(Warning: References of sexual harassment ahead)
Well, I was about to finish another piece about another internet personality when this subject came about, specifically on TikTok (I'm in that rabbit hole of an app now, might as well follow me on that and also my Instagram), about a British American kickboxing champion, resides in Romania, supposedly built himself from the ground up to become what he is today, a multi-billionaire internet personality. He appears in every podcast you can think of, but we have yet to see him on Joe Rogan's. That would be awesome.
But enough about the supposed coat tailing done by yours truly here, let's get to know the man himself. What we have here is Emory Andrew Tate III, or Andrew Tate, a. k. a Cobra Tate as we know him now. He was born on the 14th of December 1986, surprisingly, in Chicago, Illinois, USA. There is not much info about his family or his upbringing aside from the fact that he spent his childhood in Luton, England, but one thing is for sure, that he is of African American and British descent, the former from his father. While his mother is unknown, but we do know that he has a brother, Tristan Tate, another kickboxer who appeared in Shipwrecked: The Island, and a sister, Janine Tate. His father, Emory Tate Jr, was a chess player who won the USAF Championship three times and defeated several grandmasters during his career. He is currently resided in Bucharest, Romania with Tristan, while also known to be resided in Luton, where his mother (supposedly) came from.
If you look at Andrew Tate now, you wouldn't notice that behind all of the wealth, this man was a three-time kickboxing champion, with a (noted) record of 4 wins (3KOs) and 3 losses. He also tried his hands at MMA, with one amateur bout and a pro bout, all of which he won. In fact, his only pro MMA bout happened at the Ultimate Warrior Challenge 13, where he finished Shane Kavanagh with a knockout inside 3 minutes in the first round. It's a shame that he didn't fight two or three more MMA fights, he could have been in the UFC by now. His first taste of combat sport was in 2005. After scoring major victories over former Super-cruiserweight British Champions Ollie Green and Mo Karbo, Tate challenged Paul Randall for the vacant ISKA (acronym for International Sport Karate Association) English Kickboxing Light-cruiserweight title. Tate won his first ISKA Kickboxing title stopping Randall in the fifth round of their bout in Derby on 25 April 2009. Tate later scored a few more crushing victories and won the IKF (International Kickboxing Federation) British Cruiserweight title against Daniel Hughes with a devastating first-round KO, then on 19 March 2011, he fought for the first time for ISKA world title in France. Andrew lost the fight for the vacant ISKA world Full-Contact light heavyweight championship to Jean Luc Benoit on points after 12 rounds, however, he contested the results stating that he was the true winner.
Due to the fight being so closely matched, three months later they had rematch in Luton, England, and this time Tate became champion defeating Benoit via spectacular KO in round 8 of the scheduled 12 rounds. He lost a close battle for the It’s Showtime 85MAX world title against champion Sahak Parparyan on 12 May 2012 in Kortrijk, Belgium on points. On 2 December 2012 Tate participated in Enfusion 3: Trial of the Gladiators reality final tournament, to determine #1 kickboxer of the world in -85 kg category at that time. He qualified for tournament in August 2011 in Ohrid, Macedonia stopping Sammy Masa by second-round KO and Adnan Omeragić by first-round KO. He scored an easy victory in semifinals knocking out Ritchie Hocking with punches in the first round, but surprisingly lost in the final via first round flying knee KO from Franci Grajš, who fought hard battle in semifinal against Sahak Parparyan.
Tate avenged a 2011 loss to Vincent Petitjean and won his second ISKA world title in twelve rounds of two minutes. Fight was held in Châteaurenard, France on 9 March 2013 with Tate taking ISKA World Full-Contact Light Cruiserweight Championship via split decision. Andrew defended title one year later, also on Power Trophy event, stopping Cyril Vetter early in the first round. After taking four victories in Enfusion Live ring during 2013 over David Radeff, Marino Schouten, Marlon Hunt and Laszlo Szabo, Tate participated in a four-man tournament to determine Enfusion Live -85 kg World Champion, alongside Mirko Cingel, Jiří Žák and Rustam Guseinov. Tournament was held in Žilina, Slovakia on April 26, 2014, Tate lost in semifinals to local fighter and tournament winner, Miroslav Cingel, via unanimous decision. Despite losing in the semifinals of tournament for Enfusion Live -85 kg championship Tate got opportunity to fight for Enfusion Live -90 kg championship against kickboxing veteran Wendell Roche on 28 June 2014. Andrew won the title in second round, becoming the second fighter that stopped Roche in his 200-fight career.
After his kickboxing days, he tried his luck at influencer marketing. He set up his own website cobratate.com with his brother Tristan, where he offers financial and life advices in the form of "The War Room". This space works by using online profiles to steer traffic to his website offering training courses on getting rich and "male-female interactions". According to the website, he operates a webcam studio using girlfriends as employees. Another one of Tate's products is his Hustlers' University program, supposedly an online course on how to better manage their financials. Aside from the website, he also appears in podcasts discussing various topics ranging from religion, relationships, even politics. What sets him apart is his stances on some of these issues. He is known as "The King of Toxic Masculinity" by stating multiple times that women are inherently belongs to men, and often references his girlfriends as "his female."
Of course, with the state of today's society, Tate instantly came under fire for his comments. One of such occasion was at the heels of the 2017 Harvey Weinstein scandal, where the kickboxing champion posted series of tweets claiming that women should "bear some responsibility" from being raped. His reasoning being that the women in question "put themselves in position to be raped." He also justifies some forms of harassment like catcalling, calling it as a "normal male behavior." He is also once under investigation for human trafficking and physical harassment, the latter of which cost him his participation on the UK reality series Big Brother. He is also downplaying mental health issues, stating on one occasion that “depression isn’t real.” He claimed that depression “is not a clinical disease,” but instead “it is a circumstance which they must change.” His views on women, and relationship on a whole, made him an unexpected idol for the involuntary celibacy (incel) community.
One aspect of him that has been heavily scrutinized is his two online programs being The War Room and Hustler's University. One source alleged that both of his supposed "online course" is in fact, a pyramid Multi-Level Marketing scheme involving the Tate brothers convincing impressionable boys to invest onto their courses, supposedly teaching them the basics of stock trading, finance, and even cryptocurrency. In his website, every single member of The War Room has their face either blurred or pixelated, except for Andrew and Tristan. This has the implication of secrecy about this group.
But what shocks me the most (in a good way, I admit), is his views on religion. Since he resides in Bucharest, he aligns himself to the Orthodox branch of Christianity. He explicitly stated this whenever the religion card is being brought up. He often shares his stories of donating thousands of dollars to the church and having church friends, but he has a deep admiration to the Islamic faith. His main reasoning of this admiration is the Muslims' willingness to stand and defend their religious and life principles based on the teachings of the Quran and Prophet Muhammad PBUH. He even went as far as stating that the religion of Islam could fix practically every problem faced by the Western society. I have to admit, there is one quote from Tate that made me instantly hooked up to his principles. And as an Indonesian Muslim myself, I agree wholeheartedly to this quote. He once told a story about why he branded Islam as the most intolerant (in a good sense) religion on Earth. He then went on to tell this story about Christianity being deprived of its core values all because of today's Christians are so tolerant, they are willing to accepting a gay pastor (this is done without the intention of discrediting the LGBT community). By his words (I'm just paraphrasing this, as this is not his exact quote), he can wear a T-shirt saying any heinous things about Jesus Christ, and no Christian will bat an eye, but if he does the same with Prophet Muhammad PBUH, he wouldn't get past the alley without suffering a hellish beatdown to the point of almost dying at best. His way of expressing this is pure poetry. "If you are tolerant of everything, you stand for nothing." Emory Andrew Tate III, you officially have my respect and admiration.
So, what do we know about Andrew Tate? He is a former kickboxing champion, he has two online course program teaching things about relationship and finance, he appears in a lot of podcasts talking about multiple topics and sparking huge interests across social media realm. He is also known as a man known for his unorthodox views on man and woman relationship, favoring traditional and conservative values over progressive ones to the point of getting a lot of heat because of it. Although being a Christian, he admires the religion of Islam, and often states his fascination to the faith. Of course, I can agree to some of Tate's remarks and disagree with him on others, but the former champion is rising into virality for his quotes and attitudes towards society. And I have to admit that he is a damn good influencer.
"If you are tolerant of everything, you stand for nothing."
-Andrew Tate
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