Close to 10,000 people have signed a petition to prevent Julien Blanc, a “pick-up” artist banned from Australia and the UK for his misogynistic teachings, from entering Ireland.

Blanc, a 25-year-old American born in Switzerland, is a self-described “dating coach” affiliated with US-based company Real Social Dynamics (RSD). His teachings have come under intense scrutiny and generated a  backlash due to their derogatory nature and apparent championing of sexual assault and emotional manipulation of women.

Video footage surfaced recently showing Blanc putting women in chokeholds and pulling their heads towards his crotch, and he has been scorned for tweeting an image of a chart intended to help women better understand the signs of domestic abuse as “a checklist” for how to make a woman stay. Blanc has since deleted the tweet, but it was widely re-tweeted. 

This is NOT ok. Help stop this man who mocks domestic violence from speaking in Melbourne http://t.co/JmZETbX91x pic.twitter.com/mnbDKft5tj

— navycrockett (@navycrockett) November 4, 2014

His website, pimpingmygame, advertises, “Make girls BEG to sleep with you after short-circuiting their emotional and logical mind into a million reasons why they should.”

Blanc’s recent tour of Australia, where he was delivering his dating seminar and bootcamp workshops abruptly ended when the government decided to revoke his visa after widespread protests. Australia’s Minister for Immigration Scott Morrison told The Guardian, “This guy wasn’t putting forward political ideas. He was putting forward abuse that was derogatory to women and those values are abhorred in this country.”

He has also been denied a British visa and entry to the UK, where he was to have tour dates in February, after 150,000 people signed an online petition that went the Home Secretary.

Blanc is currently scheduled to travel to Ireland in June, 2015 where he plans to run a weekend-long workshop costing $2,000 (€1,600) a person.

A petition on change.org asking Ireland’s Naturalization and Immigration Services to deny him entry has collected 10,000 signatures so far.

In a CNN interview this week, Blanc offered an apology for the way his message has been interpreted. “I 100 percent take responsibility. I apologize 100 percent for it. I'm extremely sorry," he told anchor Chris Cuomo. 

”I feel horrible, I'm not going to be happy if I feel like I'm the most hated man in the world. I’m overwhelmed by the way people are responding.”