Ball in Elon Musk’s court as Andrew Tate sues Australians over cult-busting X posts | David Penberthy

Their seedy business model targets your kids and they’re lashing out at Australians who won’t stand for it, writes David Penberthy.

The backlash by big tech and its supporters against government regulation has at its centre a free speech absolutism which insists that discussion should be unfettered and beyond the reach of the state.

It’s an assertion to which many of us are instinctively drawn.

The idea that a team of faceless bureaucrats can decide what people can and cannot say jars with freedom of expression. It has an obvious Orwellian quality.

Where things get complicated is when you consider what some people are using their freedom of expression to express, and the ages of those who are exposed to their sentiments.

Which brings as to Andrew Tate.

Tate is the pin-up for what’s known as the manosphere. He’s the bare-chested, cigar-smoking, former kickboxing champion whose views on women can be summarised by some of his own quotes.

’Manosphere’ influencer Andrew Tate and Tristan Tate arrive in the United States after a travel ban on them was liftedin February. Picture: Alon Skuy/Getty Images/AFP

“You can’t be responsible for a dog if it doesn’t obey you or a woman that doesn’t obey you.”

And this classy offering: “18 to 19-year-old women are more attractive than 25-year-olds because they’ve been through less dick.”

Tate’s warped views are the subject of an online portal called The Real World which is framed around a bogus “university”. It has amassed around 250,000 subscribers worldwide.

Members pay a flat $50 a month but are offered upgrades and one-off specials costing as much as $8000 to take part in exclusive chatrooms with Tate himself.

Tate’s business interests have now come asunder on account of serious criminal charges which he and his brother Tristan are facing in Romania.

The pair have been charged among other things with rape, human trafficking, running an organised crime ring and money laundering.

Not only do they insist they are innocent, they are taking legal action for defamation against a group of a dozen-odd online campaigners who have been exposing the inner workings of The Real World.

Nathan Pope, the activist being sued by accused rapist and human trafficker Andrew Tate. Picture by Matt Turner

Two of these people are Australians, Nathan Livingston and Adelaide YouTuber Nathan Pope, while many of the other campaigners are anonymous or go by online Twitter pseudonyms such as @crayonmurders.

I have spoken to Nathan Pope a couple of times now and visited him at his home. He is a smart and driven 36-year-old who has come to know many of the young men who were sucked into The Real World, in many cases losing thousands of dollars before realising their mistake. Pope likens The Real World to an online cult, and has established a significant following as a YouTuber under the name Gadget440, where he posts videos exposing Tate’s empty promises of easy money and easy women.

The really disturbing thing is that many of the “men” who have been sucked into this sexually-charged scheme aren’t men at all. They’re kids, as young as 10, 11, 12 years of age, barely-pubescent boys who are being told that women are subservient sex objects and that feminism is the enemy of male freedom.

This is how Tate made so much money, leeching subscription money off teenagers, while also polluting their heads with the garbage that was documented so powerfully in the British drama Adolescence about the dark world of the manosphere.

“I am 100 per cent convinced that this is a cult and that Tate is a cult leader,” Pope told me.

“That’s part of my motivation. I regularly have weekly or daily comments from people on my videos that my posts have helped them break free and wake up.

“I never want to be judgmental about his followers when they attack me because they are victims of a cult. I talk to some of these young lads who have been following The Real World and when they do finally break free I feel like I am talking to someone who is suffering from a trauma. It’s not until they escape that they can see it.”

When I met Pope last month he told me that he and the other anti-Tate campaigners believed the case brought against them might have been a try-on to cow them into silence.

However, in the last fortnight Tate’s lawyers, who are bringing the legal action in Florida, have put in a subpoena request to X (formerly Twitter) to obtain all data and personal information relating to the online campaigners.

This is in keeping with tactics used previously by the Tates who have tried to expose the identities of their critics, who in some cases have been harassed online by Tate’s followers and supporters. One female victim had her personal information repeatedly posted online by supporters.

South African tech billionaire and X owner Elon Musk has said he’ll fight for any X user sued over a post. No word from him yet on Nathan Pope’s legal row with Andrew Tate. Picture: Brendan Smialowski/AFP

Pope and his fellow online campaigners note that X’s owner Elon Musk has pledged to bankroll the court cases of any X user who is sued for defamation over a post on X. They are wondering whether Musk will come to their aid to defend them against attempts by the Tates to have their details revealed and in the case of the anonymous users their identities exposed.

It will be interesting to see if Musk stands by his vow.

But there are a few bigger issues that emerge from this dreadful story.

The first is that it challenges any laissez-faire acceptance of free speech principles. I don’t see how or why freedom of speech should extend to enabling a business model which targets young people with such warped content to make huge profits.

The second is that it’s a reminder to all of us parents that mobile phones and iPads are not childminding devices. As per the TV show Adolescence, how appalling that any of our boys could be left alone in their bedroom at night with their minds being developed by the likes of Andrew Tate.

And third, if America’s “tech bros” come knocking on Canberra’s door demanding a windback of our age limits on the use of social media, all this would seem a powerful explanation as to precisely why these limits have been introduced.