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→ Four in 10 voters think Reform UK is ‘extremist’
Nigel Farage’s bid to make Reform UK respectable has come up against another stumbling block. After standing general election candidates accused of racism and a tussle with Channel 4, new polling reflects the party’s mixed success in winning over mainstream voters. While Reform’s support base remains committed to the Faragist cause, YouGov data shows that the word most associated with the party among the British public is “extremist”, with 39% of voters employing the term.
The same percentage of respondents believe that Reform “should be nowhere near power”, while just under a third describe the party as “dishonest” and more than a quarter judge it to be “unprofessional”. Farage will no doubt be perturbed that a third of Brits consider Reform to be “nasty”. Have the Tories now lost that title?
→ Blue zones exposed as fraud
The secret to living past 100? There isn’t one. The vaunted “blue zones” of the world, in which residents routinely live past 100, are in fact merely rife with pension fraud and clerical errors, according to Nobel Prize-winning research.
Utterly obsessed with this UCL researcher who won an Ig Nobel for showing that “Blue Zones” where people supposedly live well past 100 at unusual rates are actually just full of clerical errors and people committing pension fraud https://t.co/wJZRvF3RVU
— Claire Zagorski, MSc, LP (@clairezagorski) September 19, 2024
Sardinian nonnas aren’t living to 110 as a result of the Mediterranean diet — it’s because their ne’er-do-well grandchildren are scamming the public benefits system for years after their deaths. Ditto, apparently, for Okinawa and Ikaria. Bewilderingly, the general populations of these supposed blue zones experience higher crime rates, lower literacy, and shorter life expectancy than their national average, a telltale sign that something is amiss with the blue-zone myth. Fewer than a fifth of “validated supercentenarians” even have a birth certificate in existing research. We’re going to need a new diet fad.
→ Johns Hopkins publishes diversity data
Another elite college has published its demographic data for the first post-affirmative action admissions cycle. Johns Hopkins University’s incoming freshman class saw the black and Hispanic populations decline by more than half compared to the year prior, returning to 2010 levels. The share of white students decreased — from 39% to 34% — while the proportion of Asian students increased from 32% to 46%.
The drastic changes indicate that the consideration of race was a major factor in JHU’s admissions over the past decade. The school’s president and provost called the recent demographic changes “profoundly disappointing”. The spike in students from low-income backgrounds was apparently little consolation.
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Subscribe2 out of five think reform are bad? Well one in five put labour into a majority government so on that basis the reform odds should be 3/1 on – I’ll buy that for a dollar . . .
I actually take it as promising. In effect, it means 6 out of 10 Britons oppose the ruling political class and might even accept a challenge to the current constitutional model.
There are 300 people over 105 in Tower Hamlets.
Yes, and they all live live in the same two bedroom flat and vote for Lutfur Rahmen.
Why would I not be surprised?
Reform need to be far more extremist to tackle the remigration that will be needed in the very near future.
In the socialist utopia desired by a certain kind of egalitarian each and every one of us would be scamming the benefit system.
The upper middle class radicals who advocate for socialism wants socialism for themselves, not for the masses. They want a type of socialism where they themselves will always be in a position of power and be able to dictate every aspect of the masses lives and reap the rewards of power, prestige, and money. It’s why you find these people working both in government and large corporations, It may not be what they want exactly but it suits their desires. But despite their desires, The bulk of these people would be reluctant to enact a true socialist revolution because they themselves benefit from the established order and would lose everything they have to the collectiv, and would work hard to keep the established order. George Orwell had these people pegged quite well and understood them.
Indeed he did, as “Gift-gate” has just shown…” looked from the pigs to the men, and the men to the pigs”…and, of course, there is no difference whatsoever.
That’s where 30 years of “progressive” mass political, media and educational brainwashing gets you. Things which not that long ago were considered normal and common sense are now “extremist”.
It feels like half the country knows they’ve been lied to and the other half still believe what they’re told.
Some extreme common sense is certainly needed now.
It’s interesting that Reform voters largely agree with the general population: Reform is far from moderate. The difference is that Reform voters think desperate times call for desperate remedies. The rest of us are not so inclined to go down that particular rabbit-hole.
Polls produce the answer wanted by those paying for them.
Copium
Of course Reform is the new nasty party. It’s full of fascist, racist, homophobic, xenophobic, transphobic, misogynistic, Europe-hating, bigoted thickos. That’s what I’ve been told anyway.
We “Reformers” know who told you that.
Reform extremist? Well it certainly attracts a good number of those, alongside a good number with a racial reflex. But arguably its biggest magnetic effect is with the plain silly.
Led by Farage & Tice, as establishment as they come, Reform will never do more than amplify rage and give the soppy a chance to bask in the comfort of echo chamber where they can spout twaddle and prejudice to hearts content. Listening to one speech at their Conference this week by some non entity was v informative – hated rainbow lanyards – Boo, covid vaccines – Boo, the OBR- Boo, BBC- Boo, Strictly having diverse contestants – Boo, and here’s the stinger – taxes on wealthy folks like himself. Then another Clown raged about Vegans – Boo, Net zero – Boo, Sadiq Khan – double Boo, BLM – Boo but then bizarrely went on about the virtues of comic Jim Davidson.
And they go home convinced everyone else worried about these things. Not a practical policy in sight, which of course isn’t a focus anyway as they don’t ever expect to have to take responsibility. On the Continent such a gathering would probably have had an air of menace, but this was just a bucket of silliness with a few balloons.
It’s a party conference speech. That’s what people do at party conferences – they are the original echo chambers. All parties behave like that. The whole point is to fire people up. Why were you expecting anything different ? Have you not noticed the other parties doing much the same ?
If you don’t like it, just turn it off and do something more rewarding.
You seem to be stuck in this logical fallacy that Reform are somehow silly (or any other critical word) because they have some silly supporters. All parties have silly supporters.
Some of that is fair PB, but what fires up people also informative. The paucity of practical policy also.
I’m afraid, you are also silly supporter
Of who El? Intrigued.
The Blue zones research won an Ig Nobel prize, not a Nobel prize. Totally unconnected.
Not totally disconnected)
I imagine 40% of the population also believe that Labour is actually a socialist party as well. The statistics quoted don’t tell us much about the perception of Reform per se as much as little of the Overton window is still ajar.
Mainstream voters.
Mainstream voters are myopic sheep.
We need to wake up