This article contains references to sexual assault and rape.
“I’m gonna find myself a nice Islamic ass wife. I’m gonna build up a big pile of rocks in case she gets fresh. I’m going to be prepared. So I ain’t gonna mess around – as soon as I catch her cheating, there’s gonna be no delays. In sha Allah.”
These are the words of Andrew Tate, reviled and revered TikTok megastar with millions of followers, talking about how the idea of being able to stone his non-existent Muslim wife for infidelity is one of the things that attracted him to Islam. Alarmingly, one in four young men in Britain agree with his views on women.
Last year, Tate declared that he had become a Muslim. Given his track record, it’s little surprise that he bypassed the humility and introspection of a new convert and immediately saw his new faith through the lens of horrendously misogynistic violence.
After all, he has a slew of allegations against his name, from trafficking to rape, and a hatred for women (or “females”, “bitches”, and “hoes” as he prefers to call us) is a core pillar of his social media output – whether that’s telling his largely young male fanbase that women are “barely sentient” or advising grown men to enter into relationships with teenagers because they are easier to “imprint.”
Plus, a timeline of the accusations.
Many Muslim women, like me, cannot reconcile Tate’s misogyny and hatred with Islam’s focus on ethics, social justice, equity and charity. How can an alleged human trafficker and rapist think his views are reflected in a religion that sought to provide rights to women where none existed before?
After all, while Europe was still debating whether women had souls and functioning brains, Islam came to liberate women in the ancient Arab world by protecting our rights to keep our own names and money after marriage and forbidding the pre-Islamic practice of female infanticide.
But that’s the point. Islam – or rather, the Muslim community – is simply another platform for Tate to dominate. And, sadly, amongst many Muslim men he has found a receptive audience.
Questions about the genuineness of Tate’s conversion to Islam aside, it cannot be denied that his adoption of a minority faith is nothing short of convenient for his overall message and status as a martyr of traditional masculinity. Taking on the identity of a persecuted religion like Islam allows him to mask his vitriol in the politics of persecution.
Any Muslim knows that we are disproportionately targeted in the UK (according to the Home Office, half of all hate crimes are aimed at Muslims) so by, for example, conveniently holding a Quran whilst being arrested in front of the world’s cameras, Tate gets to shift some of the attention away from the shocking allegations made against him personally and instead blame it on Islamophobia or the ‘matrix’ or the west’s rejection of Islam’s traditional values.
But we have to look beyond the facade, and in my view, it’s not about religion at all. It’s about masculinity.
“Nudifying” AI tools that “undress” women in photos are gaining traction.
Masculinity is in crisis, especially where “traditional” values are concerned. Many faiths, Islam included, set pretty firm gender dynamics that are not always reflected in our modern capitalist structures.
For example, Muslim husbands are obliged to provide a basic standard of living for their families – not because Muslim women aren’t allowed to work but because our religion places equal value on other iterations of work that women may go through, like pregnancy and the maternal load involved in child rearing: things that our capitalist system overlooks.
But in the UK, the Muslim community is one of the most heavily impacted by poverty, and Muslim men of certain ethnicities have some of the lowest rates of higher education, stable employment and social mobility in the entire country. As such, the very notion of affording to get married in the first place can seem a far-fetched reality for many, let alone being able to provide for a future family without a stable income.
So if traditional notions of what it means to be a “man” are harder to access (like having a wife and kids, good education and enough money to live), then other versions of masculinity become more appealing – and that’s where Tate steps in to sell vulnerable and impressionable young men the idea that women and feminism are to blame for all their problems, that they deserve a beautiful, passive woman just because they’re a man.
Oh, and the secret to making money is all here in this exclusive online programme that will cost hundreds of pounds to enrol into.
Talking about misogyny is important, but how we talk about it is even more so.
Fundamentally, Islam doesn’t really come into what Tate espouses because, by its nature, it is entirely opposed to everything he says. Take a look at any of his content, and the double standards are glaringly obvious – posing half-naked next to women in bikinis, openly drinking alcohol and smoking cigars in the middle of Ramadan and referring to himself as some kind of godlike deity to be worshipped – none of these hints at genuine piety nor the Muslim values that define our faith.
Thanks to his high profile status, sometimes I think we make the mistake of exceptionalising Andrew Tate.
Yes, his huge social media following, given his own alleged history of heinous crimes should cause grave concern. And yes, it matters when he normalises calling women “hoes” or being violent towards partners. But in reality, he is part of a wider trend of monetising and repackaging conservative – even extreme – views as a return to traditionalism for a modern audience.
Like the TradWives of right-wing Christian America who charge you hundreds of dollars to tell you how to be a good housewife (while raking in the cash themselves), the stay-at-home girlfriends glamourising childlike dependence on men, the mummy bloggers shaming mothers for using shop-bought baby food, not opting for cloth nappies and daring to show their toddler a TV screen once a while, or the fundamentalist Christians who scream pro-life without any consideration for the life of the mother.
In our capitalist, content-driven world, it is imperative we don’t underestimate the reason Tate is so dangerous. We have to look beyond the distraction of the cigar smoke and the gaslighting, aggressive language, beneath the pseudo-religious facade to see him for what he really is.
Do we care more about trauma or the performance of trauma?
He is more than a public figure spewing his vitriol into an echo chamber. He is a businessman selling a dangerous prospect. Scroll through his now-reinstated Twitter feed, and you’ll see that most of his content is actually about how great a man he is and how most men will never live up to him.
Like any good influencer, he understands his audience: self-conscious men struggling to understand their masculinity in a harsh and changing world. His vile misogyny, the shame he creates in his male fanbase and the sprinkle of religion he decides to add every couple of weeks are carefully constructed elements of the same overall aim: to sell.
In Tate’s warped portrayal of the world, women are the enemy of men, and he is the saviour – or rather, his products are. For a mere $8000, you can join “a global network in which exemplars of individualism work to free the modern man from socially induced incarceration” (whatever that means) or for $50 a month, subscribe to his online Hustler’s University which promises to teach men how to make money and become an alpha male.
Tate is dangerous precisely because he is good at what he does – and he is creating the perfect conditions for a storm that we will see the repercussions of for years to come: a new generation of young men whipped up in a frenzy of inceldom validated by distorted religious justifications, self-esteem issues and a brimming hatred for women.
For more information about reporting and recovering from rape and sexual abuse, you can contact Rape Crisis on 0808 500 2222.
If you have been sexually assaulted, you can find your nearest Sexual Assault Referral Centre here. You can also find support at your local GP, voluntary organisations such as Rape Crisis, Women's Aid, and Victim Support, and you can report it to the police (if you choose) here.
Men are also twice as likely as women to say feminism has gone too far.
