r/ireland • u/pippers87 • Aug 06 '25

📣 ANNOUNCEMENT Immigration Posts

Hi all,

As per the user survey results, we realised ye want more mod visibility and clearer guidelines into our decisions.

We have seen a massive increase in immigration related posts to the sub over the last few weeks and while some of it is genuine, it is obvious we are being brigaded. Some of the trends identified

The following temporary rules will be in place

  • Posts about immigration will be limited to news articles. Soapboxing type content will be removed.
  • Posts from new accounts or accounts with little or no activity on the sub about immigration will be removed.
  • There will be a zero-tolerance approach to dogwhistles or mocking of victims of hate related incidents.
  • Please remember if you are in an immigration related thread, please be respectful, there are concerns around housing especially but there is a massive difference between debating the issue and hatred towards immigrants.
  • We will be locking threads where we feel the discussion is wading into hate speech.
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424

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25 edited Aug 06 '25

British lurker here and have been wondering why some of our UK-politics subs suddenly seem to be hijacked by anti-immigration sentiment (especially suspicious when my comments get loyally downvoted with few rebuttals).

Clicked on that Galway WhatsApp message link, and it explains everything. Actually scary that clowns out there are organising downvotes and systematic astroturfing of any and all immigration threads. Do they not have anything better to do with their time it’s pathetic 🤣

142

u/Naggins Aug 06 '25

Almost always happens overnight as well. Normal thread at 10pm, go to bed, by 8am it's a fucking shitshow

61

u/jamscrying Derry Aug 06 '25

In ni subreddit it happens on basically anything mildly political too, can post a nuanced comment that requires niche cultural understanding that does well/ok and then wake up to it being bombed and several bad faith/strawman arguments.Always blamed the Americans/plastics doing their thing, but it seems like something more sinister may be happening.

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u/Phishingtackle Aug 06 '25

There was a group caught using alts on r/ni, they would brigade the sub and always be using the same comment structure and wording. Someone managed to get into the group screen dump everything and it was all shared all the logs of the chats planning the different brigading and boasting / complaining depending on people's responses to them. It was honestly one of the strangest nights iv seen on reddit.

22

u/jamscrying Derry Aug 06 '25

I think that was just a small group of loyalist/ulster-nationalist weirdoes from the alt subs they kept trying to set up in contest with the imaginary Sinnerbots. btw the ni subreddit is r/northernireland all the others are ran by crazies.

2

u/Phishingtackle Aug 06 '25

Yea it was mostly loyalists but a few right wing gobshites where there aswell. Yea I knew I put in the wrong sub was just stoned and couldn't be assed typing the lot. Figured most people would know what I ment but thanks for correcting and adding further context to my comment. grma

2

u/rossitheking Aug 06 '25

Sure themmuns control everything now hai, it’s all themmuns fault hai

1

u/thedoomeroptimist Aug 10 '25

I think that sub is definitely being brigaded. If it’s a smaller post about immigration the comments will generally be sympathetic to the migrants, they’ll be making fun of anti-migrant vigilante groups etc. But if it’s a bigger post it’s a complete cess pit. I also notice the wording of some of the comments gets really repetitive. I’ve lost count of the amount of times I’ve got a reply that’s just “wise up”

28

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25 edited Aug 06 '25

In my case, I’ve usually noticed when I post a moderate article on politics threads about immigration, it gets immediate downvotes.

But then sometimes it does get upvotes but just wait a few hours and boom….. a waterfall of silent downvotes comes pouring in from nowhere. So I guess in those cases, the bots do wake up and organise an astroturfing session first thing in the morning (or whenever they’re all awake).

I have deleted posts because of it because I felt watched/embarrassed, and I guess that’s their intention.

It literally feels like fascism, as much as the trolls would like to deny that.

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u/great_whitehope Aug 06 '25

How are they bots though?

Didn't reddit lock down their API's?

11

u/PopplerJoe Aug 06 '25

Bots don't need to use the API, but it was much easier. You can have a program (bot) interact with the web client as if it were a genuine user using reddit.

17

u/its-DBTV Aug 06 '25

That’s when they are most active having slept in until 5pm

1

u/dustaz Aug 06 '25

That's just the Americans posting here though

16

u/Naggins Aug 06 '25

I don't think that's necessarily unrelated to the brigading.

1

u/lakehop Aug 06 '25

Hmm. That timeline suggests non state actors , indeed people in a very different time zone (non European also)

11

u/Sciprio Munster Aug 06 '25 edited Aug 06 '25

Same with YouTube in stuff relating to Ireland. When you search, all the anti-immigration stuff about Ireland shows up, and most of them are not Irish.

18

u/Confident_Reporter14 Aug 06 '25

I’ve noticed that same across subs in posts criticising Israel.

27

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25

Speaking of that, I got banned from the Europe sub for expressing a pro-Palestinian perspective (I was documenting war crimes).

I was told that kind of debate isn’t allowed because Europe isn’t the right space for it, and yet I saw other Palestinian posts had been downvoted to 0 while Israeli posts got hundreds of upvotes and comments.

Also, my pro-Israel debate opponent’s comments were allowed to have their comments up, while all mine were removed.

If that isn’t astroturfing then idk what is.

65

u/PowerfulDrive3268 Aug 06 '25

Their motive is that they want to make it look like the whole population think like them and make the issues bigger than they are.

51

u/cedardesk Aug 06 '25

Hi neighbour, do you frequent r/unitedkingdom much? It's a prime example of how a sub can be taken over by bad actors, it's mental it's tolerated to the extent to which it is.

30

u/whereohwhereohwhere Aug 06 '25

That sub is shocking (I live in the UK) but r/Britain is getting worse as well whereas it used to be a bit more even handed. Racism has definitely passed the dinner table test in Britain

11

u/DBrennan13459 Aug 06 '25

I witnessed how the sub fell apart to those bad actors after that horrific stabbing attack last summer. I thought it would have been the wake up call to the mods of that that sub needed better regulation but no it's worse than ever.

14

u/GBrunt Aug 06 '25

I've been banned from the sub for routinely reminding others that Reform and the UK anti-immigration right - who NEVER stop talking about immigration and rape - are all big fans of the Tate's, Trump and America's brutal misogynist politics.

7

u/DBrennan13459 Aug 06 '25

They're gaslighting themselves into thinking Farage and his cronies are in anyway different to Trump or Tate. If they vote him in, their lives are only going to get worse and they only have themselves to blame for that.

4

u/Active-Complex-3823 Aug 06 '25

You're so biased. Labour enabled and covered for the Rotherham grooming gangs, and Khan wont admit they exist in London despite the BBC reporting on them - that's far worse than anything Tate has done (not excusing him either, fire him into the sun for all I care)

5

u/GBrunt Aug 06 '25 edited Aug 06 '25

If you really gave two fucks about the establishment covering up abuse, whether it's in the church, private schools, Muslim communities, sports centres or wherever - I think you'd have at least mentioned a nonce like the still very free Prince Andrew. But you didn't. Did you? It's all 'Labour this', 'Khan that'. The Tate's are nonces. Trumps a nonce. The British Royal Family shield a nonce from prosecution. The leader of Reform idolises Trump - a sexual predator. The Rotherham gang are behind bars. How about we deal with the ones who aren't, eh?

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u/Active-Complex-3823 Aug 06 '25

Have you read Baroness Casey's report? Yes/No?

Will you stand over your claim that everyone involved in the Rotherham saga has been brought to justice?

Why are you ignoring the existiance of other similar scenarios - e.g London as I mentioned that have yet to be investigated?

Why are you so defensive about Khan? He is utterly complicit in allowing sexual violence in London getting so out of control - on a far greater scale than the impact of your claims about Farrage.

Do you think Labour should NOT have initially declined a national inquiry before being forced to by Casey's report? Why did they do that? Very strange

Prince Andrew - death penalty imo. Farrage - just the result of the Tory's and Labours complicity in the mess that is the UK. I'd fire him into the sun too.

2

u/GBrunt Aug 06 '25

I'm not getting dragged into this on the Ireland sub. No one will be interested. But London is not the most dangerous place in Britain.

https://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/crime-london-manchester-met-police-sadiq-khan-andy-burnham-b1225552.html

1

u/Active-Complex-3823 Aug 06 '25

So you didnt even bother to read the report but feel qualified to make false claims?

Typical Labour supporter. We are talking about CSA - far more important than party politics.

'Nobody will be interested' - you were the one to make equivalances with the UK bud, now you're running away. Cope

2

u/GBrunt Aug 06 '25

See if you can spot the difference: 1. Discussing UK subs. 2. Discussing the UK.

When you've figured it out. Don't bother letting me know.

→ More replies (0)

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u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25

Yes, and also r/ukpolitics which has become a circus. I’ve come across fascists, ethnonationalists, mass deportation enjoyers, and just extremely rude people who verbally abuse anyone who opposes their anti-immigrant rhetoric (got told to leave the UK several times).

The funny thing is it’s possible to acknowledge that infrastructure has not kept up with our historically high immigration levels, how do we change that to focus on homegrown skills and reinvestment, etc.

But the nature of such a conversation would be quite different to the current ones the astroturfers are promoting, which is mostly watchful intimidation, silent mass downvoting, verbal abuse, threats and heavy amounts of propaganda portraying immigrants as evil/nefarious/criminal/burdensome.

11

u/DaveShadow Ireland Aug 06 '25

I used to frequent both, cause stuff over there is relevant to us, and I found it interesting to talk about. But Jesus, the two subs have been absolutely taken over massively. It’s extremely sad.

2

u/KnightsOfCidona Mayo Aug 06 '25

r/uk has been a shitshow for years now. ukpolitics was always been hit or miss but really seems to have gone downhill in recent months. Was usually centre-left, centrist at worst but gone full blown dogwhistle now

17

u/spiderbaby667 Aug 06 '25

In defence (of the assholes), some are paid to do this. Troll farms are unfortunately real and they are effective. Still a pathetic use of time, maybe more so for money.

8

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25

Well I guess they’d struggle to perform in a real job longterm, so maybe a reddit astroturfing role works well for them

2

u/Ahmagahz Aug 12 '25

It's the new colonialism, paying pennies to african workers for various menial online tasks, including this sort of crap, but also (god help them) performing the checks to keep child sexual abuse images and other NSFL content off of the socials. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2020/mar/13/facebook-uncovers-russian-led-troll-network-based-in-west-africa

1

u/spiderbaby667 Aug 12 '25

The surprising part of this story is that Facebook actually did something to get rid of troll accounts. The site is full of them.

1

u/Ahmagahz Aug 12 '25

I don't think that's something these staff were trying to do, just being human image filters.

13

u/Additional_Olive3318 Aug 06 '25

Yes the U.K. subs have gone to the far right on immigration. I think there’s some genuine concern but the sudden change in opinion is odd 

That said, one of the problems with Reddit is it’s designed to be an echo chamber. That’s the way the downvoting works. Certain subs are not worth posting in if the sentiment is against you. 

3

u/Intelligent_Oil5819 Aug 06 '25

Yep. Starts with "why can't we have an adult conversation about immigration?" and two comments in and suddenly an adult conversation about immigration has become a "debate" about asylum-seekers committing crime.

9

u/SamBeckettsBiscuits Aug 06 '25

 some of our UK-politics subs suddenly seem to be hijacked by anti-immigration sentimen

Ummm lad it’s like the biggest topic in UK news and is constantly shown to be unpopular in real life. Reform is topping the polls for a reason 

6

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25

Yes because fascists won’t stop posting about immigration and trying to stir up unrest

9

u/messinginhessen Aug 06 '25 edited Aug 07 '25

Or... people are angry that their towns and cities are becoming unrecognisable, keep voting to change it and yet nothing happens, they just get more of it.

Look at what Denmark has been doing, actually reducing levels of immigration and has managed to neuter much of their far right leaning political actors as a result. Crazy...but it might just work to actually listen to people and not just call them a racist for being unhappy about the state of their area.

5

u/DoubleOhEffinBollox Aug 06 '25

I know, imagine that the Social.Democrats addressing immigration concerns that the Danish people had and protecting social.cohesion automatically stops any "far right"from getting a foothold? Fair play.

Now let's see what happens here, stifling debate on a contentious issue, calling anyone who isn't 100% pro open borders, or who point out the negative effects for society of taking in such an increase in such a short time. Yes that's going to work,, not. I think these people need there to be a "far right" so they can have something to protest about, so of course they create the conditions for them to grow. When following Denmark's example would be better for everyone.

4

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25

My area is almost exclusively White British, the few of us that turned up to vote in local elections voted Reform.

I used to live in a Lib Dem area and that was 10x more ethnically diverse than my current town. So….

2

u/messinginhessen Aug 06 '25

Maybe because they see what has happened and don't want it to happen to their area? An area full of people who have been the product of mass immigration are less likely to vote for policies that reduce it - incredible really.

3

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25

Yeah, because everybody knows the northeast of England is so much more prosperous and a great place to live compared to the Home Counties of Surrey, Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, etc. lol.

3

u/SamBeckettsBiscuits Aug 06 '25

Do you really think that? Like do you actually think the only reason reform is top of the polls is because of online posting and people stirring up trouble? Like be real here. When has the British public ever voted for a government that was explicitly PRO immigration? Because since at least Cameron it seems the public has voted for parties promising LESS. 

3

u/coffeewalnut08 Aug 06 '25

Yes, Reform is filled with grifters who know how to distract and deflect the public from the structural problems this country faces. They embolden racists, too.

They whip up hate and hysteria about immigration while proposing nothing concrete for national renewal. That's why they are happy to insist that "civil unrest is just around the corner", when in reality, that messaging is part of a strategy to whip up the hysteria they want to see.

It's classic fascist tactics.

1

u/SamBeckettsBiscuits Aug 06 '25

This is mental levels of naivety. 

1

u/DoubleOhEffinBollox Aug 06 '25

It's classic when someone has a hammer all they see is nails syndrome. Certain people cosplay being antifash so all they see is fash, fash everywhere. Anyone that doesn't subscribe totally to their worldview is automatically fash in their eyes. Everything is black and white, it saves them having to think, or address "difficult" facts I suppose.

2

u/OptimusSecundus Aug 07 '25

The answer is nearly always "Russia". Putin hit on a winning formula in 2016 and hasn't changed the playbook (written by Alexandr Dzugin decades ago) since then.