The murky online world of Andrew Tate and ‘pick-up artists’

Exclusive: The controversial influencer’s arrest last year prompted an outcry over his misogynist social media presence. But now, as he and his brother face a string of criminal charges in Romania, Maya Oppenheim finds their troubling videos are still freely available online

Andrew Tate’s videos can still be found within minutes online (Getty)

Martinis, martinis, martinis, martinis,” he tells the camera, gesticulating wildly. “Bang, threesome. Slam them both.”

This is Andrew Tate, the misogynist influencer, preaching to his audience about how to recruit women to perform for webcams. Sitting in an unremarkable room, the former kickboxing world champion turned “success coach” exhorts viewers to get women drunk and stream content of themselves on an online pornography website.

It is more than six months since Tate and his brother Tristan were arrested in Romania, prompting an outcry over how easily accessible his vile content was for impressionable young Britons.

Tate is currently facing serious charges in Romania (Sourced)

But now, even as the Tates are charged with rape and human trafficking, The Independent has found their videos can still be found within minutes online.

What they reveal is a murky world promoting the exploitation of female sexuality for financial gain, coercive control, and retrograde views centred around women performing domestic duties for men.

The brothers’ videos proclaim them to be “pick-up artists”, a term tied to an industry where men seek to cajole women into sleeping with them via charm and compliments, intricate mind games, as well as coercion and harassment.

For sums that can run into hundreds of pounds, users are encouraged to sign up for access to their content. For instance, the “Tate webcam program” purports to provide a “PhD course” to “teach you how to obtain and retain unlimited beautiful women and this course will teach you how to turn them into cold hard cash”.

Other courses, advertised as being run by Andrew Tate, teach participants “how to lie”, as well as “how to intimidate”, and “how to get your girl on lock down”, and “have multiple women who are all loyal to you”.

It comes as The Independent revealed TikTok has been accused of not acting to block misogynistic videos from influencer Tate that can be viewed by children as young as 13. Figures show that videos linked to the Tate hashtag have been viewed 74 million times in the UK on TikTok in the past three months alone.

His brother Tristan Tate was also arrested by authorities (Tristan Tate)

Tate and his brother Tristan, dual British-US citizens initially arrested in December, were recently charged in Romania with rape, human trafficking and forming an organised crime group to sexually exploit women – allegations they deny.

Videos The Independent found of Tristan Tate, the younger of the siblings, show him teaching “pick-up artistry”. The 34-year-old boasts about being “one of the baddest playboys in the world” and an “elite level guy”, as well as speaking about how to sleep with virgins.

In one clip, he explains he has multiple girlfriends who are all exclusive to him as he brags about women “who cry their eyes out if I stop speaking to them”. In his own words, “that is power”.

The influencer also explains how he looks for girlfriends who leave their phone “unlocked” and do not mind if he looks at the device, as well as someone who ”never goes out the room” to take a phone call, “cleans up my house” and “cooks my meals”.

He adds: “If these things are adding up then I’ll usually turn it into something serious. I’ll tell her she is exclusively with me.”

Tristan Tate says he will “never trust a woman like I will trust a man”, also saying that while he knows his girlfriends do not cheat on him, “you have to test their loyalty”. He suggests doing this by saying, “Hey baby, give me your phone, unlock it, I want to do something”, as he recommends, “Don’t do sh*t, take a selfie. Give it back to her.”

The ‘Tate webcam program’ purports to provide a ‘PhD course’ to ‘teach you how to obtain and retain unlimited beautiful women’ (Pick Up Artist Tools)

In his view, “if she will hand you her unlocked phone, she ain't cheating”, however, “if they won't unlock” their phone and give it to you then “she is probably not girlfriend material”.

Other relationship advice offered by the younger Tate brother involves asking women to do tasks, as he claims “good women are servile” and females are “very servile creatures”.

He recounts the example of asking a woman to top up drinks, add ice cubes, find beers, and fetch lighters for his male friends when they are spending time together - adding that “a good woman” will “love” doing this.

“A good way to keep your relationship fresh and a good way to keep your relationship happy is to make demands of women,” he adds. “Women love to serve men, they really do.”

Courses advertised as being run by Andrew Tate teach participants ‘how to intimidate’ and ‘how to get your girl on lock down’ (Pick Up Artist Tools)

Discussing the Tate brothers' “pick-up artist” content, Callum Hood, of the Centre for Countering Digital Hate, warned that the “Tate brothers’ original business as pick-up artists involves viewing women as objects and applying simple formulas that they believe will result in women sleeping with you”.

The organisation’s head of research said “this is really dangerous” as he argued “pick-up artists have contempt for women and contempt for consent”.

Mr Hood added: “Their pick-up artist advice instructs men to view women as objects and instruct women to do whatever you want – whether that is sleep with you or perform on webcams for your profit.”

He noted a “unique” element about the Tate brothers in comparison to other pick-up artists is that while others focus their attentions on “one-night stands”, the Tate brothers are concentrated on “lasting coercive relationships where you have control over multiple women”.

A website titled “pick-up artist tools” running a course called the “Tate webcam program” asks: “What’s the only thing better than hanging around with beautiful women? Being paid to do it!”

“THE £250 PHD course teaches you very important and valuable lessons about retaining and obtaining women,” the course states. “You will learn: How to convince girls to work for you. How to start a webcam company from home with zero investment. How to do banking and handle taxes, so that you get paid day one. The best way to motivate women to make you rich. Tips and tricks from over seven years in the game. A full breakdown of how to earn 30k per month profit from only three girls.”

The course boasts if you “listen carefully to Tate’s system”, then you will make all of your course investment back in the first day!”

Joe Mulhall, of leading anti-fascist charity Hope not Hate, said the Tate brothers’ “brand of extreme misogyny and disdain for women is plain to see in these videos”. He warned that the siblings are “financially benefiting from churning out this misogynistic content to their male audience”. In his opinion, “Tate’s aspirational lifestyle videos are a disturbing gateway to more extreme far-right content”.

The Independent previously reported on research by the Centre for Countering Digital Hate which unearthed 47 videos of Tate pushing what it describes as “extreme misogyny”.

The report uncovered adverts on videos where Tate discusses fighting women, saying “grip her up by the neck” in a video, which has been viewed 1.6 million times, as well as referring to putting his “imprint” on 18 and 19-year-old girls in footage which has been viewed 8.4 million times.

A representative for the Tates declined to comment when approached by The Independent.

Ruth Davison, chief executive of Refuge, a domestic abuse charity, branded the so-called “pick-up artist” content from the Tate brothers “horrifying” and argued that the origins of the culture lie in misogyny.

“This coercively controlling, love-bombing and gaslighting behaviour displays all the warning signs of domestic abuse,” she added.

“We are seeing a worrying trend of disturbing misogynistic content across social media and online, whereby men seemingly brag about abusing women, profit by victimising them and try to influence more men to do the same.”