But is it really shocking? A week after the interview UKIP triumphed in the 2014 European election. So racist Farage, as obnoxious as he is to me and you, clearly appealed to significant % of voters, as he continues to do in today's Reform party
Replies
Farage has been aided by being given a ridiculously free ride across swathes of the UK media, including the BBC, for years and years. Clearly, some powerful people want a Reform government despite them being a one issue incompetent mess when actually faced with responsibility.
aug 14, 2025, 2:06 pm • 0 0 • view
'Appeal' on what basis? What does he offer that he can deliver and what they actually want.
aug 13, 2025, 10:54 pm • 0 0 • view
He delivers (in campaign) the image of the man of the people and the memory of empire. If you want to believe / feel that then he’s your man. Additionally, his followers often confuse Strong Leadership with the authoritarian and fascistic people he adores.
aug 14, 2025, 7:45 am • 0 0 • view
True
aug 13, 2025, 9:46 pm • 8 0 • view
We used to rely on the politicians to provide the moral backbone of the U.K. The electorate are a pretty despicable bunch. Or, at least enough of them are, It turns out.
aug 13, 2025, 10:23 pm • 0 0 • view
Just a thought. Farage led one of the Leave campaigns. I believe more see leaving now as a mistake than think out was good...and yet they still tell polls he is their man. It's not policies (he's a one trick pony) it's a cult thing going on with all the associated manipulation of facts etc
aug 14, 2025, 5:34 am • 8 0 • view
Talk to Reform 'voters' and the vast majority cannot name you more than one policy (boats). You might get DOGE stuff also but that's incoherent rubbish Untill we treat it like MAGA, a cult, we are not going to get anywhere. People are looking for messiahs. Johnson blew it so now they have switched
aug 14, 2025, 5:34 am • 14 2 • view
What I'll never understand is why working-class people see upper-middle-class public schoolboys Johnson and then Farage as just the saviours to understand ordinary people's predicament.
aug 14, 2025, 3:26 pm • 6 0 • view
The upper class use the various levels of the middle class, right down to the ganger/non commissioned officer, to talk to those at the bottom. This is because they don't want to be sully themselves. Ofc the working class hate the ganger, because he makes them work, and they love to see the next
aug 14, 2025, 4:35 pm • 1 0 • view
level up bullying him in return.
aug 14, 2025, 4:35 pm • 1 0 • view
The result is that the people at the bottom of near the bottom have no idea how horrendous the people at the top are, because they never meet them and attribute all their plans and schemes to the people who are tasked with telling them. They shoot the messenger.
aug 14, 2025, 4:45 pm • 4 0 • view
Good points
aug 14, 2025, 6:19 pm • 1 0 • view
Thanks. Everybody hates this guy⬇️
aug 14, 2025, 6:26 pm • 0 0 • view
There's probably a book on it somewhere with a cartoon of a chimney sweep doffing his hat to the bloke in his Top hat and tails!
aug 14, 2025, 3:36 pm • 4 0 • view
There's definitely a Cleese, Barker & Corbett sketch! www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p...
aug 14, 2025, 4:29 pm • 7 0 • view
Yes that did pass through the grey matter. It's so on point
aug 14, 2025, 6:11 pm • 1 0 • view
The very uncomfortable truth is that 35%+ of the population is a little (some a lot) racist, and Farage has found a way (with lots of media compliance) to stretch the window of "racist things you can acceptably say out loud". His racism would not help him if there wasn't an electoral market for it.
aug 14, 2025, 5:24 pm • 7 0 • view
The racists were always there but now they've been given a mainstream voice.
aug 14, 2025, 5:27 pm • 12 0 • view
I wouldn't go that far. My gut feeling was that around 20% are very right wing, and maybe not even all of those are really racist at their core. But there is another rightwood-leaning in the middle cohort, in my opinion "low information voters" who are easily led by misinformation and rhetoric 1/2
aug 14, 2025, 5:44 pm • 1 0 • view
My guess is that half the 20% very right wing are a lost cause. But the other half and the "rightward middle" are addressable if not labelled as racists or thick (I called them low information, but that's not the same!). But politicians inflaming the subject with misinformation doesn't help 2/2
aug 14, 2025, 5:44 pm • 1 0 • view
Agree totally on one thing. Calling Brexiter's gammon was a big mistake. Like many others I did it initially but very soon stopped as it was clear that approach was having a negative effect, providing a way for them to push back on something other than Brexit facts
aug 14, 2025, 6:17 pm • 1 0 • view
Prof Haidt @jonathanhaidt.bsky.social provided this interesting analysis back in 2012 (pre-Trump). He was primarily focused on US voters, but the social psychology theories (duping hypothesis, moral interests, moral 'cuisine' etc) could apply equally to Brits... www.theguardian.com/society/2012...
aug 14, 2025, 3:53 pm • 1 0 • view
If this is true, we are all doomed.
aug 14, 2025, 4:06 pm • 0 0 • view
Reform has policies but ragbag of grievance remedies or risible promises: -Stop small boats/health tourism/‘woke’ policing -Stop "war on drivers”, scrap net zero -Cut EU regs and red tape -Lower taxes, “make work pay” -More police, doctors -Nice immigration only & renogotiate amazing deal with EU!
aug 14, 2025, 7:35 am • 0 0 • view
My point was find a Reform voters who can name them let alone elucidate them
aug 14, 2025, 7:38 am • 2 1 • view
In other words, the standard populist/fascist shit written in Moscow and regurgitated by 'such' partys all over the western world. Where this leads, see USA. They are one step from firing up the ovens.
aug 14, 2025, 7:41 am • 1 0 • view