question.”
— For years the Black Manosphere screamed “The Moynihan Report!!!”. Then Cynthia G read the Moynihan Report on Youtube and it said the complete opposite of what they thought/claimed it said. They never bothered to read it. Not even a paragraph. That or their reading comprehension is … well, maybe I shouldn’t go there.
Oh fuck off Vaush you nonce.
FFS, Vaush!
Tate had a massive platform and influence because he was already rich and his grift just made him richer! The left can’t have a Tate equivalent because we’re not supposed to bunker money, traffic women and launder money for the mob until we can afford a to expand into the influencer market. Tate literally told his fans that we live in the matrix. His message wasn’t good or relevant, he had money to wave around and that’s why he caught attention and that allowed him to add his red-pill misogynist shit.
And IMO, the best advice we can give to young men is LISTEN TO WOMEN AND MARGINALIZED PEOPLE! It was what i got when i thought I was a young man and it helped me more than anything that Vaush spews
This is a big topic; and people have already covered a lot of the points. So I’d just add this:
I can see why a kick-boxer might have allure for certain boys; especially inadequate ones (I’m a firm believer that, ultimately, feelings of inadequacy, conscious or otherwise, are at the heart of all oppressive movements.). But, even if the left has a dearth of ‘traditional’ masculine role models, there are plenty out there. To go back to combat sports, I’m a big fan of a chap called Bas Rutten. Now he’s properly nails. World champion in all sorts of MMA type events, and one of the pioneers. But he’s always been more than happy to talk about how he was bullied as a kid (that’s what got him into martial arts). His views wouldn’t be out of place here (it’s ok for boys to be upset and have feelings) but I think he’s worth a gazillion Tates*.
(Tate must have some value, if only for the phosphorus content)
@Steph Tohill
That’s one of the key points of the zine I linked. I’ll quote part of it that I think is especially relevant:
It’s rather worrying to me that those tendencies have been endemic in even the most radical of organizations. If even Huey Newton and Eldridge Cleaver- the sort of people who had far more insight into the workings of domination and exploitation than many others of their time and inspired others to address those systems of oppression as well- could remain so blind to their role in recapitulating the very forces they fought against, then it’s not surprising that someone like Vaush who isn’t nearly as committed to leftist/radical causes would end up going down the same path.
On that note, I found another article on the subject, this one focused more on misogynoir specifically.
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/afrofuturist-abolitionists-of-the-americas-the-left-has-a-misogynoir-problem
@Anonymous
Have you read Soul On Ice? Cleaver wrote about how he “practiced rape” on black women in order to “graduate” to raping white women. Reading that book you don’t get the vibe he was the remorseful and reformed type. Prison as rehabilitation center doesn’t work for everybody.
Well, ackshully (pushes glasses up nose, looks down nose), Tater Tot’s less than 50% Black, since the odds of a Black American man born in the mid-20th century being wholly of African descent are non-existent. That’s just science! /s He certainly appears whiter than many other biracial people, like Barack Obama, whose father was African.
And considering Tater Tot’s English mom moved him back to Britain when he was 10-11, plus he says Dad was never home before that, it’s probably not like he had much, if any, meaningful Black American experience.
I’m thinking he’d probably been passing for White until he decided saying he’s bi-racial is better for the grift or street cred or such. Yet he still manages to be racist towards ethnicities he’s not.
Nothing wrong with being bi-racial or multi-racial, of course (though apparently the Royal family and MAGA haven’t gotten that memo yet). Using it purely for grifting purposes is wrong, though.
And misogyny knows no racial limits, so whatever his ancestry, the menz regardless of race are going to be women-haters. Which is why I guess he’s so keen on Dubai — no enforcement of sex trafficking laws as well as no taxes.
Hey, is he still drinking alcohol? More haram!
@Oogly: both your comment and your avatar made me smile today.
@Thread
Just because we probably ought to have it on every page that quotes the thought:
No, Vaush is NOT the “wiping your butt is something manly men don’t do”.
That is Roosh V, who is a very different and extremely, extremely repellant person who wrote a series of guides that included, among other things, details about him raping women (if his stories are to be believed). Roosh V is now living a post shroom hallucination life as an extreme religious windbag who is still a terrible person.
Vaush is a YouTuber who has not written a series of rape guides, nor bragged about not wiping his bum.
I’ve stumbled across some of his vids. Some okay, some not, his style does not appeal to me because I’m not sure how much of the fragile ego behavior is him being an edgelord of the old sort and acting the part of a blustering overconfident jerk as part of his online persona and how much of it is him just having a fragile ego.
People’s mileage may vary. Not my cuppa, because whatever it is, the vibe just makes me uncomfortable.
But not bad enough to be cool with us linking him to literal rapist and scumbag Roosh V. Accidents happen, so uh… folks in thread, if the accusation gets posted to the next set of 25 comments maybe someone toss up a correction?
Having something like that on the first set of comments someone’s likely to skim seems impolite.
Rian Stone on Twitter
Sid on Twitter
Why does that particular demographic deserve any more compassion or any alternative than the rest of us? Life is a struggle for most humans, even under the best of circumstances. The vast majority of people are average and ordinary, leading remarkably unremarkable lives. College education remains the number one indicator of financial stability in this country and the world. We are all told to get one, or at least learn some skill by which we can support ourselves in a legal way. These guys don’t want to. They expect to be an exception to the rule, the norms, the statistics. So because they haven’t come to grips and made peace with the utter banality of human existence like the rest of us have, we should create a special lane for them?
Say what?
With the extra added fun of debt debt DEBT!! And no longer a sure ticket to a decent, secure middle-class adult life culminating in a secure retirement, to boot. The value proposition has therefore gone to hell. Can you really blame them?
So, if we prevent people from growing up to have fragile egoes, we fix the world?
OK … so what causes that then?
<i>Leftists and progressives have absolutely no idea how unnecessarily repellent they come off to so many people…</i>
Examples, please? When I was a teenager, there were things “leftists and progressives” said that didn’t really click with me, and things I didn’t totally agree with…but IIRC nothing that “repelled” me. Does this guy have any actual examples or anecdotes, or is he just robotically repeating a zombie-talking-point that’s almost as old as I am?
I honestly think until we change the way we socialize boys we will keep losing them to the likes of Tate and JBP (they are just the tip of the toxic masculinity iceberg). There are plenty of entertaining, engaging and well informed guys on the left doing great content but young men are seemingly always going to be drawn to the misogynistic, materialistic douche bros.
@GSS ex-Noob
This does not stop him being birracial.