In today's #vatniksoup, I'll introduce two American-British social media personalities, Andrew and Tristan Tate (@cobratate and @tatethetalisman). They're best-known for their social media grifts, allegations of human trafficking and rape, and anti-Ukrainian rhetoric.
1/18
Andrew used to be a professional kickboxer, and eventually became a four-time world champion. He became to wider public in 2016, when he appeared on Big Brother. He was removed from the show after six days due to an ongoing police investigation for rape.
2/18
Some years later, the brothers launched a group of websites selling training courses on making money and improving in "male-to-female interactions". They also started a webcam business, where up to 75 women were working for him. They admitted the business was a "total scam".
3/18
The brothers launched a website called Hustler's University, a paid platform with an affiliate marketing system, where members receive a commission if they recruit new people to the service. Andrew also encouraged people to spread the content far and wide on social media.
4/18
Their other websites like "The Real World" and "War Room" are also paid services with little meaningful substance. Leaked chat logs showed that the latter even ran a "PhD course" on how to emotionally manipulate women into performing on webcams.
5/18
Throughout the years, Tates have gathered a large, cult-like following and his social media campaigns have reached especially young men - 80% of British boys aged between 16 and 17 had seen Andrew's content, and 45% of British men aged 16–24 had a positive view of him.
6/18
Andrew and his brother have been connected to various far-right figures & conspiracy theorists, including British far-right activist @TRobinsonNewEra, PizzaGate promoter @JackPosobiec, and of course @RealAlexJones.
Andrew's been featured several times on InfoWars.
7/18
Out of the two, Tristan has been much more vocal about the War in Ukraine.
Some of their views most probably come from their late father, Emory, who already back in 2015 wrote that "Why is America silent when Kiev is slaughtering innocents?? Unreal".
8/18
Both Andrew and Tristan are strongly pushing for the "US/Western proxy war" narrative, and neither has never condemned Russia for their invasion of Ukraine. Tristan even claimed that "Western politicians are responsible for the slaughter of a generation of brave young men".
9/18
Tristan has claimed that "Porosenko [sic] overtook the country in a CIA led coup," and then started "murdering" the ethnic Russians. According to him, Putin tried to "mitigate this and the killing for 7+ years," eventually "stepping in" to save them. All this in one tweet.
10/18
He's also has called Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia "breakaway regions," then comparing the situation to China and Taiwan, completely misunderstanding how countries and borders in general work. According to him, Donbas "declared independence" from Ukraine.
11/18
Tristan has naively called to "stop the war," but neither of the brothers ever talks about why this is not possible: it's because Russia has decided to decimate Ukraine and at the same time kill hundreds of thousands of their own men.
12/18
According to Andrew, Putin "cured" COVID after he launched the full-scale invasion to Ukraine. He's also suggested that the war is some kind of money laundering scheme of the elites. And of course it's a proxy war and, according to Tristan, provoked by NATO expansions.
13/18
After Yevgeny Prigozhin and PMC Wagner launched their insurrection against the Kremlin, Tristan tweeted that he's "Praying for all the people of Russia". He's also called Zelenskyy a "criminal", and claimed that he was "spearheading" the humanitarian aid in Feb 2022.
14/18
As a matter of fact, Tristan delivered a bunch of coats and shoes (probably costing ~100 USD) to fleeing Ukrainian refugees, and filmed this for all to see. This way he can show his critics that "he actually cares." He doesn't, he did it for attention and to sell their BS.
15/18
In Dec 2022, Romanian police arrested both Tate brothers and two women. All four were suspected of human trafficking, forming an organized crime group and one of them was suspected of rape. Naturally, they've countered the accusations with their own.
16/18
Recently, various fellow conspiracy theorists like @drloupis have come to defend the Tates, claiming that they "won't be on the Epstein list," using the infamous "I may be an (alleged) sex trafficker and rapist, but at least I'm not a pedophile!" defense.
17/18
In Finland, however, the big brother Andrew is best-known for his tendency to "culturally appropriate" Finnish sauna by sitting on the kid's bench in the measly temperature of 50C, all this while wearing his swimming trunks. And this guy calls himself the "ultimate alpha".
18/18
I have paused personal donations for now, please support @U24_gov_ua by donating to the #HopakChallenge and sending me the receipt:
Forgot this "gem" from Tristan.
Also, do follow @CrayonMurders and @thePAXWAX who know much more about Tates and the Matrix than me.
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