[News] Nigel Farage and Reform

[nevergoagain]

Reform UK fake candidate conspiracy theories debunked

How an airbrushed photo led to claims Nigel Farage's party was fielding fictional election candidates.

www.bbc.co.uk

 

[A1X]

Will Nigel Farage behave in Commons after record as a ‘ranting’ MEP?

Reform leader made reputation in 2010 speech calling former Belgian PM Herman Van Rompuy a ‘damp rag’

www.theguardian.com

Good, if he can’t act like a grownup then he doesn’t belong in Parliament

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Will Nigel Farage behave in Commons after record as a ‘ranting’ MEP?

Reform leader made reputation in 2010 speech calling former Belgian PM Herman Van Rompuy a ‘damp rag’

www.theguardian.com

Yet his first speech was to insult the former Speaker of the House?

 

[WATFORD zero]

Reform UK fake candidate conspiracy theories debunked

How an airbrushed photo led to claims Nigel Farage's party was fielding fictional election candidates.

www.bbc.co.uk

Certainly appears to just be an Internet rumour started by a mix of desperately getting friends, relations and office workers of Reform that were not associated with the constituency in any way to stand as paper candidates at the last minute. That, together with an AI image of a candidate and marketing literature using photos claiming that dead people were voting for Reform.

Somehow, it just grew from there

 

[Zeberdi]

Of course not, that's perfectly normal and happened at my school but the teachers facilitated, not participated.

Yes I fully expect teachers to discuss racism and discrimination but without their own political slants applied.

Is speaking out against groups that engender racism and discrimination a “political slant”?

I thought it was just being a human being, respectful of other people’s differences and culture.

Making lists against teachers doing this, stinks of the sort of blacklisting we saw in the McCarthy era and the anti-evolution, anti-vaxxer movements against schools in America by far right groups.

 

[The Clamp]

Is speaking out against groups that engender racism and discrimination a “political slant”?

I thought it was just being a human being, respectful of other people’s differences and culture.

Making lists against teachers doing this, stinks of the sort of blacklisting we saw in the McCarthy era and the anti-evolution, anti-vaxxer movements against schools in America by far right groups.

Exactly. No different to speaking out against the KKK.

I’m not equating Reform to the KKK. It’s the principle I’m highlighting.

Reform is not a legitimate political party.

 

[Eric the meek]

Certainly appears to just be an Internet rumour started by a mix of desperately getting friends, relations and office workers of Reform that were not associated with the constituency in any way to stand as paper candidates at the last minute. That, together with an AI image of a candidate and marketing literature using photos claiming that dead people were voting for Reform.

Somehow, it just grew from there

From that BBC article:

'For opposition parties this practice is particularly important for amassing "short money" - the funds handed out by parliament to help them hold the government to account. A party is awarded £22,295.86 for every seat won at the general election plus £44.53 for every 200 votes amassed.'

Are you suggesting that Reform threw Auntie Flo, Shazza the dog walker, and Dave down the pub at the election, purely to amass votes and put more money in the coffers?

 

[Billy the Fish]

So the fake candidates theory has pretty much been debunked, which is weird because those ethical reporters at byline times wouldn't print things before they had proof would they?

But anyway, lets brush it under the carpet and never mention it again.

Lets address the lists and the nazis. The obvious answer is that some parents (probably Reform voters) have made a complaint to R Lowe that teachers are trying to influence their children in a way they're not supposed to. This may or may not be correct, who knows, but he's well within his rights to make an official complaint. If he's been given more than one name he probably had to keep them in a LIST (arrrrrrrrrgggghhhh) in order to remember them and forward the correct name to the relevant authority. That's it. Most likely nothing will come of it.

The stupid thing is there's actually real story here - paper candidates (which I'd not heard of until now) and our electoral system allowing any old person to stand for election seems a bit unethical to me and it's certainly worthy of a debate.

But byline times and their band of twitter followers are ignoring this angle because they can't help themselves and have to go for the biggest scandal, and when that failed they double down and come up with some mad comparisons with Nazis based on a throwaway comment.

 

[Thunder Bolt]

So the fake candidates theory has pretty much been debunked, which is weird because those ethical reporters at byline times wouldn't print things before they had proof would they?

But anyway, lets brush it under the carpet and never mention it again.

Lets address the lists and the nazis. The obvious answer is that some parents (probably Reform voters) have made a complaint to R Lowe that teachers are trying to influence their children in a way they're not supposed to. This may or may not be correct, who knows, but he's well within his rights to make an official complaint. If he's been given more than one name he probably had to keep them in a LIST (arrrrrrrrrgggghhhh) in order to remember them and forward the correct name to the relevant authority. That's it. Most likely nothing will come of it.

The stupid thing is there's actually real story here - paper candidates (which I'd not heard of until now) and our electoral system allowing any old person to stand for election seems a bit unethical to me and it's certainly worthy of a debate.

But byline times and their band of twitter followers are ignoring this angle because they can't help themselves and have to go for the biggest scandal, and when that failed they double down and come up with some mad comparisons with Nazis based on a throwaway comment.

Before you go in all guns blazing, I highlighted the investigation by Byline Times, which was an investigation not an accusation. It has now been established that Reform weren't ready for an election, and asked the dogwalker, Dave down the pub, someone's partner and a Crawley college student to stand as candidates.
Like you, I hadn't ever heard of paper candidates, so thanks to @Brovion we all know a bit more now.

Only one person on this thread has mentioned Nazis or fascists so please don't conflate the two issues.

 

[Eric the meek]

So the fake candidates theory has pretty much been debunked, which is weird because those ethical reporters at byline times wouldn't print things before they had proof would they?

But anyway, lets brush it under the carpet and never mention it again.

Lets address the lists and the nazis. The obvious answer is that some parents (probably Reform voters) have made a complaint to R Lowe that teachers are trying to influence their children in a way they're not supposed to. This may or may not be correct, who knows, but he's well within his rights to make an official complaint. If he's been given more than one name he probably had to keep them in a LIST (arrrrrrrrrgggghhhh) in order to remember them and forward the correct name to the relevant authority. That's it. Most likely nothing will come of it.

The stupid thing is there's actually real story here - paper candidates (which I'd not heard of until now) and our electoral system allowing any old person to stand for election seems a bit unethical to me and it's certainly worthy of a debate.

But byline times and their band of twitter followers are ignoring this angle because they can't help themselves and have to go for the biggest scandal, and when that failed they double down and come up with some mad comparisons with Nazis based on a throwaway comment.

Thanks for clearing it all up. A few of us have questioned Reform tactics, but it looks like we were all wrong. You've nailed it.

'The obvious answer is etc'.
'Probably'
'He probably had to keep them in a list'
'That's it'.

Do you have the capacity to see that you made up an entire scenario about what happened, and write it immediately after you criticise the Byline Times for doing the exact same thing?

#selfawareness

 

[Billy the Fish]

Thanks for clearing it all up. A few of us have questioned Reform tactics, but it looks like we were all wrong. You've nailed it.

'The obvious answer is etc'.
'Probably'
'He probably had to keep them in a list'
'That's it'.

Do you have the capacity to see that you made up an entire scenario about what happened, and write it immediately after you criticise the Byline Times for doing the exact same thing?

#selfawareness

It's a theory, I'm not presenting it as anything else. To me it's the most likely scenario. I did the same thing with the fake candidates story.

How are you making a serious comparison between me (nameless poster on football message board) and the byline times?

@Eric the meek - on balance of probability, what do you think is more likely. My scenario or Reform UK are compiling a dossier on people who disagree with them, presumably for nefarious activities in the future?

 

[Eric the meek]

It's a theory, I'm not presenting it as anything else. To me it's the most likely scenario. I did the same thing with the fake candidates story.

How are you making a serious comparison between me (nameless poster on football message board) and the byline times?

@Eric the meek - on balance of probability, what do you think is more likely. My scenario or Reform UK are compiling a dossier on people who disagree with them, presumably for nefarious activities in the future?

I'm not making a comparison. I'm expressing my incredulity.

I pointed out that you had criticised The Byline Times for their reporters printing something before they had proof. You even used an emoji to emphasise your point. You then made exactly the same mistake that you had criticised them for.

You then reply by asking me if I'm making a serious comparison.

 

[Zeberdi]

Lets address the lists and the nazis. The obvious answer is that some parents (probably Reform voters) have made a complaint to R Lowe that teachers are trying to influence their children in a way they're not supposed to. This may or may not be correct, who knows, but he's well within his rights to make an official complaint. If he's been given more than one name he probably had to keep them in a LIST (arrrrrrrrrgggghhhh) in order to remember them and forward the correct name to the relevant authority. That's it. Most likely nothing will come of it.

Let’s change that narrative for you:

Lets address the lists and the ’nazis’. The possible answer is that some children (probably those with parents who are Reform voters) have gone home and told their parents that teachers said Reform blames much of what is wrong with the Country on immigrants and the leaders of that political group are rooted in a hard right ideology that is unapologetically racist as Farage’s birthism remarks about Sunak’s early exit from the Dday celebration showed. This may or may not be correct, who knows, but Reformer parents are well within their rights to make an official complaint if they feel their children have been misled about Reform’s true xenophobic and racist nature . That's it. Most likely nothing will come of it. Btw, the complainant suffers from amnesia apparently so this may undermine his complaint.

*”(I)f [Rishi Sunak’s] instinct was the same as the British people’s he would never have contemplated for a moment not being there for the big international ceremony. He’s utterly disconnected in every way”. Farage 2024 referring to Sunak’s ethnicity and leaving 250,000 residents of Southhampton wondering why they’d never been told that Southhampton is no longer a part of Great Britain but had been granted independence in some vague and distant past.

 

[Billy the Fish]

Good try, but that makes absolutely no sense.

I'll accept a change of "obvious" to either "possible" or "more likely".

 

[Zeberdi]

Good try, but that makes absolutely no sense.

I'll accept a change of "obvious" to either "possible" or "more likely".

It’s just as ‘sensical’ as your narrative.

Saying Reformer parents complained about what teachers were saying about Reform makes perfect sense to me - no one likes to admit that their political allegiances are for a group that courts popularism by demonising immigrants and people of colour so of course they would complain if their kids had come home and said that..

One could easily say, thank goodness for schools fending off the risk of children being unduly influenced by the bigotry of their parents.

 

[Harry Wilson's tackle]

Thanks for clearing it all up. A few of us have questioned Reform tactics, but it looks like we were all wrong. You've nailed it.

'The obvious answer is etc'.
'Probably'
'He probably had to keep them in a list'
'That's it'.

Do you have the capacity to see that you made up an entire scenario about what happened, and write it immediately after you criticise the Byline Times for doing the exact same thing?

#selfawareness

Excellent post.

It is weird how people try to prove a hypothesis is wrong (which is good - the scientific method) by raising four other hypotheses (which is whataboutery).

It is true that some hypotheses are not worth testing. For example, Kier Starmer is a space alien. And just because they hypothesis isn't disproven (because nobody gives it credence) does not make it likely it is correct.

On the other hand, some hypotheses that are under test are important and plausible and the way to test them is, er, to test them. For example, the "Reform mode of operation is dodgy". Raising other hypotheses won't make it more likely that this one is wrong.

 

[nevergoagain]

Another pile on by usual suspects. Interesting the topic of "paper candidates" as others have mentioned, I'd not heard of the practice either but does seem like the smaller parties do use them so not a new thing. Greens seem to do the same. Money yes but also I read that if you stand in more than a 6th of seats then you are granted a party political broadcast so that makes a little more sense for the smaller groups to get greater exposure.

On the money side, unless you actually win the seat which gets you a lot of cash then it's something like £44 per 200 votes received but that's offset against the £500 deposit to stand. Roughly 2200 votes to break even then.

 

[Billy the Fish]

I'm not making a comparison. I'm expressing my incredulity.

I pointed out that you had criticised The Byline Times for their reporters printing something before they had proof. You even used an emoji to emphasise your point. You then made exactly the same mistake that you had criticised them for.

You then reply by asking me if I'm making a serious comparison.

What are you incredulous about? That a poster on a forum isn't equivalent to a regulated publication.

What you're implying is utter bullshit.

 

[GrizzlingGammon]

Another pile on by usual suspects. Interesting the topic of "paper candidates" as others have mentioned, I'd not heard of the practice either but does seem like the smaller parties do use them so not a new thing. Greens seem to do the same. Money yes but also I read that if you stand in more than a 6th of seats then you are granted a party political broadcast so that makes a little more sense for the smaller groups to get greater exposure.

On the money side, unless you actually win the seat which gets you a lot of cash then it's something like £44 per 200 votes received but that's offset against the £500 deposit to stand. Roughly 2200 votes to break even then.

It happens when someone says something a little bit silly.

 

[Eric the meek]

Excellent post.

It is weird how people try to prove a hypothesis is wrong (which is good - the scientific method) by raising four other hypotheses (which is whataboutery).

It is true that some hypotheses are not worth testing. For example, Kier Starmer is a space alien. And just because they hypothesis isn't disproven (because nobody gives it credence) does not make it likely it is correct.

On the other hand, some hypotheses that are under test are important and plausible and the way to test them is, er, to test them. For example, the "Reform mode of operation is dodgy". Raising other hypotheses won't make it more likely that this one is wrong.

You put that better than I could.

Normally, I'm all for evidence based analysis (that's where my heart is), but I realise that this is a forum, and at the time of writing, nothing is proven or disproven about the lists of teachers, and speculation is more entertaining than facts. If we all waited for the evidence to emerge, if it ever does emerge, then we wouldn't have much to write about!