Andrew Tate is public enemy No. 1, and not because of the seriously flawed human trafficking charges he’s facing in Romania. Tate is hated because he speaks to disaffected men, and not just any disaffected men — he speaks to young disaffected men. Despite his moral pitfalls, which I have already identified and rebuked, Tate has a unique ability to comprehensively explain the stakes behind the West’s war against masculinity in a highly engaging manner to middle- and high-school boys.
For adolescent males in 2023, life has never been more dissatisfying and confusing. As Tucker Carlson put it in his viral interview with Tate this week, our culture’s message to young boys today is: “Stop being yourself. Sit still. Stop joking. Suppress your aggression. Share your feelings. Obey. Female qualities are virtuous, masculine qualities are oppressive.”
Tate speaks to young boys. He helps them pinpoint all their frustrations in our hyper-feminized society and gives them concrete ways to resist “the matrix” and embrace their masculinity. Tate might not be a perfect figure, but his larger argument that our elite’s version of masculinity is poisonous is something boys desperately need to hear.
Mental and Physical Toughness
One example of something people have found wildly offensive is Tate’s insistence that “depression isn’t real.” Tate explains that most cases of “depression” are natural human emotions irresponsibly treated with prescription drugs. “I don’t believe in depression, I believe in feeling depressed,” said Tate. “If you have to install software, in your own mind … why not adopt a mindset that makes me as competent and as fearsome as possible?”
“If you feel a degree of uncomfortableness inside of your mind, I think it’s just your mind telling you that something about your life needs to change,” Tate told Carlson, emphasizing mental toughness and conditioning your mind to train, study, and go to work, even when you’re feeling unhappy. “I was in a Romanian jail cell, with cockroaches crawling all over me as I slept,” said Tate. “I never missed a day of training. I wouldn’t say I was particularly happy, but push-ups must be done, so they got done.”
Tate also stresses the importance of overall physical health for one’s mental health. He instructs men to boost their testosterone by working out, eating foods high in protein, and quitting porn. “Happiness and strength go hand in hand,” said Tate. “If you’re weak, you’re going to be miserable.”
Resisting Authoritarianism
Tate talked extensively with Carlson about how society teaches men that “to be a good man, you have to be a very weak one.” He correctly pointed out how false and dangerous this is because weak men, who lack conviction and act on their emotions, commit “ the most heinous acts … in society” and are particularly harmful to women.
He described the hypocrisy of the globalist, climate activists who galavant across the world in private jets and own beach homes that, according to their own calculations, will be underwater in a few years. “It’s not that I don’t like nature,” said Tate. “The problem is that nearly any issue which appears to be virtuous on the planet today is Trojan horsed with garbage.”
Ultimately, Tate tells his young audience that everything comes down to authoritarianism. “Every government on earth — all of them … they all want to be as controlling as possible over their citizens.” He theorizes that things like the radical transgender movement are a “deliberate attack on … our senses” and serve the government by conditioning us to “ignore our eyes.” He says depression “is a fantastic way to subdue a population” because “if everybody’s depressed, it’s hard to have a revolution.”
“The reason men died on the Titanic was for self-respect and dignity. They went into the icy cold water and died because they would feel honorless if they jumped on the boat and left the women to die,” said Tate. “When you have self-respect and dignity … you’ll do things which are deemed crazy or insane, because you believe in them, and you stick up for yourself.” Authoritarian governments fear that level of agency and personal conviction.
Tate is observably correct that the West is not as “free” as we once thought. Our federal government openly violates our most sacred rights, beginning with the First Amendment, and aggressively punishes acts of bravery among its citizens because they are symbols of power outside the purview of the state.
Don’t Let Them ‘Cut Your Balls Off’
Many conservatives agree with Tate’s overall message but wish young men would listen to someone who’s less boisterous and has more humility and Christian values. Perhaps someone like Jordan Peterson? Peterson is insightful and nuanced and is indeed an excellent male role model.
For younger men, however, Peterson doesn’t always resonate as well as Tate. Peterson is older, and his commentary can be highly academic. Tate is young, blunt, and flashy. The truth is that both men are an overall positive cultural force. Imagine Peterson is the psychology teacher, and Tate is the football coach.
If you find Tate distasteful, it’s probably because his messaging isn’t for you. Tate is filling a void for millions of disaffected young men. He identifies their discontent, places it in a broader context, and gives them concrete solutions.
Of course, the best person to teach a boy how to be a man is his father. However, with single motherhood being ubiquitous and young people spending exorbitant amounts of time on their phones, American youths are largely raised by the internet. For many young men, Tate feels like the first person to really understand them. He taps into their innate attraction to strength, courage, honor, and discipline.
Authoritarian global government wants everyone, but particularly men, to be financially and mentally shackled. Corporate America, the media, the school system, and the internet are engaging in what Tate calls “slave programming,” conditioning men to suppress their masculinity by becoming less physically fit and more mentally submissive. In other words, society wants to “cut your balls off.”
Tate helps men resist this slave programming in their early and most formative years, and I can get behind that.
Evita Duffy-Alfonso is a staff writer to The Federalist and the co-founder of the Chicago Thinker. She loves the Midwest, lumberjack sports, writing, and her family. Follow her on Twitter at @evitaduffy_1 or contact her at evita@thefederalist.com.
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