People are celebrating the ‘loony mudslide’ that buried UKIP

Nelson Muntz pointing at UKIP logo


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While the Lib Dems won Brecon’s by-election on 1 August, the Monster Raving Loony Party stole the show. 334 people voted for its candidate, Lady Lily the Pink, meaning the party came second to last – above UKIP. And the reaction on social media has been priceless.

“The second most Loony party in Britain”

Many in the media view the Brecon by-election as a proxy vote on both Brexit and Boris Johnson’s leadership. Meanwhile, the public is viewing the Monster Raving Loony Party’s success as a sign that the party which started it all is finally dead.

Some people pointed out that a satirical party’s beating of UKIP shows just how low the party has sunk:

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The Monster Raving Loony Party itself used the #LoonyMudslide hashtag to rub it in:

While Lady Lily the Pink herself was very happy about the outcome:

Even former UKIP general secretary Paul Oakley admitted the results were damning:

But, predictably, some used the results as a stick to bash Jeremy Corbyn and Labour with:

Bootle, 1990

Some have compared Lady Lily the Pink’s Brecon by-election success to the 1990 Bootle by-election:

Founder and then-leader of the Monster Raving Loony Party, Screaming Lord Sutch, beat the Social Democratic Party (SDP) candidate. The SDP’s Bootle defeat is seen as the event that finished the ailing party off, leading to the birth of the Lib Dems.

Former UKIP leader Gerard Batten left the party on 2 June after disastrous European election results in which the party lost all of its seats, including Batten’s own. Nigel Farage’s new group, the Brexit Party, effectively usurped UKIP. Meanwhile, the Tories have lurched further right in recent years, picking up many former UKIP supporters.

Farage once claimed that UKIP thrived from the British National Party’s (BNP) demise, stealing a third of its votes. It also replaced the BNP as a symbol of overt racism in the political establishment. But the right-ward shift of the ‘Overton window‘ in recent years means overt racism has once again become part of the political mainstream.

Time to laugh

In the run-up to the Brecon by-election, Lady Lily the Pink said, “I’m not a real politician. I’m not even a real Lady, I am however a real Loony”. And that:

Like a large proportion of the electorate I’m angry… at the failings, the loopholes and the all-too-often self-serving system of governance we currently have.

UKIP may be at death’s door, but the nationalist and racist voices it reflected haven’t gone away. There’s serious work to be done on the streets and in the polling booths to make sure they don’t thrive. But the response to the Monster Raving Loony Party’s result shows there’s always time for a good laugh.

Featured image via YouTube – TheRealJims / Wikimedia

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  • Show Comments

    1. My supposition would be that prople no longer need to feel the need to support UKIP if they want Brexit, becuase the Conservatives are promising to do it for them.

      So I wouldn’t neccessarily call this good news for Remainers, as it means people may well have returned to the Conservative Party from UKIP. Something Boris is aiming to do.

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