Millions of men admire Andrew Tate for his misogynistic views, even though he was accused of rape and human trafficking and has a webcam business in which he allegedly forces women to perform sex acts. He’s a loud voice in the “manosphere” who speaks up for men who feel otherwise unseen.
Hannah Pearl Davis, “the female Andrew Tate,” does the same thing, in theory. Pearl has gone viral for absurd comments she has made about women, giving Tate and his sympathizers a token female who also think women are less valuable than men. Pearl told Piers Morgan that the comparison to Tate (an abuser who calls women “a means to an end,” mind you) is a compliment.
It’s disheartening to see Pearl’s platform grow because she’s bound to attract subsets of young men who really think that women hate themselves, and of young women who see in her a role model. Like Tate, Pearl makes unsubstantiated, brash claims about feminism.
Pearl bashes women who aren’t virgins because, apparently, “the one thing we’re supposed to be better at [than men] is purity.” The media personality herself is not a virgin, yet she says that a woman who is a nonvirgin on her wedding day is as bad as a man who cheats. Pearl wishes she could go back to when she was a virgin, yet shows no sympathy for women who might feel the same. She claims that a man’s cheating is a woman’s fault.
She doesn’t hate women per se. Pearl just thinks that we shouldn’t vote and are happier as stay-at-home mothers, that divorce should be illegal, and that when unmarried women get pregnant, they themselves are almost always to blame. My favorite exchange involving Pearl was during a podcast in which she was asked to support her argument that women categorically “pick violent men.” She admitted that the claim was speculation, which elicited a hilarious response from the host: “You’re just saying stuff.”
Pearl is right to point out America’s crisis of defining authentic femininity, but, indeed, she just says stuff. There’s no intellectual depth in her discussions of topics of grave importance. The worst part is that her narrow view of womanhood precludes reasonable critiques of feminism — ones that might actually help young women discern what sort of work–life balance is best for them or why purity is a virtue.
Women, on the topic of ourselves, deserve to be taken seriously. Especially when we grow older and consider starting families, women face sincere confusion about how to be industrious without letting work consume personal life. We want to know how best to bridge the gap between career and family. The Pearl persona, which almost has to be a joke, doesn’t help.
If we’re to pursue the good life, women like Pearl won’t be our advocates. If we’re to value virtue, women like Pearl, who are quick to shame, cannot be our models.
This chick is just saying stuff. Don’t listen.