Controversial online influencer and self-described misogynist Andrew Tate has been banned from Meta platforms Instagram and Facebook.
The former kickboxer and reality TV star was removed for violating Meta policies “on dangerous organizations and individuals”, the company confirmed by email.
Tate did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Tate first rose to prominence after appearing on the TV show Big Brother in 2016, when he was removed from the series after a video of him beating a woman outside the show surfaced.
Since then, he has garnered backlash for his posts across social media, which domestic abuse charities have called “extreme misogyny”. He stated on Twitter in 2017 that women belong in the home and that rape victims “bear responsibility” for their attack, after which Twitter permanently banned him from the platform.
Tate has grown a following for his advice videos to men, many of them veering into sexist territory. On one YouTube video, Tate described himself as “absolutely a misogynist”. He said: “I’m a realist and when you’re a realist you’re sexist. There’s no way you can be rooted in reality and not be sexist.”
Tate was a vocal supporter of former president Donald Trump and has appeared on a number of rightwing podcasts, including shows like Infowars, hosted by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones. More recently Tate has become “impossible to avoid” on social media, and at the time of his ban from Meta platforms he had more than 4.7m followers on Instagram.
The influencer is still active on TikTok, where he has more than 420,000 followers and his videos have been seen more than 12.7bn times. The UK advocacy group Hope Not Hate called Tate a “dangerous misogynist” and called on more social media companies to deplatform him.
TikTok did not immediately respond to a request for comment regarding whether it had plans to take action against his account.
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