What’s going on?
Andrew Tate, an American British social media influencer and former professional kickboxer, was seen making this hand gesture when he was arrested in Romania on charges including human trafficking and rape.
Tate’s brother Tristan, who was also arrested at the end of 2022 as well as two Romanian suspects, was seen making a similar hand gesture too.
Videos by VICE
The Tate brothers have been seen making the hand gesture several times in the past in videos and photo shoots. Andrew Tate has likened the gesture to a “power-up,” and something that his father, the late chess master Emory Tate, used to do before matches.
Now Andrew Tate’s supporters are copying the sign to demonstrate their support for him.
Why is this a problem?
Andrew Tate has built up a huge following of teenage boys and young men, many of whom will have been introduced to his extremely controversial views by viral videos on YouTube, TikTok and Instagram.
While some of the content Andrew Tate is known for is connected to business and accruing personal wealth, a lot also depicts him attempting to normalise or promote misogyny.
In Romania, authorities are expanding an investigation into Tate after raiding several of his properties and seizing his fleet of luxury cars.
He has been detained on suspicion of human trafficking and rape, which he denies. An appeal to be released from detention was unsuccessful. Tristan Tate also denies the charges against him.
VICE World News revealed earlier this month that Andrew Tate was investigated over allegations of sexual assault and physical abuse in the UK seven years prior to his Romanian arrest – but that UK authorities had declined to prosecute him at the time. Andrew Tate denied the allegations.
What are teachers saying?
Cassie Rattray, a 25-year-old sex educator and content creator in Liverpool, told VICE World News that she has witnessed boys making the gesture and sharing photographs of classes or sports teams performing it.
Rattray said she has led sessions where pupils have told her men are more qualified to talk about sex than women and that “there was no point even in me talking.”
When she taught a session on consent, pupils began laughing and a teenage boy said “if you put yourself in a position to be raped, you must bear some responsibility.”
“I couldn’t believe this was leaving a child’s mouth,” Rattray said. “I looked at the teacher in the room and she just rolled her eyes as if this was an everyday occurrence. When I got home I googled that sentence and it was a direct quote from Andrew Tate.”
The quote appeared in a since-deleted Tweet that ended up getting Andrew Tate banned from Twitter in 2017, although he was reinstated following Elon Musk’s takeover.
Another teacher from the East of England who is being kept anonymous to prevent the school from being identified said that he witnessed two groups of children in school making the hand gesture last week.
A group of 11-year-olds were “very deliberately sitting in a row all doing it with their hands on the desk,” he told VICE World News.”It came across as rude and facetious so I gave them a look and they stopped.”
After 13-year-olds were also seen making the hand gesture, the teacher said “this morning we’ve had specific guidance in school to keep an eye out and deal with it.”
Schools across the UK are currently building bespoke lessons to counteract misogynistic rhetoric espoused by influencers like Andrew Tate.
Tim Squirrel, an extremism expert from the Institute of Strategic Dialogue, told VICE World News: “There’s a two-pronged appeal here. For one, you can show your endorsement of controversial people or beliefs without having to say it outright, allowing you plausible deniability and possibly avoiding consequences like detention or censure.”
“You can also signify that you have hidden knowledge – that you’re aware of what this sign means to you and others around you who are part of the in-group who are in the know, and that’s a very appealing identity marker for children and teenagers.”
He added that teachers shouldn’t be worried by the gesture itself, but more by what it represents. “For women and girls who are around it, that doesn’t really make much of a difference – ‘ironic’ endorsement of violent misogyny is, in many instances, indistinguishable from the real thing and creates an unsafe atmosphere for them.”
“They should absolutely be concerned about children engaging with Tate’s content. Not only does he endorse violent misogyny, based on recent reporting it appears there’s good reason to believe that he has engaged in hideous and brutal violence against women, as well as being an alleged human trafficker.”
Despite measures to improve sex education in the past few years, including making it mandatory in England, VICE World News discovered last year that the UK government had withdrawn almost half of the funding it had promised to train teachers to deliver new curriculums in order to reinvest in “other departmental priorities.”
At least one school in the north of England contacted parents last week to make them aware of the hand gesture as they had observed pupils using it to support Andrew Tate.
The Cumbria Crack, an local online outlet, reported that a communication from the school’s headteacher read: “This has been used by Tate and other individuals on the internet to show support for the views he holds. All staff at QEGS are aware of this hand signal, and we will challenge those who use it. We will also inform parents that this has occurred.”
VICE World News also found evidence from a Discord server associated with Tate’s online courses that a pupil in another school, most likely somewhere in eastern Europe, had taken a photograph of a class of boys also making the same hand gesture.
The pupil is currently subscribed to one of Tate’s paid-for online programmes, which he appears to balance on top of schoolwork.
And what does the hand gesture actually mean?
The shape appears to be taken from the yogic practice of mudras, which are hand gestures believed to help direct energy throughout the body.
The mudra pointing upward is the Uttarabodhi mudra, a position representing enlightenment.
But its triangular shape lends itself to online rumour that it is connected to the baseless Illuminati conspiracy theory, with one Instagram picture of Tristan Tate going viral with comments claiming he was “requesting assistance from the Illuminati.”
Andrew Tate has previously denied the gesture is connected to the conspiracy theory in the same video where he explained why he does it.
“Andrew Tate is not part of the Illuminati, because the Illuminati is not a real organisation,” Squirrel, the extremism expert, added. “Is it dangerous to believe that he is? It’s possible that this might increase his appeal as a member of one secret group fighting against the ‘matrix’ – which is essentially another word for ‘deep state’, or any other secret, entrenched enemy who operates from the shadows.”
“If you believe that Tate is being persecuted, then that can make it hard to level some of the most serious and credible accusations at him – that he’s an alleged human trafficker and rapist – because you can say that these are fake charges that have been made up to silence him. That’s ultimately the most damaging thing, because it prevents his appeal from being dampened and makes him a martyr.”
