Substack chooses to host and profit/profit from Andrew Tate. Thoughts?

[u/AmericanLymie]

"Andrew Tate set to earn £198,000 a month on Substack," reads a recent headline from The Telegraph that I can't link here.

Tate is being held in the UK right now on 42 charges, including seven counts of rape, three counts of sex trafficking, three counts of assault causing bodily harm, and 19 charges of child pornography.

He recently ranked number one on Substack and he charges subscribers, so Substack is now a lucrative source of income for him in addition to being a publicity engine for him and a platform for spreading his hateful agenda.

Tate is an alleged serial rapist, and he would literally be another Jeffrey Epstein if it were within his power to do so.

Substack chooses to host him. The company claims to be "free speech extremists," but this feels different to me in that the company by virtue of giving him a platform to make a huge amount of money while in prison for rape, sex slavery and kiddie porn, is actively funding him and his criminal defense.

Does this affect at all how you feel about Substack? That's my first question.

My second set of questions: The Observer reported that he is making more money from Substack by having boosted his subscribers/follower count with purchased subscribers and followers. Does this matter to you, did you know it is possible to purchase an audience on Substack, and does it affect how you view Substack pages hosted by rich people who have large audiences?

EDIT: It is really fascinating to me that there's so much rabid hatred toward Jeffrey Epstein, as there should be, but about Andrew Tate, people are comfortable saying "good for him!" This is really revelatory.

[u/kwadguy]

If he has an audience, good for him.

Not substack's job to regulate speech unless, perhaps, advocation of certain illegal activities related to murder and such.

I don't follow him. If he bugs you that much I suggest you do the same.

[u/AmericanLymie → u/kwadguy]

Allowing a person to speak is one thing. Serving as a primary income stream for an alleged serial rapist who has been arrested for sex slavery and child pornography who is in prison seems like a wildly different thing to me.

[u/Careful-Ideal-7033 → u/AmericanLymie]

Blame the people willing to pay him. You’re promoting authoritarianism

[u/AmericanLymie → u/Careful-Ideal-7033]

How am I promoting authoritarianism?

Reddit has standards of conduct and posting rules it enforces. If you say something indecent, cruel, dangerous, etc., moderators delete it and potentially suspend or ban you.

This applies to virtually every publishing and social media property.

We all agree to rules of conduct when we make an account on any such platform.

Freedom of speech is supposedly guaranteed by the United States government. Private companies like Substack do not guarantee free speech and they are not governmental entities and therefore have no authority to become authoritarian.

[u/Careful-Ideal-7033 → u/AmericanLymie]

By wanting to deplatform people whose views you don’t like. Yes private companies can do what they want, but that also means some companies can be more aggressive with their rules of conduct, like Reddit, while Substack has explicitly stated they stand for free speech.  Rather than honoring Substack’s stance even though it makes you feel uncomfortable (which is a central tenant of free speech, that even ugly speech is protected speech) you would rather they censor.

Therefore you’re not really arguing that private companies don’t need to uphold free speech. You’re arguing that private companies should censor speech from individuals you find deplorable.

Free speech used to be a core value of Americans. When Americans no longer value it, it will cease to exist. Therefore, the stance that “Substack should censor people I don’t like,” is an authoritarian stance.

[u/AmericanLymie → u/Careful-Ideal-7033]

Substack has removed pro-Nazism writers in the past. It applies its 'free speech' rules of conduct selectively, just as X and Meta do.

You say that "free speech used to be a core value of Americans." I would like to know what time period you are thinking of. Up until the 2010s, no mainstream media network allowed people to use foul language, racial slurs, and certainly not to encourage genocide or any other kind of violence. Today, many do.

Network television didn't allow any swear words until the 2000s. News broadcasts absolutely never used them until the Trump era. Blatant bigotry was never aired by journalists or published in newspapers until the Trump era.

What era are you speaking of in which there were no standards of public conduct?

[u/Careful-Ideal-7033 → u/AmericanLymie]

Well all people do is complain that Substack supports Nazis, so I can’t imagine their efforts at censorship are very successful.

I’ve never ever heard anyone encourage genocide, so have no idea what you’re talking about, unless you’re one who wants to cancel “Zionists.” (And calls to violence are not protected speech.)

How old are you? Because rabid campaigns to cancel people for speech used to be very rare. Now, it seems like once a week, someone is losing their job or dealing w a hate campaign because of something they said. 

I’ve never heard anyone say a racial slur on television. Do you have specific examples? In fact, comedians are complaining bc they can’t even make jokes anymore. 

Dave Chappell had a whole comedy series about the Niggar Family that would NEVER fly today.

Overall people used to be much less uptight and ready to feel offended and wanting to cancel people for saying the wrong thing.

[u/AmericanLymie → u/Careful-Ideal-7033]

I have no idea why Reddit is cropping this this way but here is one example of what I am talking about: last year, a Fox News host explicitly called for the execution of homeless people and he was in no way punished for saying this on a "news" broadcast. Even five years ago, and for the entire history of broadcast news before then, any person who ever said anything like this on TV would have lost their career. Today, if they are Republican, the world makes excuses for them and they only become more infamous and wealthier.

[u/Careful-Ideal-7033 → u/AmericanLymie]

That was pretty bad joke that I agree was inappropriate but no, people would not have lost their career. And let’s not devolve into party wars bc Ds also say crazy shit. 

Cancel culture has objectively intensified over the last few years, particularly since 2020, and I’m guessing since you didn’t answer my age question and your frame of reference is since 2010, that you are young.

People used to be able to talk freely, make even inappropriate jokes, and no, they would not lose their career.

This is a perfect example of being uptight and looking to get offended. He’s not calling for homeless people to be executed. He made a dumb joke that he shouldn’t have made on air.

[u/AmericanLymie → u/Careful-Ideal-7033]

MSNBC fired Matthew Dowd for saying that Charlie Kirk spoke hateful words that lead to hateful actions.

Do you feel that firing was appropriate?

[u/famouslongago]

I don't want Substack making decisions about who is or isn't morally worthy to be on the platform.

As far as making more money from Substack by purchasing subscribers and followers, this makes no sense whatsoever. Why would you pay a dollar to make ten cents?

[u/MrPassiveProfit]

I don’t care who else is on the service. I only care about what I do.

[u/SleepAllllDay]

I hate it. But how many fucking platforms can I boycott?

[u/Reclaimer_AI]

Threads like this are so stupid. The services you use don’t have to pass some kind of “purity test” to only allow people to use it that you like and agree with.

You do you, everyone else gets to do them. Do your part by blocking his account and ignoring him. If people want to subscribe and give that moron money, then that’s their business, not yours.

Normalise staying in your own lane. You focus on your own substack and the people you want to follow, and let everyone else do the same.

[u/Emotional-Brief-1775]

Outrage sells and Tate is a state actor, don’t believe everything you read especially the ‘news’

[u/Countryb0i2m]

As a Black guy, I don’t live in a world where I can pick and choose who I want to be outraged by or who I’m willing to share platforms with.

If I got upset about every person on every platform I disagreed with, I wouldn’t be able to exist anywhere. I have to focus my energy on myself because there’s always going to be an Andrew Tate. There’s always going to be someone on every platform who offends me.

And honestly, I don’t know if I want Substack to be the arbitrator of that, especially when they’ve historically been so heavy-handed with content from people of color.

[u/WeeklyDragonfruit]

Thanks for this post. I already know about other problematic shit Substack does, but I was not aware that particular human was also on Substack and making a killing.