Long Overdue.

Hi all ~ some last notes before I log off.

I’ve decided to release a few chapters of this book for free, specifically those involving Andrew Tate and his ongoing criminal cases. Let me address a few things before you get into said chapters:

1. The reason these chapters aren’t behind a paywall is because they weren’t written with the intention of profiting off this incident. They were written because they’re part of my story, and they’re true. If you're here just to read about Tate or think this is some kind of selling point, please don’t buy the book. You won’t find anything more significant about him in its pages beyond what’s already here for free.

2. I can assure you no one is more aware of the cosmic irony or the colossal trainwreck of my life than I am. I’ve made mistakes, some mine alone, others shaped by the psychological toll of existing in a deeply toxic political space. If you’re here to point those things out, you’re late. I’ve already written the book. I’ve named the skeletons, told the stories, owned my mess. But let’s be clear: my personal drama doesn’t change the credibility of claims I’ve made. I hope those who can think for themselves can see past the name calling and attempts to muddy the water that will certainly come about by influencers-for-hire trying to cash in or cover their asses.

3. I was not the first person to talk about this event publicly. Others involved chose to speak out and purvey a distorted version of these events, not just to get ahead of the narrative, but to undermine other witnesses and other legitimate cases of assault and trafficking. I’ve spent much of my life since then mentally avoiding this experience and the drama surrounding it, but I cannot remain silent when my story is being twisted and used as a tool to discredit others. It would be unjust not to set the record straight.

4. I understand people will want evidence for some of the claims being made here, and that’s completely fair. Given the deeply personal nature of the material, I’ve shared it privately with two media sources: one mainstream and left-leaning, the other independent and right-leaning. I did this knowing readers have different levels of trust in different outlets and wanted to offer a chance for clarity through whichever lens they find more credible. I’ll hyper-link their pieces when I get a chance, may take a few days. I haven’t done any interviews and don’t plan to. If anyone else seems unusually informed, no, it’s not some grand Matrix conspiracy, just a few DMs and some advance copies in the mail. And while this is my account, it’s not the only one. Another book, by someone who knows this story from a very different angle, is on the way.

5. I’ve mentioned on these pages that I’ve assisted with investigations where and when I could. Though for much of my life, I stayed on the sidelines out of fear and a desire to preserve my anonymity. Since that’s no longer an issue, I want to make it clear that I’m willing to help in any way I can in a more official capacity, especially with the ongoing cases in Romania and elsewhere if they would like to reach out to me.

6. I’ve seen the claims online that many of the anonymous witnesses don’t exist, or that they’ve been paid off, or are part of some “deep state” plot. Every kind of misdirection imaginable. I don’t know any of these women personally, but I do know that I exist, and I know that no one paid me to come forward. Everything in the book, and here, is written in my own words and published by me. No ghostwriters, no sponsors, no shady backers. Just hundreds of hours of my time and more sleepless nights than I care to count.

7. I don’t know if the legal cases will be successful. What I do know is that in a world where you can buy off algorithms and politicians, the truth is hard to find and it certainly isn’t always officially verified. As we’ve just seen recently with Epstein. Information is powerful though. The more people who understand the digital delusion we’re living in, the closer we get to breaking it. I know parts of the book I’ve written will be used as political bludgeons in the culture war. I know it’ll be chopped into clickbait, stripped of context, and turned into ammo for people who haven’t even read a page. The point of course, is that in the chaos, maybe it will find its way to the handful of people trying to get out of this digital hall of mirrors… or to the even fewer who still actually read books.

8. My ultimate hope with the publication of these chapters, and more importantly with my full book, is for healing. Even for those who have hurt me. I’ve learned well in my own life that some healing only comes from purifying fire.

I hope my care in writing these notes and chapters give the truth the best chance to breathe in a media ecosystem that thrives on distortion and unreality. Let’s see if it makes it out alive.

CHAPTER TEN: SCAM ECONOMY

[Chapter introduction about crime in the digital age has been cut. Caolan & George were Tommy and I’s mutual video team at the time, referenced in earlier chapters.]

I’m not entirely sure how the conversations leading up to it went, and part of me dreads just how sinister they may have been. But around February 2018, Tommy Robinson mentioned to Caolan, George, and me that he had been in contact with some wealthy crypto investors in Eastern Europe who might be interested in sponsoring a larger media project we could all build together. Things were going incredibly well with my YouTube views, but as any up-and-coming online influencer knows, you can never just be okay with things. You’re always chasing the next big idea, the next project, the next opportunity. A right-wing European media outlet hosted by some of the most famous figures in the dissident right? It sounded crazy, but with the right funding, maybe it could work. How could I say no?

The flights were booked almost instantly by the investors, and I’ll never forget showing up at the airport in Luton with Caolan and George early in the morning. Tommy was off his head, as usual. But I wasn’t familiar enough with the antics of cocaine addicts to fully understand the gravity of it. He wore a matching designer tracksuit, a typical look, and kept clenching his jaw, motor-mouthing between paranoid rants and overly enthusiastic anticipation. He somehow smuggled an absurd amount of cocaine through airport security. Incredibly cheeky about it, as always.

Now, I know the TSA (and every equivalent agency) is largely nothing more than a time-wasting joke. But back then, I still clung to the illusion that airport security actually served a purpose. Watching Tommy slip into the plane’s bathroom again and again to do lines left me in a surreal state.

It felt like I was living on autopilot, watching a movie I didn’t understand. One that was no longer my story, but someone else’s. I’ve heard every motivational podcast about taking extreme responsibility for your life. And maybe, in a twisted way, I tried to avoid responsibility by taking my hands off the wheel entirely, as if I had no role in the truck flying off the cliff. My people-pleasing, passive self had no business being on that plane unsupervised with a coked-up Tommy, en route to some shady meeting in Eastern Europe. But there I was, nodding along to every unhinged plan like it made perfect sense.

Honestly, I was just as bad as Tommy, only I didn’t need cocaine to fuel my delusions. He was probably doing drugs because he knew how insane everything was. I was worse. I actually thought it was serious. I was sitting there mentally drafting business talking points, wondering if we needed a Google Docs slideshow.

Guys? Do we have a plan here???

Any time I asked about the investors, the answers were vague and broken—something about a “professional boxer” or whatever. Why a boxer in Eastern Europe would want to invest in our company was beyond me, but sure. They’d paid for the flights and agreed to a meeting. What’s the worst that could happen?

When we landed in Romania, Tommy told us the investors had sent cars. “You’re gonna love these blokes,” he chirped, still buzzing while the rest of us were groggy from the morning flight. We grabbed our bags and headed for the airport exit. I’d traveled through enough of Europe, including the old Eastern Bloc, to be familiar with the dreary landscapes and brutalist architecture. But the people waiting for us were hard to miss. They stood out like sore thumbs against the washed-out Balkan backdrop and the aging Dacia SupeRNovas from 2001. Two sharply dressed men leaned against polished sports cars, waving as we rolled our suitcases down the walkway. The cars looked comically out of place, and completely impractical for our luggage, but I wasn’t about to complain. At least the investors clearly had money. And I’d never ridden in a car like that before.

Tommy clasped hands with his acquaintances in one of those firm, pull-in handshakes that turned into a quick, back-pat half-hug—the kind that was more about respect than warmth. As it turned out, the pair were brothers, and after the greeting, they ushered us into the cars. But not before making it clear that I would be personally escorted by a man named Andrew. He had a wide grin and a unique lisp that reminded me of an old childhood friend but seemed a bit too eager to get me alone. I figured we were all headed to the same place anyway, and Caolan, George, and Tommy all knew where I was and who I was with. Andrew seemed harmless enough, maybe even a fan. I didn’t want to overthink it. Before I’d even finished buckling my seatbelt, he was telling me how much he liked my work.

I won’t pretend I remember exactly how the conversation went, but Andrew clearly viewed me as some kind of hero, someone saving the Western world. He’d watched plenty of my content; he referenced it, almost reverently. Between flirtatious smiles and compliments, he was nice, charming even. And I won’t lie; I wasn’t exactly disappointed to get a break from Tommy’s antics and have a conversation with someone who was actually sober.

Tommy mentioned he needed a nap before our meeting with the investors that evening (he needed much more than a nap), so after we stopped at the hotel, Andrew asked if I was hungry and if he could take me to grab an early dinner before we met up at the “compound” later. The sun was still high; we had plenty of time to kill, so I said yes without thinking. I wasn’t in the habit of turning down food; years of financial stress made me frugal to a fault. My travels around Europe were basically a McDonald’s tour, something my friends constantly teased me about.

The steakhouse Andrew took me to was a stark departure from my usual dining choices. I’d say it was upscale, but everything seemed fancy compared to my chicken nugget dinners. We really did get along, but seeing someone with so much apparent wealth and success, I found myself curious about his ultimate goals in life. The Tate brothers carried themselves like they owned the place—well-dressed, fit, with nice cars and enough money to start an entire news organization.

I don’t know if I was slowly waking up from my dopamine-induced daze, but part of me was just not satisfied with what I was seeing or where I was going. If I built a news network, if I got more fame, if I got more wealth—what was it all for? I wanted to know where this was headed. I can’t help but laugh at the way I used to question men. They’d confidently declare their plans to dominate their field or conquer the world, and I would simply stare into their eyes and ask, But why? For what? What does this do for your soul? I’d watch something in them crack, something I didn’t understand yet.

Really, I asked them those questions because they were the same ones I was asking myself. Some part of me hoped these successful men would have the answer. But I hadn’t yet realized that part of the journey up meant taking those kinds of questions and lining them up against a wall for execution without trial.

Looking back, it’s clear Andrew humored a lot of my queries, especially those about whether he wanted to start a family or get married someday. “If I found the right woman, of course. That’s what life is all about—family. It’s how we rebuild Western civilization,” he mused. But he lingered on that “if” just a little too long for it to feel sincere. There was an awkwardness in his response, like he was nervous I might see through it. I remember this part of our conversation well, and it was the first moment that things felt… off.

I hadn’t learned to spot red flags yet, at least not the kind that wore nice clothes, smiled politely, and echoed your politics back to you like a mirror. Dinner had relaxed me more than it should have. It was almost a rehearsed level of calm. He never said anything wrong, and maybe that was the red flag.

After the meal, we returned to the hotel to prepare for the investment meeting. I didn’t know what I was expecting the meeting to look like, but it certainly wasn’t what I found myself walking into. With Caolan, George, Tommy, and I all loaded into sports cars, Andrew and his brother Tristan drove us through the dreary side streets of a Bucharest neighborhood, not far from our hotel. The final destination didn’t look like much at first, just a generic industrial warehouse. But when the giant black gate rolled open, it revealed a scene that would’ve been obvious to me as a criminal operation if I had any clue how the world worked. We were greeted by a glowing blue pool surrounded by luxury cars as we stepped onto the tiled entrance.

The building itself looked like it had been designed by edgy Reddit mods and anime nerds turned Marie Kondo minimalist fanatics. A giant samurai statue was one of the few decorations in the entryway, and flat-screen TVs adorned the walls, flashing cryptocurrency prices. It felt like every decision made here was exactly what a 10-year-old would do if they suddenly became a multi-millionaire: “I want fancy cars, a glowing pool, a big samurai statue, girls, and my favorite e-celebrities.” What was more interesting than the decor, though, were the people in the building. At this point, it was hard to tell who was in charge—was it the brothers, or the nerdy-looking crypto bros sitting around a table on computers, eyes glued to their investment screens? It almost seemed like the brothers were the muscle and drivers, while the crypto guys were the ones doing the actual work.

I was suddenly snapped out of my fascination with the scenery by an overwhelming sense that something was terribly wrong with Tommy. I’m not sure he had even napped at all. Had he somehow gotten more drugs since landing in Bucharest? It certainly looked that way. Caolan and George exchanged concerned, knowing glances as we watched Tommy lob one social grenade after another into what we’d hoped would be a productive investment meeting. It was nothing short of a disaster. It was beyond obvious to everyone in the room that they were either speaking to a severely mentally ill man or someone inhabiting a completely different, drug-induced realm. Watching the reaction of the main crypto bro was something I wish I could describe in a way beyond writing. It’s not a perfect comparison, but imagine Donny Azoff (Jonah Hill in The Wolf of Wall Street) enduring Tommy’s ramblings. The whole scene felt straight out of an SNL sketch. From this point forward, I’ll call this guy Donnie.

What was even more fascinating, though, was that Tommy’s behavior had no apparent effect on the pitch being delivered from across the table. Donnie pointed to one of the screens and confidently announced that what appeared to be millions of dollars displayed in green pixels was what their coins were making in just the last 24 hours. I looked up at the screen as the numbers kept climbing—another ten thousand dollars as I was watching. It was incomprehensible to me. We had just entered the era of crypto scams collapsing, but it still hadn’t fully settled into the public’s consciousness just how far-reaching these pump-and-dump schemes were. I don’t think I, or many other influencers at the time, really understood all the altcoin jargon yet.

My head was spinning—Tommy chewing on nothing, Caolan and George doing their best to look engaged, and the Tate brothers casually lounging in their muscle shirts. I really wish I could remember the exact name they pitched to us. If I could, it would probably make you laugh, but after an exhausting technical monologue, Donnie put his hands on the table, looked up, and said, “We’ll call it FREEDOM TOKEN,” or some nonsense like that. Oh no, I thought. Fuck.

They want us to sell cryptocurrency. Is this even an investment meeting at all? Despite my growing realization, I still wanted to make something out of all this. I had nothing to lose at that point. So, I interrupted rather awkwardly, “The coin stuff is really interesting, but do you plan on putting an initial investment into this media company we’re starting? Or is this going to be entirely a crypto operation?” The men at the table seemed caught off guard, but Donnie quickly scrambled to reassure me. “Absolutely! If we can come to an agreement, we’d cover the initial operating costs of the news network and link this token to it, making it mutually beneficial for everyone. Honestly, the token will be something all patriots can get behind. It’ll just be a side operation, more of a way for your viewers to earn by sharing and engaging with your content. Barely the focus of the project! Plus, we’d give you all shares of the token for your own benefit.” “Great,” I responded, just before he cut me off by launching into another incomprehensible tirade of crypto jargon. (Crypto bros are great at this; it’s like half the battle is just confusing you enough that you’re too embarrassed to ask for details.) To be honest, I didn’t care about the money at all. I was delusionally invested in building this alternative media platform, and I might have been the only one in the room still under the misguided impression that this was the real purpose of the meeting.

I wasn’t thrilled about the crypto angle, but it seemed like we might be able to make something work if they were genuinely interested in contributing a few hundred grand upfront. Just as I started running through possibilities in my head, Tommy took the conversational reins again, and almost instantly destroyed any shred of serious credibility I’d managed to salvage with my admittedly naive, but critical, questions. Caolan and George hadn’t contributed much to the conversation at this point, but whenever they did, it would slightly bolster our social standing. If there was one thing they were good at, especially Caolan, it was being the life of the party. He was a master of big grins, inside jokes, and flattery. They had both the skills for a successful business meeting: the production talent and the marketing persuasiveness.

However, considering we were all a decade younger than Tommy, we were hardly the focus of the business discussions. By the time we were leaving to get in the cars, Caolan, George, and I had resigned ourselves to the reality that the whole thing was a bust. We did our best, but no one with even a fraction of their wits would give any of us access to real money, knowing it would all end up being snorted up Tommy’s nose.

We returned to our hotel in Bucharest feeling dejected, embarrassed, and unsure of where to go from here. It wasn’t our first failure, and we knew it wouldn’t be our last, but we needed to sleep and recharge before figuring out the next step. Expecting to retreat to my room and binge some Prison Break on my phone, Caolan suddenly lit up with a completely different energy. “They want to meet with you, Lauren.” To be perfectly honest, I can’t remember whether it was Caolan or Tommy who got the text—it was a confusing game of telephone between different people. Maybe Tommy texted Caolan, or maybe it was the other way around, but for some reason, I wasn’t the one who got the invite directly.

What? “Yeah, they just reached out saying you impressed them at the meeting, and the deal is still on if you’re willing to meet with them before you leave tomorrow and sort out the details.”

Now, if you’re reading this and screaming—“NO, LAUREN!”—I get it. I understand now. But there’s very little you could have told a 22-year-old me to convince me I didn’t have a real shot at saving the day. Despite my imposter syndrome and self-doubt, flying by the seat of my pants had generally worked up until this point. Maybe I really could be the key to getting this entire media company off the ground. Imagine that! Me saving the day? It seemed like a meeting, free from the distraction of a drugged-out motormouth, might actually get somewhere. I clung to the fantasy that I could turn this into something meaningful, as if my ambition could somehow justify the risk.

They sent a car for me, and we headed back to the compound where the same group of men were waiting. No one was sitting at the desk; no papers or computers were out. They were just wandering around, conversing, while I awkwardly waited for some kind of prompt to continue our discussions.

“Hey, Lauren, get over here.” Andrew waved me over to the couch. “I want a picture with you.” Tate barked it more like an order, but his sing-song tone kept it light, almost playful. By now, I was used to it. Ever since my sudden rise to Internet fame a few years ago, people asking me for photos had become routine. I barely thought twice about it. I sat beside him, and he casually wrapped his hand around my waist and tugged me in as someone snapped the shot. I wasn’t used to men grabbing me like that; Tate did it like we’d been dating for years or something. It left me slightly uncomfortable, but I brushed it off. I still wonder what’s become of that photo. It’s probably on an old phone somewhere.

“This is boring. Let’s go somewhere more exciting,” Andrew snapped while pacing. Tristan and the others agreed.

Now, I was naive, but I wasn’t that much of an idiot. I asked again when we’d discuss business and where exactly they wanted to go. “To the club. It’s just around the block; we can take the cars. It’ll be fun. We’ll discuss business there.”

At that moment, my nearly nonfunctional amygdala kicked in for the first time in ages, sending off alarm bells. Maybe Tommy knew these people, but I didn’t. Climbing into some flashy sports car with strangers, bound for a Eurotrash club I’d never even heard of, all while no one had a clue where I was? Yeah, hard pass. I looked for a way to play it cool.

“Hey, I’d rather not go out unless Tommy and the boys are coming too,” I said, trying to keep it light.

“I’ve already texted them. We’re sending a car now,” Andrew replied assuredly, with a twinkle in his eye. Well, my excuse was gone.

I’m sure if I’d really pushed, I could’ve demanded they take me back to my hotel. They probably would’ve taken me. But I wasn’t thinking clearly. I was still on autopilot, lacking a strong sense of self, easily swayed by the smallest bit of pressure. The most dangerous thing a young woman can be is a pushover. Given my own experiences, I can honestly say it’s better to raise a “bitch” than a people-pleaser. I imagine the same goes for men in their own way.

We got in the cars and Andrew raced through the back roads. Not long after, we pulled up to the club—an all-black brick building with a bouncer at the door. The luxury cars were parked out front, and the low boom of bass music thudded underfoot as we walked down a narrow, dimly lit hallway to the main room.

I’m sure you’ve seen this scene in the movies: everything slows down, the background blurs, and someone steps through a doorway into another world. I turned the corner, and blue neon light flooded my vision. Stages with gorgeous women, white leather couches, and—was that fireworks? It was. I didn’t even know what bottle service was at the time, but the whole vibe of the place was mesmerizing. I was painfully out of place, an obvious North American, wearing jeans and a black top, surrounded by Romanian girls in club dresses.

Andrew offered to get me a drink. He snapped his fingers and waved over a serving girl, briskly ordering for both of us. Vodka soda—my usual, with lime. I was handed my drink, and just before taking a sip, I asked, “Any news on Tommy and the boys?” Andrew turned to me, meeting my eyes with intent. “They’ll be here soon! Don’t worry.” He winked. After spending time with him earlier in the day, I felt a certain warmth toward him. There was something about his energy that was calming, easy to lean into, easier still to ignore the small things that didn’t sit quite right.

People in the club kept approaching Andrew and Tristan, shaking their hands and chatting like old friends. They were clearly regulars here. I spent at least ten minutes just trying to process my surroundings—the music blasting, the unfamiliar faces, the unspoken social cues I was clearly missing. The Tate brothers moved through it all effortlessly, naturals in this world. While they swam with ease, I felt like I was drowning.

I figured I’d try to talk to Donnie, as he seemed to be the brains behind their… operation? The financials, at least. Honestly, I still hadn’t quite figured out what the hell was going on. We exchanged some small talk about bitcoin, but before I could get a sense of where the conversation was heading, a tray of shots was brought over. The brothers ushered us all to cheers with them. While I sipped on my vodka soda, I wasn’t quite ready for another drink until Tommy and the others arrived.

“Where’s Tommy? Where are Caolan and George?” I shouted past the tray, my voice barely carrying over the pounding music.

“The cars just arrived—they’re on their way now!” Andrew reassured me, leaning in close, his head nearly pressed to mine. His voice cut through the noise with ease, steady and sure.

I studied the shot glass, and despite my hesitation, seeing the rest raise them, I joined in, and we all threw them back. I winced as the burn hit; I never really got used to drinking anything stronger than my vodka sodas. It’s funny how an environment itself can make a behaviour feel oddly natural. Surrounded by music, fireworks, and the shimmering energy of the club, it would feel weird to decline.

Despite only having one shot and still working on my vodka soda, I found myself feeling surprisingly intoxicated. Usually, only beer hit me this quickly. I paid it no mind as I was fast distracted with conversation. Maybe it was the vibe of the club, or just the fact that I was coming off as the stereotypically fun, carefree blonde. But Donnie, who’d been friendly enough as we bantered about politics and online culture, suddenly seemed to take my relaxed demeanor as a green light. Or perhaps it was the one or two edgy jokes I tossed out. Either way, his tone shifted; it was far more candid now.

Yelling over the music—not yet drunk—he launched into an explanation of their entire operation: a series pump-and-dump crypto schemes raking in millions. He didn’t try to hide it. It was all basically illegal, and something they couldn’t pull off in the U.S. “We’ve got the police wrapped around our fingers here,” he bragged. Andrew had said almost the same thing at the compound during our initial meeting, but I’d brushed it off as some cheeky over-the-top bravado. Donnie went on, “An inside guy. We can do whatever we want, and they can’t do shit.”

He almost laughed as he said it, high on the absurdity. “And even if they do come after us, we’ll just shut down shop, take the money and run to another Eastern European shithole. Hell, I’m getting close to that point now. We’ll cash out and disappear.”

At this moment, any hope that the night might shift toward a legitimate investment discussion had faded entirely. In fact, I was struggling just to keep my eyes open. We hadn’t even been there that long, and I hadn’t drunk much, but something was wrong. My body wasn’t listening to me. The world was dimming, and I couldn’t stop it. I asked again about Tommy and the others but kept getting vague answers. Just around the corner, they said. Eventually, I found myself crawling onto a couch at the back of the club, my eyelids fluttering closed. Blue lasers and neon lights danced behind them, dragging me in and out of consciousness, pulsing to the relentless hum of the heavy bass.

I thought I felt a girl shake my shoulder, asking if I was okay. Honestly, I didn’t care about anything except keeping my head in a comfortable spot on the white faux leather couch. Time lost all meaning; I couldn’t tell if ten minutes or an hour had passed.

Tommy and the boys never showed up. As far as I know now, a car was never even sent for them.

The memories after that blur together. I remember someone carrying me to a bathroom, standing outside the stall while I threw up. The nausea was overwhelming, and I think I might’ve even fallen asleep hugging the toilet for a while.

Then Andrew was there again, lifting me up and carrying me through the dim hallway, my feet barely touching the ground, the bass of the music still shaking my body.

I felt the cool night air hit my skin as the door to a sports car opened in front of me.

A stupid fucking Bugatti, I’m sure.

CHAPTER ELEVEN: CONFESSIONS

It was kind of my fault. I can trace every moment I had the opportunity to turn things around, right up until the point when everything went wrong. The truth is, I could have said no to that strange business meeting overseas, at least until I had more information. I could have refused to go to the club until my friends were with me. I could have turned down the drinks. With whatever little sense I had left, I could have said no to what I foolishly thought was a harmless cuddle when I had no intention of going any further. But honestly, I’m not sure it would have mattered at that point. This wasn’t a case of mixed signals or intoxicated blurred lines. I fought back. I was pleading. I just didn’t realize there was a point of no return, a moment where my voice would no longer have any power.

I’d rather not give a detailed account, so I’ll keep it simple. He carried me back to the hotel room and asked me to sleep beside him. I said yes. I was incredibly intoxicated, and some part of me convinced myself that because he was Tommy’s friend he wasn’t particularly dangerous. It was a poor decision, but it happened. He kissed me. I wasn’t expecting it, and I wasn’t looking for it, but I kissed him back briefly and then told him I wanted to sleep. I was extraordinarily tired. He wanted to go further. I said no, very clearly, multiple times, and tried to pull his hands off me. He put his arm around my neck and began strangling me unconscious. I tried to fight back. He repeatedly strangled me every time I regained enough consciousness to pull at his arms. I’d prefer not to share the rest. It’s pretty obvious.

I’ve mentioned it before, but I’m once again reminded of how deeply I used to believe in that naive, almost cartoonish version of life—where I was the main character, nothing truly bad could happen, and danger didn’t exist as long as you played it smart. I held onto a teenage, radical anti-feminist idea that men weren’t a real threat unless you let them be one. I’d had experiences before where I set boundaries and they were respected, where a night ended with a cuddle, maybe a kiss, and that was it. No pressure. No problem. Once or twice, I’d even crashed in a male friend’s hotel room or at their house after drinking, without the slightest concern they’d try anything. The next morning, it was just, “Good morning—hope you’re feeling better!”

I’m not saying these were good decisions, and I’m incredibly militant now about never putting myself in a position like that again, but that was my lived experience. I believed I could take all the risks I wanted and still be fine. I didn’t know how to cope when that belief shattered. When I finally faced the real consequences of taking those risks, it broke me psychologically. I cycled through different forms of denial. It’s taken me years to even begin to process it clearly, and to take full responsibility for my own behavior.

It’s easier to convince ourselves that evil completely ensnares us without any willingness on our part. But evil isn’t always the obvious stuff; it’s the small decisions we make that put us in compromising positions. I heard this anecdote once that the devil doesn’t just leap out at anyone; he whispers, urging us to step a little closer to the fence, to come see what he’s doing, to lower our defenses, have a drink, and not think too much. We indulge. We take a step forward, and he tells us small lies, how all our friends will soon be at the fence, curious too. He reassures us that it’s safe to sit on the fence between him and God, to get a better view of what he’s offering, without making any real decisions. But then, in the final moment, you feel claws around your arm, dragging you, screaming, while the devil smiles and tells you the fence always belonged to him.

You can scream all you want about how you never wanted to go along. You can fight back in vain, but deep down, a part of you allowed yourself to get wrapped up in the lies. You drink the wine he offers. You let yourself get that close. You don’t have discernment. Don’t get vulnerable with the devil if you don’t want to end up in hell.

I mean, really.

I suppose I can’t entirely fault conservative media for turning Andrew Tate into a hero, though for a while, I certainly did. He’s not a fool, despite the persona he crafts online. There’s a depth to him, a sharp social intelligence that, in another life, might have been a force for good. It’s a true shame. You can catch glimpses of that potential in his messages urging men to better themselves. But in the end, even those moments are not separate from the larger arc of his influence. They, too, are absorbed into a worldview where power is the only currency, and dominance, not character, defines a man’s worth.

My frustration grew over time, though, as more and more evidence came to light about this man’s operations. At least when I met him, I had no idea. My comfortable state of denial was being involuntarily shattered daily. Videos and messages surfaced of Tate discussing grooming underage girls, manipulating and lying to put women in horrific situations, and scamming men out of their life savings. As I write this, he’s still under house arrest for alleged sex trafficking and exploitation, including “repeated sexual relations and acts” with a fifteen-year-old. Frankly, you didn’t need my story to see the direction it all pointed; you could just listen to what the man himself was saying.

I understand the concept of radical responsibility. Well, women have freedom now; they can make choices that put them in danger or compromise them, oh well! You asked for this, ladies! Fine. So be it, blame the women.

What I don’t understand is how the right-wing media in particular could make a hero of this man after all the evidence of his character had been released. Conservatives, even just a hundred years ago, would have strung up people in the streets for less than what the Tate brothers do on any given weekend. Men then understood that part of building a strong society is protecting people, especially young women, from predators and pimps. Instead, we got a bunch of self-proclaimed “conservative” men who would drag themselves naked across broken glass for the chance to serve up softball interviews with a man who is facing nearly three times as many charges as Hunter Biden ever did, each of them far more serious. Can you imagine if a Democrat had said even a fraction of what was stated in his Hustler University videos? We’ve got a library of damning Tate footage; Epstein never even gave us that much to work with. Tate literally admitted to moving to Romania because it’s easier to get away with crimes.

When it comes to conservative media’s reaction, it was willful ignorance in pursuit of fame and money. Nothing short of that. A lot of people received a lot of money and attention to pick a side and cover up what they certainly knew to be morally rotten behaviour, if not significant criminality. Oh, don’t forget the fear. A lot of influencers had been to that compound. A lot of people with high public profiles had been involved in that business.

I didn’t even realize how bad things were, how deep the rot went in the media space at this point. No matter, I had no intentions of getting into it. How embarrassing was it that I even ended up in that situation in the first place? Who was I to blame conservative media figures for lionizing Tate when I had my own failures as a self-proclaimed conservative media figure under my belt? Not to mention I’m sure I conducted a few softball interviews of my own.

In my first draft of this section, I just brushed over this entire experience. Of course. The same thing I did all those years ago.

It didn’t happen, I told myself.

In fact, Andrew and I were on great terms. We were still talking over WhatsApp. He was asking to visit me. I had no intention of allowing that to occur, but I humored him to preserve my own sanity or maybe further my own delusion? I wasn’t sure. In the end, I thought it didn’t matter. All I knew was that I wasn’t going to let myself care about it too deeply, so I acted like I didn’t. Cognitive dissonance makes people normalize the absurd, as if mentally reclassifying the event afterward can restore some illusion of control.

The last conversation we had in person consisted of Andrew telling me I’d better not tell the press about what he’d done as I packed my bags to rush out of my hotel room. I told him not to worry; I was the girl against feminism, after all. I couldn’t be doing that. I’d spent so long fighting the idea of victimhood on ideological grounds that of course I would ignore my own on those same grounds. It wouldn’t be very helpful to “the cause” (or my career, for that matter) for me to become exactly what I criticized. A victim. Worse, a woman, victim of a man. One who literally did everything wrong. Why was I out drinking in this strange country with strange men? What did I expect?

I didn’t allow myself to consider that there would be others after me. If I did, I figured they made stupid decisions the same as I did. I certainly never imagined the minds of an entire generation would be assaulted by Tate, not just dozens of women. I can’t help but wonder if there was a moment when I could have been more honest, more direct about the forces that would later shape the psyche of millions. Maybe it wouldn’t have changed anything, but maybe it would have made a difference to someone, given a few people a reason to pause, to think twice. Instead, I told him his secret was safe with me. What was one more secret in this world of politics anyway?

It took a few weeks before my denial was slowly replaced by a small but persistent sense of guilt, guilt that I was setting others up for failure. Even if I could take responsibility for my own mistakes, I knew his actions weren’t mistakes, they were calculated and intentional. I finally cracked and texted him, breaking the act, stating what he did was wrong, and at the very least, he needed to understand that so he wouldn’t treat others the same way. Of course, I knew he already knew this. But I also felt certain I would never go to court. I didn’t believe in punishing anyone over such a serious accusation without overwhelming evidence. I wouldn’t have believed another woman who made these exact set of claims. In fact, I would’ve torn myself apart. I wouldn’t have been able to survive my own scrutiny. I made too many decisions that indicated at the very least reckless irresponsibility.

As for holding him to account publicly? Good joke. I already knew how that would go. Whether a crime had been committed would be a secondary concern. The real question would be whether I was the kind of person who deserved my fate. Every failed relationship, every poor decision, every moment of bad judgment would be dissected under a microscope. For Tate, hiring a PR firm and weaponizing other influencers (especially those whose reputations are tied to yours) to discredit potential claimants is just the cost of doing business. Best case? My story gets hijacked by some slick HBO showrunner with a savior complex, repackaged into a glossy docudrama where the women are written as if they’ve got no internal monologue. Idiots, victims of hyper-captivating men.

The outcome was painfully obvious, especially with the amount of money and blackmail at play. People get killed over this sort of stuff, and I’d been privy to conversations with powerful people that implied as much. My brief confrontation was less about justice and more about easing my own guilt. The guilt of knowing I was embarrassed by my own behavior in this situation, and that, given the choice, I would absolutely stay silent for the sake of the cause. Perhaps even more so to preserve my own sense of control, to avoid the reputational bloodbath I feared. I guess this is the real world, I told myself. And I’d be damned before I admitted I hadn’t been prepared for it.

Andrew eventually apologized, for “making me think badly of him,” as he put it. But the apology only came after a barrage of anger and veiled threats. He reminded me that I had consented to cuddling, that he’d been drunk too, as if those facts nullified everything that came after. I told him plainly that I had said no, clearly and repeatedly, that he’d gotten violent in response. He told me to go to the police. I laughed and reminded him of his own words: that the police were already paid off. I wasn’t reaching out to seek justice or vengeance, I just wanted him to understand I wouldn’t be complicit in his delusion that what he’d done was okay.

I thanked him for the apology, and cut off contact. He reached out again and offered to bring flowers. I still didn’t reply. I know this is going to sound weird, but I do think he meant his apology. Or at least hoped it would entice me to begin speaking with him again. Either way, it wasn’t the closure I had hoped for. I didn’t expect any, though.

It’s now seven years later.

I don’t hate Andrew. I know that may sound strange, especially in contrast to the things I’ve expressed on these pages, but it’s complex. He’s still human. When he apologized to me, he admitted he doesn’t have much of a conscience, but if it’s still there, I hope he wrestles with it. I hope, one day, it wins. I hope he becomes the soul he could have been, instead of the one consumed by his vices. Whether behind bars or free. But I don’t think he even realizes he’s been consumed. Like so many in his position, he’s likely never let himself dig that deep because there’s too much pain waiting there.

I believe change is possible; I absolutely believe in redemption for Andrew Tate. But understanding why people do what they do and hoping for their greatest spiritual good doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be stopped. Especially when they’ve lost themselves so completely that they leave destruction in their wake. I have forgiven him, truly. But that doesn’t mean he should be free to keep hurting, tormenting, and scamming others.

If I ever lost myself to that degree, and there have been moments where those paths felt dangerously close, I’d hope there would be people willing to stand up to me.

Additional Note (upon completion of this manuscript):

I’ve finally decided to leave in this section of the book. At first, I wrote it just to process my own emotions, convincing myself no one would ever read it. For a while, I thought about replacing parts with dramatized, anonymized scenes to avoid drawing too much attention. But after a lot of reflection, I’ve realized I’m done with cowardice. If I’m going to do an honest book I’ll do it right, and this is a big part of my story.

Why now though? It’s a very valid question. I know how people think: Oh, you’re deciding to tell this story in your book? To make sales? What about the legal cases? Can’t believe you didn’t help earlier.

I should start by debunking some misconceptions here.

First, I will be releasing all the chapters relevant to Tate for free. It’s not about money, and frankly, I’d rather not give people another excuse to project their own twisted motivations onto me. Not that I’m too worried about the opinions of anyone who thinks human trafficking and scamming men out of their life savings is some kind of noble vocation.

Second, I’ve always believed these matters should be handled by the legal system whenever possible, rather than turned into a public spectacle. As I mentioned earlier, I had no desire to put my face on any public claims at first. Instead, I oscillated between denial and my own harsh judgments of women who came forward with similar accusations. Why didn’t you go to the police? That would be the right thing to do. Why didn’t you go to the hospital? That would be the right thing to do. Ironically, my extreme judgment of others pushed me to make some of the right choices early on. I embraced denial, but deep down I knew what really happened. I reluctantly reached out to the UK authorities the next day, feeling it was the right thing to do, only to be met with indifference. They told me an investigation could only be pursued in Romania, a country where I had been explicitly warned about police corruption. I went deeper into a dissociative state as a result, feeling certain there would never be a resolution.

Attempts to involve Canadian authorities later led to similar dead ends. While I’m sure plenty would like to claim the investigation into Tate is a deep-state operation, if anything, the state didn’t help at all. They honestly didn’t seem to give a shit.

I wasn’t looking to start a legal battle. I was just looking for any interest at all in helping me make sense of what was going on in Tate’s compound in a way that would keep me anonymous. Years passed before Tate’s antics made it onto the radar of Western authorities, due to repeated claims from other women that had nothing to do with me. Eventually a larger U.S. investigation reached out for my assistance, and I provided what information I could off the record. I did everything possible while trying to maintain my anonymity. But for the most part, I buried it until I began writing this.

Being a witness in any official capacity would’ve required revealing my identity, something I wanted to avoid at all costs. Still, over the years, public exposure started to feel inevitable. Someone I once naively trusted shared parts of my story with journalists without my consent. That disclosure resulted in others posting distorted versions of events online or in published works for political activism purposes, clearly with no real concern about the potential crimes happening or whether I wanted my story public or not.

At one point, even Tommy, worried about his own connection to the situation, put out a video trying to get ahead of the stories circulating online by pre-emptively claiming I would make false accusations. He recently did this again, just before the publication of this book, completely lying about the events that occurred. You’ll read more about that later.

Ironically, I was the last person on earth who wanted to talk about it, but everyone else, including those who wanted me to remain silent, kept forcing the situation into the spotlight. The more they did, the more journalists showed up in my inbox prying for a statement I never wanted to give.

If my silence over the past seven years hasn’t made it clear enough, the last thing I wanted is attention for this. I have an entire archive of replies to those reporters telling them to fuck off and leave me alone. Regardless, it’s always felt like only a matter of time, whether I choose to tell the story myself, or leave it to journalists, activists, and paid smear campaigns to do it for me. I’d much rather tell my own story, with all its flaws, than let a wave of outsiders, who have no real understanding of what actually happened, shape the narrative in my place.

Of course, there will still be plenty of commentary from old colleagues, eager to highlight my character flaws—some true, some not—to muddy the waters. It will be interesting, though, to watch them contend with a simple fact: I have made only two accusations of assault to authorities in my entire life. One was in Australia, where the handsy man was promptly arrested and jailed after CCTV and his serial offense record confirmed my account. The other being Andrew Tate, who despite my silence, years later became infamous for allegations of human trafficking and sexual assault.

Equally hard to pass off as mere coincidence is the fact that I went to a women’s hospital and had a report made around a week after the event. The report documented my account of asphyxiation, five years before Vice News would report in 2023 that Tate used the same method on other victims in the UK in 2015. If this were some elaborate ploy for attention, I’d have to be a clairvoyant to have predicted the rise of this man’s profile and his methods before anyone even knew who he was.

Not that anyone wants this kind of attention. No one wants to be a victim, especially not when you come from my political background. I know exactly what’s coming. I’ll be crucified online. I’m not looking for sympathy, and I don’t expect a victim trophy from any side. I’m publishing this simply because it’s the truth and far too few people are telling the truth these days.

And here’s another sad truth about the political world: it’s absolutely not just women falling victim to sexual violence. Young men are preyed on too, often in the same spaces, often with the same devastating silence. The social stigma of shame that keeps women quiet also keeps men from speaking out—sometimes even more intensely. It reminds me of the case of serial rapist Reynhard Sinaga in the UK who assaulted at least 136 men. He was so difficult to catch because most of his victims remained silent. Even when police presented them with recorded video evidence of their assaults, many still denied it had happened. I understand. I really do.

This culture needs to change for both men and women, and that change shouldn’t be a politically partisan issue. I don’t have all the answers, but I do know it won’t happen by reducing the conversation to slogans like “believe all X” or by reflexively dismissing people as liars seeking attention. Personally, I prefer handling matters privately and through legal channels—but as I hope you understand (perhaps even more so after reading this book in its entirety), that was never truly an option for me. And it isn’t for everyone. Sometimes, the only solace people find is in telling their story.

CHAPTER TWELVE: NOWHERE LAND

[Only a few opening paragraphs are connected to the incident in the previous featured chapters]

I had told him (Tommy) and the boys what happened almost immediately after getting into the cab to the airport. Andrew walked me to the hotel exit where Tommy, Caolan and George were waiting in the car, gave me a hug, and as soon as the taxi door slammed shut behind me, I blurted it out. I said it in a weird, manic-laughter, “you won’t believe what the fuck just happened” kind of way, but I was damn clear. The boys laughed too, until Tommy looked at me and said, “You serious, mate?” I said, “Yeah,” and got into the darker details. The laughter lingered for a beat, like they were waiting for the “Psych!” Waiting for the punchline that never came.

We googled Tate on the flight home, curious to learn more about who he really was. Apparently, he’d had a brief brush with fame on Big Brother before being removed from the house after a video surfaced showing him hitting a woman with a belt. The more I scrolled, the more foolish I felt for having ended up in this situation. But by that point, it didn’t matter. It was just one more absurdity in a world full of them, another drop in the pan of chaos we were all too used to.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: RETIREMENT PARTY

[Opening about personal life has been cut. You may recognize some of this content from a video which I ironically called “The Whole Truth” in which I attempted to address some of this drama without mentioning anything regarding the Tate incident.]

I was married, pregnant, and my Borderless documentary was about to be published. Naturally, my husband wanted me to visit his family in Australia to share the exciting news. The only issue was that, since my last trip there, the one where we first met, the Australian government had added me to a list called VACCU. Essentially, it’s a flag on your passport for “character reasons,” typically reserved for people convicted of criminal activities, those involved in terrorism, or, apparently, politically incorrect YouTubers. In early 2019, I applied for a general visitor visa, only to be rejected.

Even if we settled in Canada, Australia was still a part of my husbands life that he couldn’t let go of. I knew I had to find a way in. For months, I sent inquiries and called government helplines but got nowhere. My husband visited home a few times, but I had to stay behind—pregnant, emotional, and increasingly isolated. I was less active online and I hoped that would help my case, but I wasn’t ready to leave public life completely. Maybe I’d still write the occasional article or return to filmmaking once my son, and hopefully more children, were older.

The rejections wore me down. Being separated from my husband during such a vulnerable time made the stakes feel heavier with each passing month. It became increasingly clear: as long as I maintained a media presence, the door to Australia would remain shut.

I eventually chose to step away from public life entirely. After Borderless was released, I published a retirement article and sent it, along with a new visa request, to the government. Their response confirmed I still failed the “Character Test” due to my “previous conduct” and content that may have “incited discord.” But, my retirement had worked. They explicitly cited it, along with the personal nature of the visit, as the reason my application wouldn’t be refused. It was clear: stepping away from politics wasn’t just a choice. It was the cost of entry. The message ended with a chilling warning: any future controversy could result in a ban, and this note on my record would count heavily against me.

So, in the end, it wasn’t conviction or burnout that ended my career; it was a government mandate. I always believed Western democracies respected free speech, even when the views expressed were provocative or unpopular. Mine certainly were. But I never imagined they’d be grounds for exile. It was a slow, disorienting unraveling of everything I thought I understood about the free world. The notion that only authoritarian regimes punished dissent no longer held. I came to see that power protects itself, no matter the flag it flies. The “good guys” I believed in as a child were just stories we told ourselves. And once I let go of that illusion, the sting of losing my political voice began to fade.

Outside the ruins of that world, I was finally building something real.

But just as I was preparing to publish my retirement letter and wrap up Borderless, the ghosts of that old world came knocking. One of them was Milo Yiannopoulos, a previous colleague known as much for controversy as for commentary. He began sending me strange messages. Apparently, he had gotten into some dispute with my former film crew, who had since moved on to work with other high-profile figures like Alex Jones. They knew I was stepping away and had wished me well.

I had little idea what Caolan and George had been up to since we filmed Borderless the year before, but Milo was working on some kind of exposé about them, and he wanted me in the middle of it. It was exactly the kind of drama I was trying to leave behind. These so-called investigations rarely had anything to do with real political reform. More often, they were just personal grudges or enemy-financed hit jobs dressed up as journalism.

Hit pieces and public cancellations never tell the whole story. In this climate, false accusations blur the lines so much that real predators can hide in plain sight, while decent people often get destroyed—not because they’re guilty, but because they’re bad at the game.

I told Milo as much, explaining my decision to leave politics and the complications surrounding my visa. He remained polite, but there was an unmistakable undercurrent of menace in his tone that I didn’t appreciate. He already wasn’t impressed with me for declining to do a tour of Australia with him, and I was somewhat concerned he was the kind of guy who didn’t take rejection well.

Once I published my resignation article in the summer of 2019, it wasn’t long before Milo published an article of his own. To my surprise, it seemed to focus as much on my reputation as it did on my videographers. Maybe even more so, given how much of it was based on fabrications about my life. He claimed I had been a secret leftist all along, working to dismantle the right wing throughout my entire career, citing absurd “evidence” like me allegedly professing love for Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in private and collaborating with Antifa-adjacent activists. Well, he got me on one point, at least—she’s hot, what can I say?

As for my supposed Antifa connections? Milo included a short secret recording that Tommy Robinson had made of me, in which I admit to meeting with a far-left pressure group called Hope Not Hate. Of course, the clip conveniently left out the fact that I was meeting with them to secretly record the group, James O’Keefe-style. The meeting was uneventful, and the audio was unusable. Tommy already knew the story. Then, out of the blue, he called me one day asking me to repeat it. It got so strange I kept asking if he was recording the call. He swore he wouldn’t do something like that.

Not long after, I heard that very call, heavily edited without any context, played in a documentary he made. Poetic irony: I attempt to make my undercover debut and instead I end up with a cameo in someone else’s propaganda film. Lesson learned, God.

I should have laughed it off. The more time I spend outside the political world, the more embarrassed I am by how seriously I once took these allegations. It’s not even that they were unfounded—though they were—it’s that the whole thing feels so childish. A secret leftist? As if we all don’t have at least one at the dinner table on holidays. Who cares if I were? What does that even mean? Are we still in high school? Why are any of us even talking like this? Yet, back then, I did care, and it was devastating.

What stung my ego the most was Milo’s claim that I had never written my own content. He alleged that I traded sex for video ideas and scripts to climb the political ladder. A classic trope against women in politics and media. Almost poetic, given my past criticisms of feminism, a cosmic joke at my expense. Of course, it had to unfold this way. The accusation was so ridiculous it should have been obvious to anyone with a shred of common sense. No one needs to sleep with someone for ghostwritten content, especially when most of my work consisted of man-on-the-street videos. The whole notion was bafflingly stupid.

I’ve been clear: I was no “trad saint.” If that had been the allegation, fair enough. But I wasn’t guilty of what Milo claimed. And if it was scandal he was after, I was hardly the best target. Plenty of my male peers in the dissident space were hiring escorts, cheating, using drugs, even committing crimes. It didn’t escape me that many of the loudest amplifiers of his article were the ones most guilty of that behavior, and not coincidentally, men I’d rejected either romantically or professionally.

And yes, I can already hear the whinging: feminist this, feminist that. I didn’t flinch when people called me a racist for suggesting immigration rates might be a tad too high, and I’m certainly not losing sleep over being called a feminist for pointing out the glaring hypocrisy in right-wing media around gender.

You can see it in the podcasts that dominate right-wing spaces: panels of men dragging in groups of OnlyFans girls, shaming and humiliating them for their sexual pasts, pretending they represent “modern womanhood.” There’s no female equivalent on the right. No podcast where men are lined up and held to account for their own sexual behavior (or being the main drivers of OnlyFans). Instead, you get endless monologues from self-styled “truth-tellers” insisting that men are supposed to sleep around while women must remain chaste, as if that’s not completely antithetical to the conservative, religious, and family values the space generally claims to champion.

And that’s just what played out in public. Behind the scenes, the culture shaped by those beliefs was a mess. The same men building platforms to shame women for having sex outside of marriage were often the ones most aggressively trying to sleep with them. It was a rigged game. If a woman said yes, she was proof women had no virtue. If she said no, they’d sulk, badmouth her, or quietly blacklist her. I saw this cycle play out constantly, in my life and in the lives of women around me. It would’ve been funny if it weren’t so bleak. Everyone involved seemed trapped in a warped, self-defeating performance.

Honestly, at least Andrew Tate was publicly shameless about being a pimp and embracing double standards. It’s a more honest take than pretending any of this was about morals. Even beyond the podcast circuit, in the more polished, professional world, there’s no female equivalent to someone like Donald Trump or Elon Musk. A woman with endless baby-daddies would never be taken seriously within the Republican party.

When you build a system where men are granted limitless moral indulgences while women face social destruction for far less, you don’t create a culture of virtue, you create a culture of madness. It’s gaslighting at an industrial scale. And the truth is, you couldn’t even “fix” it by making the standards go both ways—because there were never any real standards to begin with. Just pharisaical sneering dressed up as moral clarity.

This was the world I operated in for a decade, and it made me worse at relationships, not better. Had I followed the examples my “saviour of the western world” peers set, I may have actually become the caricature Milo spun of me: using people for their bodies, treating intimacy like a transaction. But even at the height of my career I was still a romantic at heart, looking for a life partner. I made my dating mistakes the way our ancestors intended—awkwardly, emotionally, and without a single app (or ghost-writing agreement) in sight. Still, I somehow became a lightning rod for Internet morality panic. A friend joked that I should get a shirt like the one from the movie, easy A. It felt fitting. Only in this version, it wasn’t high school rumors spread by teenagers, it was a middle-aged man pounding out an eleven-thousand-word think piece about my dating life like it was Watergate.

At the end of the day, I’m human. I enjoyed a good relationship as much as the next person. I made poor choices that sometimes led to heartbreak. But Milo’s accusations weren’t rooted in reality; they were projections. Ironically, I think they mostly came because I was trying to walk away from the very people who I’d followed away from healthier paths. I’d seen behind the curtain, participated to a degree, and then decided it wasn’t for me. I wanted out. I wanted to heal, to clear my head, and see if I could still build something real. A family.

But walking away isn’t easy when people know what you’ve seen. The darker side of that dissident world doesn’t like loose ends. You don’t get to dip a toe in, then pull back—“oops, don’t really like that, but don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone what you’re all up to.” That made me both a complicit coward and a threat. The worst possible place to be, and exactly why I was hit with a reputational nuke.

At first, most dismissed the article as nonsense. But as I stayed silent, even skeptics started to believe it. I had my reasons (my visa), but I couldn’t share them. The traction was faster than I expected, thousands upon thousands of Twitter notifications sharing the article, spreading like wildfire. It felt orchestrated, like someone was pulling the strings.

In the piece, Milo pointed to various men who claimed I had sexually taken advantage of them for business purposes. Of course, he never named any of these men. While I knew the story was false, I struggled to determine how many were entirely fabricated versus how many were just guys in the space nursing a rejection wound or a personal gripe. Eventually, a friend tipped me off: Andrew Tate had been circulating the story in his private group, The War Room, a collection of men who were paid to promote and amplify his content. He had openly and proudly told them, regarding the men “on record” with Milo, “Everyone in the space knows it was me! Secret’s out. Oh well!” He also shared a chat with another content creator, who was apparently involved in the piece, Paul Joseph Watson.

In the conversation, Tate sent a voice note that appeared to outline some sort of strategy. Watson responded, seemingly in agreement, “Sounds like a plan.” I later discovered that, just before Milo’s article dropped, Watson shared my retirement announcement on his Telegram, writing:

“What type of young woman, with a huge audience of male incels jerking off with one hand and throwing money at her with the other, is going to ‘retire’? We all know the market value of women in media only decreases as they get older. Some would say she’s retiring for the sake of marriage and having kids… I’m sorry, but I just don’t buy it. If I were a cynical person, I’d say something sinister is about to come out that will shock the conservative world, and this ‘retirement’ is a manufactured exit to avoid something embarrassing and dirty. I wouldn’t put it past a woman who falsely accused me of rape to lie about why she’s ‘retiring.’”

I was baffled. I had never made any accusation of this sort against Watson. It was a pure fabrication. And, in reality, I was retiring for the sake of family and children. Paul, along with other associates of Tate, immediately amplified the article as soon as it was released. Later, despite offering his initial condolences, Tommy Robinson would even make his own video claiming a woman he knew was going to make false allegations, including falsely stating I travelled back to Romania to see Tate again. He lied about many things, both directly and by omission. Not once did he mention the very first words I said to him in that cab the next morning. I was devastated. He could have simply claimed ignorance about what happened that night. Instead, he chose to actively lie.

For a long time, I tried to understand why. What could possibly motivate someone to do something like that?

As far as I remember, the last time I saw Tommy was in a hotel hallway after we’d finished an interview about my UK ban. He was chasing me down the corridor, urging me to come back to his room to do some cocaine. I had no interest in returning to the spiral that began when he first introduced it to me at the club in the UK. I said I wouldn’t be going down that road again. I walked away. I can only assume that encounter has something to do with his animosity toward me now.

But perhaps it wasn’t just personal bitterness. Maybe it was something worse: self-preservation. After all, what kind of damage would it do to Tommy’s brand—built on exposing Muslim grooming gangs—if it ever came to light that he once brought a young woman to a compound run by a self-professed Muslim pimp, while high out of his mind, and she was assaulted on that very trip? In his mind, maybe protecting his image meant making me the problem. And maybe, like so many others in that world, he told himself whatever story he needed to feel like the good guy.

While the public assumed the only reason these men turned on me was that the accusations must be true. I saw their motivations clearly. A message was being sent to me, and a narrative was being carefully crafted—one with a clear objective: Lauren is not trustworthy. Lauren uses men for sex. Lauren falsely accuses men of rape. The reason she retired is because it’s all true. And there was one man who stood to benefit most from this smear campaign, the same man openly bragging about his role in Milo’s piece: Andrew Tate.

Worse, the eventual War Room leaks I received from a friend suggested that the entire Romanian “business meeting” had likely been a setup. In the leaked messages, Tate laughed with War Room members about the idea that any real investment plan had ever existed. “Do pimps give girls money?” he mocked. “We didn’t invest a fucking penny. Dropped her at the hotel. Invited her for steak—she came. Then the club—she came. Then the house—she came.” Of course, he conveniently left out the part where I never returned to his house. In reality, I was carried back to my hotel room. Did Tommy know it was a setup the whole time? Was I trafficked? What the fuck?

The more of this story I unraveled, the stranger it all became. Andrew was slowly gaining followers online, and then I realized he had DM’d me a year before we ever met. At the time, I didn’t know who he was. I didn’t connect the dots when Tommy introduced us. Reading the messages back now, they just have the energy of a throwaway fan interaction. He felt like one of thousands of small accounts that messaged me back then, hardly any followers, nothing that stood out. In those days, I interacted with my audience constantly. I had no concept of how dangerous it can be when you don’t know who you’re talking to. Letting people get close. Letting them feel like they own some part of you.

I’d send kind, thoughtful email replies to fans only for them to morph into years-long, one-sided, schizophrenic relationships that slowly wore me down. That openness stopped being safe.

We exchanged a few messages where Andrew cheered on my activism, I replied kindly, even made a quip about a funny tweet I’d seen on his page. But when the conversation shifted and he asked if I lived in England, I stopped responding. Questions like that were always a subtle bid to hang out. Like, no, I’m not going to visit you, random person on the Internet. I figured my silence made that clear. But apparently, he found other ways to get together, through mutual connections and faux business meetings.

I agonized over all of this. How intentional was it? How much of it was planned? Even now, I don’t know.

At that point, what haunted me most was the question of whether Milo was paid to write the article. But frankly, I could think of at least half a dozen people who would jump at the chance to ruin me, Milo himself included. Just writing that sentence makes me feel like I’ve been living in an alternate universe Gossip Girl with significantly less attractive characters: a bunch of Machiavellian nerds. There were clearly many conversations going on behind the scenes about what my future, or lack thereof, would be in the “movement.” I knew too much about them all.

Still, I couldn’t believe the smear campaign had begun before I had even spoken a word about Tate’s criminal activities. And I couldn’t believe how naive I had been to think that my silence and complicity in this cover-up would protect me. But when you operate like the Tate brothers, you live in a constant state of paranoia, playing whack-a-mole with perceived threats before they even materialize. At any given moment, you’re haunted by your past—ironically often creating the very future you fear.

The entire episode disturbed me to my core. To their credit, their plan worked. They got their results; they psychologically broke me. I never wanted to face these people again. Even if Andrew wasn’t actively paying for it, he was actively a part of creating and promoting the article. Andrew had been plotting to position himself as a hero of the right-wing media for a while. He’d been reaching out and building as many connections as possible with figures in the media sphere, flying them out to his compound in Romania, giving them donations, gathering information on them. My public profile was much bigger than his at the time, and I held significant influence over the dissident right-wing audience. For him to break into that space, he would need to eliminate any potential threats, especially a threat like me, who could turn my loyal audience against him before he’d even managed to get his brand going.

I wouldn’t put all these pieces together for a while, but at the time all I knew was that my audience was gone now. Aside from a handful of fans and friends I personally knew, my most dedicated political followers had already branded me a traitor and a whore, believing I had vanished before the full force of these allegations hit, knowing what was coming. Although it would still take Tate some time before he was able to properly enter the right-wing media space, I watched from afar as his public profile grew bit by bit. Strange, seemingly inorganic interviews began to emerge with personalities he had encountered in my former arena, appearing with increasing frequency. I was one of very few watching closely then. I’m not sure anyone else saw the repeated stories about him, seemingly amplified by bots—his early failed attempts to manufacture fame. He was dedicated, I’ll give him that, and eventually he got the formula right.

Now, you might be asking yourself, why didn’t I just sue Milo for defamation? Get some extra cash for my political retirement and clear my name? The truth is that the general public (those who don’t live in the online or media world) have a profoundly skewed perception of how defamation laws actually work. In reality, defamation law is largely designed to protect the wealthy. It’s not meant for the average person, and certainly not for mid-tier Internet celebrities like me.

Take my Wikipedia page, for example. It has never represented me accurately. It was a carefully curated hit piece managed by anonymous activists who despised me. Even Larry Sanger, Wikipedia’s co-founder, had warned that the site had become an activist-controlled narrative machine. But correcting the record wasn’t an option. Wikipedia isn’t a publisher; it’s a platform where anonymous editors shape public perception, often with no oversight.

To this day, one of the opening paragraphs of my page still falsely states that I was demonetized from YouTube and banned from GoFundMe, neither of which ever happened. But truth isn’t a requirement for Wikipedia; what matters is what a handful of dedicated editors decide is the “official” story. Wikipedia itself couldn’t be held accountable anyway, and tracking down the individual editors responsible would require a Norwich Order just to uncover their identities, assuming they weren’t scattered across different jurisdictions where legal action would be impossible. Even if I pursued a case, I’d need a six-figure retainer just to get started.

While suing someone like Milo for defamation wouldn’t come with the same hurdles as going after Wikipedia, it would still involve the same costs. Not to mention that once you’re classified as a “public figure,” the press is granted significant leeway to publish whatever “opinions” they choose about you. The Internet is a dangerous place, and these aren’t lessons taught in school. They’re ones I learned firsthand. Although credit where credit is due to the few teachers who warned us not to use Wikipedia as a source, and even more so to those who encouraged a general healthy skepticism in all media.

At the end of the day, I couldn’t respond to the accusations even if I wanted to. It felt unjust, but I accepted it as the cost of moving from my old life to a new one. I stopped looking. I didn’t care anymore. My real life needed me; it was time to move on.

At least, that’s what I told myself. But deep down, I did care. My soul ached. I felt betrayed. Not just by the online world, but by the very people I had risked everything for. When we talk about parasocial relationships, it’s usually the fans who are looking into a celebrity’s life. What we don’t discuss as much is the parasocial bond creators develop with their audience. I felt a sense of ownership over them. I believed they owed me loyalty; I had sacrificed so much for them, lost a part of my soul for them, faced imprisonment for them, put my life on the line for them.

But the truth is, they never owed me anything. They were never mine to begin with. I had built a parasocial relationship with them just as much as they had with me, and in many ways, I was the one who mistook their attention for something deeper, something personal. I wanted their loyalty, but I should’ve asked myself: loyalty to what? A version of me they had built in their heads? Or the real me, who had never really been the person they imagined in the first place?

I sank into a deep depression. Everything I’d built had been lost. I watched people I previously called friends mock and speculate about my life. The same accounts professing their love for me days earlier were now cheering on my demise.

I blamed everyone but myself. The situation was messed up—there’s no doubt about that—but I wasn’t setting myself up for success by refusing to see how my own choices had led me here. I had sold my soul. Enjoying the praise of people who don’t truly know you is a dangerous game because they don’t know you. They can be made to believe anything about you. And it’s not their job to dig deeper, to find out who you really are. They don’t owe me that. Maybe what they owe themselves, though, is to stop caring so much about the drama of the famous, because in the end, that obsession is as much of a perversion of the mind as my own obsession with their thoughts.

At the end of the day, I got on the fame train and rode it until it was going at speeds that threatened to kill me before I jumped off, and then I was angry at the train for taking me so far. I may not have known exactly what I was getting into, but no one forced me onto that train—I wasn’t a helpless passenger. I wanted the ride, I thrived on the speed, the attention, and sense of purpose it gave me. I say I jumped off, but really the train went off the rails. It stopped being fun. I like to focus on the crash, on my victimhood. But the part that’s hardest to admit? I was angry that the train had stopped serving me.