Gonzalo Lira

Gonzalo Ángel Quintilio Lira López (, February 29, 1968 – January 12, 2024) was a Chilean-American novelist, filmmaker, commentator and self-styled dating coach.

He was involved in the manosphere, posting anti-feminist content under the name Coach Red Pill.

As a resident of Kharkiv, Ukraine, he vlogged about the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine and was described as spreading Russian disinformation and propaganda.

In April 2022, Lira briefly disappeared and claimed to have been detained by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU).

In May 2023 Lira was arrested and charged with producing and publishing material that attempted to justify the ongoing Russian invasion, which is illegal under Ukrainian law.

Lira was released on bail, but attempted to flee the country.

He was arrested again for violating his bail conditions, and died of pneumonia in custody on January 12, 2024.

Lira was born to Chilean parents in Burbank, California, and grew up in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles; Guayaquil, Ecuador; and Santiago, Chile, among other places.

He graduated from Saint George's College, Santiago in 1985.

From 1985 until 1991, he worked as an English teacher and traveled in South America.

He entered Dartmouth College in 1991, graduating in 1995 with a bachelor's degree in history and philosophy.

After graduating, Lira moved to Los Angeles to pursue a career as a screenwriter.

Unsuccessful, he turned to writing novels.

In 1997, Lira released a Spanish-language coming-of-age novel, Tomáh Errázurih.

Lira's first English-language novel, a spy thriller called Counterparts, was published in January 1998 by G. P. Putnam's Sons.

Lira received an advance of one million U.S. dollars for the novel and a follow-up, upon which he was referred to by Qué Pasa magazine as the "highest paid Chilean writer in the world".

In 1998, after moving to New York City, Lira wrote, produced, and directed a short comedy film, So Kinky.

He was also involved in the story creation of the 2000 video game Soldier of Fortune.

Lira published a second English-language book, another spy thriller titled Acrobat, in 2002, the movie rights to which were bought by Miramax.

In 2005, he filmed Secuestro in Chile, which came in second in the box office in Chile following its opening weekend.

From 2010 to 2013, Lira published his thoughts on economics and other subjects on his blog, some of which were reposted by Business Insider, though a majority of his articles have since been removed.

He also contributed to Zero Hedge, a far-right financial and geopolitics website.

During this period, Lira contacted Australian economist Steve Keen, proposing a collaborative project and suggesting that they start a paid subscription website.

According to Keen, Gonzalo "overstated and over-promised what he could do".

From 2017 onward, Lira was active on YouTube under the pseudonym Coach Red Pill (CRP), an allusion to Red Pill and Black Pill symbolism in the manosphere community.

The content was misogynistic and anti-feminist in nature, appealing to incels.

Lira posted videos with advice such as "never date a woman in her thirties" and argued that all women wanted was money, a house, and kids, as only child-rearing would biologically validate them.

In one video, he advised viewers living in Western democracies to move to "a poor, underdeveloped country" due to the former's supposed "totalitarian" deployment of COVID-19 vaccines.

In November 2021, Lira deleted most of his CRP content and began posting under his legal name.

Following the Russian invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Lira shifted the majority of his commentary to the war.

Lira's content was heavily pro-Russian, praising Russian military actions and denying Russian attacks on civilians, as well as doxxing Western journalists.

His content, which has been described as Russian propaganda and disinformation, was amplified on social media by Kremlin-linked accounts and praised by Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova.

Lira lived in Kharkiv, and married a Ukrainian woman with whom he had two children, though the pair later separated.

On April 15, 2022, friends and family of Lira said that they had lost touch with him, after which Chile's Ministry of Foreign Affairs began searching for his whereabouts.

Ukraine-based American journalist Sarah Ashton-Cirillo reported Lira's apparent capture by Ukrainian forces on April 18.

Lira became the subject of conspiracy theories surrounding his alleged murder, but resurfaced alive on April 22, 2022, claiming that he had been detained by the SBU for the period he was missing.

On May 1, 2023, Lira was arrested for violating Article 436-2 of Ukraine's criminal code, which prohibits justification of Russia's ongoing invasion of the country.

The Ukrainian Centre for Strategic Communication and Information Security noted Lira had also shared pro-Russian disinformation such as claiming the Bucha massacre was faked or that the Ukrainian government was a Neo-Nazi regime, and that Lira had shared video of himself insulting Ukrainian soldiers.

His arrest was reported by the SBU on May 5.

Lira was subsequently released on bail and placed under house arrest.