After hearing her son Spencer Parker repeat misogynist views he’d heard online, worried mum Rachel Parker took action, and has now urged fellow parents to follow her lead
Mum says her son was ‘red-pilled’ by Andrew Tate
A mother has spoken out about her horror after learning her teenage son had been ‘red-pilled’ – just like the central character of Jamie in Adolescence.
When her son, Spencer Parker, was just 11 years old, worried mum Rachel Parker began to notice that he’d started repeating misogynistic views, telling her “women are gold diggers”.
Rachel, 33, immediately challenged the schoolboy, who is now 15, asking him exactly where he’d heard that sort of language. He responded by explaining the subject had been discussed in Andrew Tate videos that had popped up on his YouTube content feed.
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Rachel, from Mansfield, Nottinghamshire, said: “One day, he randomly said, ‘Well, women are just gold diggers anyway’. I remember thinking, ‘That’s weird for an 11-year-old to say,’ so I asked him where he’d heard that, and he told me that he’d seen some men talking about it online.
“He watched normal videos of people playing video games, and then out of nowhere, this information started leaking in. Because he watched one video of it, another one came in, and then he liked that, and then another one came in.”
According to Rachel, she has had to intervene in conversations as recently as a year ago on topics such as women “respecting their bodies” and men being blamed for “everything”. She shared: “We would talk about other things that came up in these videos, such as women ‘not respecting themselves ‘and women being on OnlyFans.
“At that age, he didn’t even know what [OnlyFans] was, but he jumped on the hate train. At one point, he said he was sick of everyone ‘blaming men for everything’. Even as recently as about a year ago, I was out on a walk with him, and he said something about ‘body count’, and we deconstructed that together as well.”
During one of these conversations, Rachel explained to Spencer that he shouldn’t be offended by critical words used against men if he himself isn’t behaving badly. The beauty industry worker expressed how she’d felt upset to see Spencer “turning his back” on women, particularly given that he grew up without a father figure in his life.
Rachel further struggled to comprehend where her son’s frustrations came from, given that female figures, including his grandmother and aunties, had played a key role in raising him. She recalled: “It kind of threw me for a loop because I have raised him to be aware of feminist issues and aware of the system that he lives in.
“He mentioned watching Andrew Tate to me. I never squashed any part of his personality to make him feel like he should have needed to find community in a place like that. He was having to deny his own lived experience because he was essentially raised by women.
“His dad’s not around so it’s been just me and my family that have raised him. My sisters, my mum, my grandmas, they’ve all been really involved in his upbringing. All of a sudden, he was turning his back on us and picking these beliefs up. It upset me more than anything, and I wondered what I had done.”
Reflecting on how she handled the situation, Rachel continued: “If I would have ignored that, that would have been the wrong thing to do. Misogyny is everywhere anyway, but recognising it and realising this is something I’ve got to tackle was probably one of the hardest things I’ve done. It was the most important thing I’ve done as a parent as well.”
And it would appear her efforts have paid off in a significant way. Just a few weeks ago, Rachel overheard Spencer telling one of his friends off after he referred to his mother in a disrespectful manner. Expressing pride in the young man her son is now becoming, Rachel revealed: “He has now gotten to a point where he sees him [Andrew Tate] as a caricature of the red pill movement. He once liked him, but now he thinks he’s a joke.
“He is now in a mindset of not wanting to be like those men he saw in those videos. It was probably a couple of weeks back now that he was sat playing on his PlayStation with his friends. One of them said a slur that means whore, and my son jumped on it straight away.
“He was like, ‘You do not talk about your mum like that. She deserves respect because she brought you into this world’. He told him it was disgusting and suggested he go and apologise for saying that. I was really proud of him for that, it shows growth.”
In light of Netflix’s powerful new series Adolescence, Rachel is now warning parents of ‘red-pilling’ signs while advising them on how to tackle any concerning opinions. The term ‘red-pilled’ refers to a scene in The Matrix (1999) where the lead character, Neo, is offered the choice to take the red pill, which would lead him to understand the illusion of the reality he’s always known.
In Adolescence, it is explained that the ‘red pill’ signifies a supposed awakening to the ‘truth’ about gender issues rooted in online misogynist ideology. Rachel and Spencer have watched the first two episodes together, and plan on watching the rest soon.
According to Rachel: “He doesn’t normally put his phone down, but he put his phone down to watch it [Adolescence], and he was really engaged with it. It was emotional for sure and I worry about children of this generation anyway and not just the girls, the boys as well.
“I think watching it made me wonder, ‘Where is this going to stop? Where does it end? How far does it go?’ Don’t let the fear of being judged stop you from getting the help you need for your child. The important thing when it comes to starting these conversations is to just start them.”
Spencer added: “Watching Adolescence, it was very interesting to see how it plays out when a boy is exposed to that stuff online and has to experience the social expectations of having a girlfriend, which is why I focus more on school work instead of that.
“I now find this online content cringe. It’s so embarrassing to watch those people have these opinions so loudly, knowing that people are going to believe it without question.”
YouTube has stated that channels associated with Andrew Tate were terminated in 2022, following multiple violations of Community Guidelines and Terms of Service, including the platform’s hate speech policy.
Reuploading content from a channel following its termination is in violation of YouTube’s policies and will be removed. The platform has stated that its long-held Community Guidelines make it clear that hate speech isn’t permitted. In accordance with its hate speech policy, YouTube takes down any content that promotes the Incel ideology. This includes the recruitment of users to the Incel community.
Do you have a story to share? Email me at julia.banim@reachplc.com
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