Not being well versed in popular culture, I had never actually heard of Andrew Tate before his Twitter exchange with Greta Thunberg made news headlines last week. I was in a discussion group where the topic of the tweets came up and one of the participants enlightened me on who he was and the odious views he espoused, adding that he has become ‘the Jordan Peterson for the incels’.
Rebecca Solnit goes beneath the surface of the Twitter exchange.
There’s a direct association between machismo and the refusal to recognize and respond appropriately to the climate catastrophe. It’s a result of versions of masculinity in which selfishness and indifference – individualism taken to its extremes – are defining characteristics, and therefore caring and acting for the collective good is their antithesis.
“Men resist green behavior as unmanly” is the headline for a 2017 story on the phenomenon. Machismo and climate denial, as well as alliance with the fossil fuel industry, is a package deal for the right, from the “rolling coal” trucks whose plumes of dark smoke are meant as a sneer at climate causes to Republicans in the US who have long opposed nearly all climate action (and are major recipients of oil money).
…Tate is part of a huge network of far-right men online and he’d been banned from most social media platforms. Elon Musk’s Twitter let him back on not long before the tweet that was heard around the world.
…Beyond the entertainment value of what transpired over the past few days is a serious reminder of the intersection between machismo, misogyny, hostility to climate action and climate science, and the dank underworld of rightwing characters like Tate recruiting white boys and young men to their views.
Almost immediately after the tweets became news, Tate and his brother were arrested in Romania over allegations that they were involved in sex trafficking. There were some suggestions that he had staged the arrest in order to get publicity, which is what trolls like him crave, and what he got with his attempt at mocking Thunberg’s concerns about the dangers of catastrophic climate change. But it appears that the arrest is the real thing and he has been initially detained for 30 days.
A Romanian court agreed late on Friday to extend the detention of Andrew Tate by 30 days, after the divisive internet personality was arrested on suspicion of human trafficking, rape and forming an organised crime group.
The former professional kickboxer and his brother Tristan were detained on Thursday for an initial 24 hours alongside two Romanian suspects, prosecutors from the anti-organised crime unit said after raiding their properties in Bucharest.
…Prosecutors said the Tate brothers had been under criminal investigation since April.
“The four suspects … appear to have created an organised crime group with the purpose of recruiting, housing and exploiting women by forcing them to create pornographic content meant to be seen on specialised websites for a cost,” the prosecutors said in a statement late on Thursday.
…Tate gained notoriety for misogynistic comments and hate speech. He has said women are partially responsible for being raped and that they belong to men.
I can see why he would be a hero to incels.
It’s true up to a point but there is also another big factor. A big chunk of this is also the far right opposing anything the liberals support and then coming up with some rationalization for it.
I thought Jordan Peterson was the Jordan Peterson for the incels.
I think that’s a rather Western/Anglophone-chauvinist insult to Romanian law enforcement, to suggest they’d been played like that as though they’re some banana-republic bunch of clowns.
Mmm.
It’s one thing to claim that machismo (“maleness” in Spanish) draws one to climate change denialism, and another to say that it causes it.
And yet another to say:
“from the “rolling coal” trucks whose plumes of dark smoke are meant as a sneer at climate causes […]”
And yet another to claim that those people don’t accept the change.
I myself know at least one person who is quite informed, but who just does not give one single fuck about it. He”ll be dead before it really matters, and he’s not poor at all.
(I don’t refer to myself, I hasten to add 🙂 )
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Anyway, more like the concept of ‘toxic masculinity’ than of ‘machismo’, which at least in its original incarnation included concepts of honour.
(No honour to be seen in this case)
@ 3 Morales
He literally was taunting a person famous as a climate change activist about how big his “emissions” were, you dope.
Your friends are dictionary sociopaths. Gosh, who would have guessed.
Bobiferous:
So he was taunting a person, not climate change. By your own claim.
(Did you imagine I somehow denied that? I was actually referring to the OP and its quotations and its claims)
I haven’t failed to notice how you purport to believe me when that belief puts me in a bad light (as you see it), and you likewise purport to not believe me when that belief would put me in a better light. And you do like to fantasise about me.
(Mind you, how someone can supposedly be both a dictionary sociopath and a personal friend is left unstated; think about it: if they were truly a sociopath, they would definitionally be incapable of friendship)
“Mind you, how someone can supposedly be both a dictionary sociopath and a personal friend is left unstated; think about it: if they were truly a sociopath, they would definitionally be incapable of friendship”
Not a contradiction. That person being a sociopath does not prevent other people such as yourself regarding them as a friend.
Holms, I see we’re back to talking about me and mine, not about the topic at hand. Seems to happen a lot, with a certain subset of commenters.
Ah well, I know I am remarkable and notable. Only to be expected.
As if I don’t know a true friend with whom I grew up and have known for… um, like 45+ years now.
Anyway, I didn’t say it was a contradiction, did I?
Again: “how someone can supposedly be both a dictionary sociopath and a personal friend is left unstated”.
(And, since I notice your imprecision, I’ll just note here that there is a difference between someone being a friend and someone being regarded as being a friend)
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I also note how you don’t dispute what I actually initially wrote, but rather your interpretation of my retort to my fanboi.
In response to SBob’s claim that your friend is a sociopath, you stated “if they were truly a sociopath, they would definitionally be incapable of friendship”. I pointed out that this was in error; their being a sociopath does not prevent you viewing that person as a friend. A simple error, yet here we go again.
Also Sbob was the one to describe this other as a sociopath, I made no claim on that point.
Well, Holms. Here we go again.
As always, it is actually your mistake; I wrote he is a friend, not that he is not a friend but that I perceive him as one. You can be as stubborn about it as you wish, but the words are there for anyone to read.
No, but you outright refuse to believe my claim that he is my true friend with whom I have interacted over the decades. Which is kinda stupid, since the proposition was about a speculated sociopath actually being a friend, not about a sociopath being only perceived as a friend.
(Did my reference to your imprecision not make it past your jaundice filter?)
At no point did I express disbelief in that.
Of course you did, Holms. It’s futile to attempt to deny it.
(At #6 and at #8, so far)
Neither of those are expressions of disbelief that you count this person a friend. Tilt at this windmill all you like, I’ll see you the next time you totally overreact to a minor correction.
Totally over-react? Heh.
A correction? Heh.
Sure, Holms, I get why you bluster as you must so as to hold on to what tatters of self-esteem you retain. Futile and transparent as it may be.
Point being, you did not write something like “it’s possible to be a friend and be a sociopath”, did you? What you wrote amounts to “it’s possible to be seen a friend and be a sociopath”.
But fine, since you now claim you don’t deny he is my friend, you must perforce accept that sociopaths can have good friends, since the alternative is that my friend is not a sociopath, which apparently would be unconscionable to you, right? 😉
Heh. You mean, point out the vacuity of your bluster and the correctness of my position. I quite recently gave it to you straight, you chose to characterise that as “venting” instead of being informative and laying out the reality for your apprehension.
(But hey, you want to be a windmill, then sure. Round and round you go)