Gonzalo Lira

Lira was born to Chilean parents in Burbank, California.[5] He grew up in the San Fernando Valley, Los Angeles, New York, Miami and also Guayaquil, Ecuador. He graduated from Saint George's College, Santiago in 1985, and from Dartmouth College in 1995, with a degree in history and philosophy.[6]

According to El Mercurio, in December 1996, Lira signed a million-dollar book contract with G. P. Putnam's Sons to publish a commercial thriller entitled Counterparts. In 1997, he published a Spanish-language novel, Tomáh Errázurih. In 1998, he directed a short action film, So Kinky. He published a second English-language commercial thriller, Acrobat, in 2002. In 2005, in Chile, he filmed Secuestro, which despite a large investment, was not successful nor received favourable reviews.[7]

Between 2010 and 2013, Lira published his thoughts on economics and other subjects analysis on his blog, sometimes reposted by Business Insider[8] and on four occasions by Naked Capitalism.[9] He also contributed to Zero Hedge.[10] During this period, Lira contacted Australian economist Steve Keen, proposing him to work together on a project and start a content paid subscription site. According to Keen, Gonzalo "overstated and over-promised what he could do, then under-delivered", and that his demeanor led to the departure of collaborators and employees.[3]

From 2017, Lira was active on YouTube, under the pseudonym Coach Red Pill (CRP). This name is an allusion to Red Pill and Blue Pill symbolism in the Manosphere community. The content was anti-feminist in nature and appealed to incels.[7][11] Lira posted videos with advice such as "never date a woman in her thirties" and argued that all women really only want money, a house, and kids, as child-rearing is the one thing that will biologically validate them.[3] In one video, he advised viewers living in Western democracies to move to "a poor, underdeveloped country" due to the former's "totalitarian" deployment of COVID-19 vaccines.[10] He published over 500 videos, gaining 324,000 subscribers and around 2 million views.[12] In November 2021, Lira deleted most of his CRP content and began posting under his legal name.[3][7] He lives in Kharkiv, Ukraine and has family there.[3]

In mid-February 2022 Lira said that "no one over the age of 12 or with an IQ over 90 seriously believes that the Russians are going to invade [Ukraine] anytime soon".[13] After they did in fact invade just over a week later, he began to vlog about the invasion from what has been described by The Daily Beast as a pro-Russian or "pro-Putin" perspective,[3][14] for example calling the Bucha massacre a "hoax".[13] Segments from Lira's vlogs have been replayed on Channel One Russia.[3] Some of Lira's former associates have voiced skepticism that he is still in Kharkiv, from where he says he continues to vlog.[3]

On 17 April 2022, George Galloway announced on his YouTube channel "The Mother of All Talk Shows" that an interview with Gonzalo Lira scheduled for that edition could not be carried out due to having lost contact with him. According to the Cyprus Mail, friends and relatives of Lira stated that they had lost contact with him on 15 April.[4] On 22 April, Lira reappeared, alleging that he had been detained by the Security Service of Ukraine.[13]

• So Kinky (1998) — writer, director.
• Secuestro (2005) aka Catalina's Kidnapping — co-writer, co-producer, director.

• Lira, Gonzalo (1997). Tomáh Errázurih. Santiago: Grijalbo Mondadori. ISBN 978-956-258-057-1.
• Lira, Gonzalo (1998). Counterparts. New York: G.P. Putnam Sons. ISBN 978-0-399-14312-0.[15]
• Lira, Gonzalo (2002). Acrobat. New York: St Martin's Press. ISBN 978-0-312-28694-1.[16]

• IMDb page