Show notes
When Andrew Tate and his brother were arrested for sex trafficking in Romania last month, it was the first I’d heard his name. But my teen daughters knew exactly who he was because, as they told me, most of the Christian teen boys they know enthusiastically follow Andrew Tate online. I soon found out that Tate was the most Googled name in 2022 and he had over 11.6 billion views on his TikTok account before it was banned for violent content. Why would a man like this be attractive to the teen boys and young men in my community and, evidently, around the world? What’s the draw? And what void or need is Tate evidently filling in their lives?
Tate is a British-American former kickboxer who rose to fame by selling his “successful” lifestyle online. His videos and content include nutrition and body-building advice, luxury cars, throngs of women, and training on how to get independently wealthy. Tate’s Hustler University (now known as Join the Real World) trains young mean in all of the above for a monthly fee.
Behind Tate’s ultra-confident facade and obvious worldly fortune lies a dark side. His wealth comes from trafficking women across the US, the UK, and Romania and coercing them to perform sex acts on camera. Tate boasts he’s had as many as 75 women working for him at one time. Romanian authorities allege Tate, his brother, and two other suspects misled their victims “into believing that they intended to enter into a marriage/cohabitation relationship” while transporting them to Romania and later sexually exploiting them with physical violence and coercion. Romanian police said the men forced the women to perform pornographic content via “physical violence and mental coercion,” using “intimidation, constant surveillance, control and the invoking of alleged debts.”
It’s tempting to quickly move past Tate and think he’s history now that he’s in prison. But the bigger question is, why is he so popular? Why are young men drawn to a clearly violent and misogynistic man? And further, for those of us in the Christian community, how can we disciple our sons and brothers away from this kind of content? What better hope can we offer the teen boys and young men in our lives?
To get at the answers to these questions I invited Vince Greenwald onto this bonus episode of All Things. Vince is the director of student ministry at Immanuel Nashville and a student at Covenant Theological Seminary. Vince has also written for the Gospel Coalition and Rooted, which is an organization that comes alongside churches and parents to disciple teens. Obviously as a youth pastor, Vince is more closely connected to young men than I am, and he’s a writer and thinker, so I knew his perspective would be needed in this conversation! He offers excellent socio-cultural and theological insight.
If you are a parent, teacher, youth worker, or someone in the church who loves teens (hint, that should be all of us!), you do not want to miss this episode. While Tate may fall out of fashion very soon, the cultural issues that have led boys and men to follow him will likely remain. We need to be prepared to lean into that. And, finally, here’s the best news and reason we have hope even in the face of darkness like this: Jesus is on his throne, he is good, and he is all-satisfying to those who come to him. Vince does a great job of bringing us back to what’s eternal and true in this conversation. While we must be prepared, we have every reason to hope.
Links mentioned in this episode:
The Death of Porn: Men of Integrity Building a World of Nobility by Ray Ortlund:
Sticky Faith: Everyday Ideas to Build Lasting Faith in Your Kids by Dr. Kara Powell and Dr. Chap Clark:
Cultural Counterfeits: Confronting 5 Empty Promises of Our Age and How We Were Made for So Much More by Jen Oshman
Rooted: Advancing Gospel-Centered Youth Ministry
Vince Greenwald on The Gospel Coalition
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