In 2016, ex-kickboxer, Andrew Tate, gained traction after being removed from the show, Big Brother. This action was taken after a video surfaced in which Tate appeared to hit a woman. Both, the woman and Tate, have denied any foul play, though the effects of the removal were sustained when he was banned from Twitter.

“Next point, if you put yourself in a position to be raped, you must bear some responsibility,” said Tate, in a now-deleted Tweet.

He gained notoriety and a loyal following on social media apps like TikTok, where the hashtag #AndrewTate has amassed over 12.7 billion views. TikTok’s audience is composed almost entirely of impressionable teenagers and young adults. The fact that someone like Tate, whose brand is based on upholding toxic masculinity, is becoming a sort-of-icon for a portion of Gen-Z is dangerous and has serious repercussions.

When young male teenagers view Tate, they are unduly fed misogyny. Tate’s target audience is at an age where these ideas act as catalysts for violent misogynistic and homophobic views. His videos speak of what “real” men should act like and, on multiple occasions, have said things that do nothing but spread hate.

In a particularly spiteful YouTube interview, he said that women were “intrinsically lazy” and added: “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.”

YouTube recently banned Andrew Tate’s account for violating multiple policies, including its hate speech policy. It’s crucial that these steps are taken by social media sites in order to prevent more of these ideologies from reaching a larger audience. While it’s easy for representatives of these sites to say that they are against anti-women content, they must take action against it before the situation gets out of hand. In the weeks preceding Tate’s social media ban, women all over the internet pushed for his accounts to be removed.

TikTok creator, Drew Afualo, posted a video to her account saying, “Men like that don’t want to learn. They don’t even really want to debate. They just want a platform to spew their venom… I don’t put them on my podcast. I don’t platform them whatsoever.”

By the time any action had been taken, it had already been too late. This situation showcases the double standard of sites like TikTok. It took months to ban Tate’s truly hazardous content, yet it swiftly took down and censored harmless posts made by women. Sites must be committed to the true protection of women, and, in order to do this, they must listen to women in the first place. Taking down the accounts of women who are simply using social media will do nothing but amplify the platform for creators like Andrew Tate.