"No, I Don't Own a Bugatti - But Neither Do You" by Alexandra Paul

There has been a litany of controversial figures who coloured the year 2022, yet none have quite irked or perplexed me as a certain new breed of political influencers – deeply misogynistic male podcasters. While this may seem like a niche corner of the budding social media content creation industry, it has skyrocketed in popularity over several months. Their clips routinely go viral, especially on TikTok, and comment sections are flooded by intense debates, usually with a fair share of insults and taglines like “What colour is your Bugatti?” This catchphrase, which has been parroted and parodied in equal measure, is commonly used to refer to kickboxing-star-turned-podcaster and Bugatti owner Andrew Tate. My answer as a twenty-something student is, like most people, that I do not own a Bugatti – but I don’t think that makes me any less qualified to speak about success. Tate’s decision to spend an exorbitant amount of money on a car does not make him wiser than anyone else and even kicked off a chain of events that recently landed him in a Romanian jail cell on charges of trafficking and sexual assault. However, he often flaunts his wealth as evidence of his success, supposedly facilitated by his warped “alpha male” philosophies.

While he is now banned from most social media platforms, Tate’s name has become almost synonymous with this new epidemic of political influencers who encourage their young, male audience to adopt their violently sexist ideas. They frame it as a defence of masculinity while lamenting the feminization of society – a problem male political figures have been supposedly combatting for centuries. Though most reasonable adults would recoil in disgust from many of Tate’s proposals, like beating female partners into submission, they are not his target audience. Instead, Tate and the unfortunately growing number of copycats are interested in influencing boys and young men, making their rhetoric all the viler. They claim that society (or, in a gross misuse of the Wachowski sisters’ classic film, “the Matrix”) wants to make men weaker and that it is their responsibility to combat that by embracing “traditional” masculinity. Some of this focus is on breadwinner status, encouraging men to centre accruing wealth over all else, or on physical strength and appearance. However, much of it pertains to men retaking dominance over the Big Bad – women.

Unrestricted internet access and the incessant goal of social media algorithms to keep users online have led to a recognizable pipeline directing young men from innocent apolitical content, usually related to fitness or gaming, to content from conservative political commentators and, eventually, hate-fuelled extremists like Tate. It helps that many creators from these three distinct groups have a major overlap in their intended audience, but the further down the pipeline they come from, the more sinister their intentions become. Their audiences gain a community and a sense of purpose. These young men feel as though they have stumbled onto a secret blueprint to solve one of society’s biggest problems. Of course, like any good con man, Tate is selling a solution to a problem he invented – the feminization of men. But what does this mean for the rest of us, especially women?

Misogyny has almost always had a foothold in internet culture. Perhaps the most infamous example is the “incel” or involuntarily celibate subculture, which originated between several forum sites, including 4chan and Reddit. Young, single men who feel shunned for not meeting societal expectations and thus feel undesirable to women use forums to express their anger. However, they do not blame a society that creates unrealistic and harmful standards and roles of masculinity – instead, they place most of the blame on women. They argue that all women demand men meet these strict criteria and arethereforeresponsiblefortheirmiseries. These communities have even spawned acts of terrorism, including the 2018 van attack in Toronto. While Tate’s philosophies are not exact copies of those expressed on incel forums, they are not dissimilar either. Tate’s emphasis on women as the enemy and the erosion of male dominance resonates with the same entitlement that incel platforms are predicated on – an entitlement to ownership over women, especially their bodies. Unfortunately, Tate’s reach has exceeded the traditional sites incels often occupy, boasting 3.8 million followers on Twitter, the only mainstream social media platform he can still access. In several countries around the world, scores of young men are buying into his ideas.

This has undeniably triggered a new wave of violent misogyny in online spaces as the existing anonymity of the internet enhances the ability to verbally abuse women. But this influx of sexist comments has not stopped at invading social media comments and direct messages – many of these Tate fanboys carry these attitudes offline, empowered by the sheer number of their like-minded peers. This has become a particular issue in classrooms as a sizable portion of his audience is no older than fourteen. Female teachers have taken to online platforms to express their difficulties with managing the barrage of questions, and even disrespectful attitudes, stemming from their students’ adoration of Tate and similar misogynists. What is born online rarely stays there – these influencers have offline consequences for the women who interact with these young followers, and I shudder to think how they will treat the women in their lives as they age, especially romantic partners.

The obvious question is what can we do? How do you prevent boys and young men from stumbling down a path of vile sexism? Perhaps the easiest answer is that parents should monitor their children’s internet activity, using parental controls to restrict content on sites like YouTube, TikTok, and other social media platforms. But a policy of abstinence in this case, as with many others, rarely works. Along with efforts to prevent these influencers from reaching their target audience by pressuring companies to safeguard their users, adults need to understand what material is out there and have sensitive conversations with the young men in their lives. Only by recognizing a destructive pattern can you stop it, and this issue cannot be left to fester. As women, we often exhaust ourselves trying to explain to men the many nefarious ways sexism creeps into our lives when they fail to recognize it. Unfortunately, Tate adds yet another burden to the growing pile. But men are also on the hook for these conversations – when Tate’s fanboys refuse to take women seriously, it is up to their male leaders to lead them away from his rot. These discussions are as long as they are draining, but they need to be had lest we be left to reap the consequences years down the line.