Monster Raving Loony Party tweets cast doubt on the party’s apolitical image

Famed for being the electoral home of the politically apathetic, the Official Monster Raving Loony Party has attracted admiration for its tongue-in-cheek policies such as issuing free pins to solve inflation and reducing hospital waiting lists by “using a smaller font”.

Last week saw the party announce its candidate for the Wellingborough by-election (triggered after MP Peter Bone lost his seat over an inquiry finding he subjected a staff member to bullying and sexual misconduct) as Nick "The Flying Brick" Delves, with the election hopeful sharing his policies at the weekend.

Known as a single-issue candidate campaigning for "the abolition of gravity", Mr Delves also pledges to "stop the boats by declaring an end to the 'Hundred Years War' and talk to the French", develop Wellingborough Golf Club into an "intergalactic space port", relocate parliament to Kilnway in the constituency, and make fishing a "spectator sport by introducing piranha [sic] into the River Nene".

However, past tweets from the ‘protest vote’ party have revealed the organisation is far more politically charged than its satirical brand image may suggest.

In posts seen by indy100, the Official Monster Raving Loony Party’s Twitter/X account responded to one user’s comment about gender to say “two is hardly too many”, and replied to a tweet from the right-wing blog Guido Fawkes about gender-neutral toilets in parliament to brand it “more nonsense from the unofficial loony sector”.

When Piers Morgan criticised an advert from the shaver brand Gillette exploring the harm behind the phrase “boys will be boys”, the party (which we’re now shortening to MRLP for ease) replied with “the best a trans can get”.

MRLP have also shown support for JK Rowling, the Harry Potter and Strike author who has received widespread condemnation for her stance on trans rights, by criticising The Body Shop for supporting trans people.

After Rowling called out the beauty brand on Twitter/X, the shop clapped back by attaching a photo of one of its “it’s bloody natural” bags and writing: “Here’s something we made earlier, we thought you might like one! We’ve also popped in a vegan bath bomb and a copy of Trans Rights by [Paisley Currah] for you to read in the bath!”

Unenthused by the response, MRLP tweeted a GIF of Jack Black making a mocking gesture and wrote: “Hmm looks like someone completely misread someone else’s tweet… Good luck not losing customers with that one!”

The MRLP has commented on issues concerning the Black community, too, replying to a tweet from Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, about the first Black on the Square event in the capital to say that they “embrace diversity”, but not “blatant political division”.

After Little Britaincomedians Matt Lucas and David Walliams apologised for their use of ‘blackface’ – the racist practice of using make-up to imitate a Black person – MRLP responded to a report from The Guardian to ask if the duo were “planning on doing an apology per week”.

“Next it could be to the gay community, the week after to the disabled, then the trans, bank team, overweight people, etc. They should then apologies [sic] for narrator Tom Baker, who was even more offensive,” they wrote.

The party’s online remarks, dated between 2019 and 2022, cast doubt on the Official Monster Raving Loony Party as an apolitical ‘protest vote’, with the party’s stance on trans rights bearing a close resemblance to comments made by Prime Minister Rishi Sunak at Conservative Party Conference in October, which sparked fury online.

Mr Sunak told attendees: “We shouldn’t get bullied into believing that people can be any sex they want to be – they can’t.

“A man is a man and a woman is a woman. That’s just common sense.”

After being contacted by indy100 for a response to the tweets, the party’s leader – Alan “Howling Laud” Hope – replied: “I don’t quite honestly know what on earth you are talking about. Is this some sort of joke or what?”

Mr Hope then insisted he had never seen the Twitter/X account before and that “as far as I’m concerned it is nothing to do with me or the Official Party”.

He went on to provide the details of the social media manager for the profile, before writing that he has “never heard of a Twitter account”.

Later, in an email to Mr Hope, forwarded to indy100, social media manager Jason “Chinners” Chinnery wrote: “Love the wacky world of social media as invariably any tweet of about 200 characters will get pounced upon by someone, especially if it's made by one of the top 10 political parties!

“OK, for info, the stock answer I use when questioned about trans/gender/sex etc issues (and mainly the question of ‘what is a female/woman’) is as follows: 'We believe a woman is an adult female.'

“'There are many forms of sex, and these are undertaken by both males & females of the human species (we cannot comment for other species).’

“With regards to JK Rowling, I have in the past 'backed' her comments that have pretty much said the above (never getting into the multiple layers of sex/genders that apparently some now think exist).

“I have tweeted under the party account, that because there are only two genders, that 'gender neutral' toilets seems a stupid (and possibly dangerous) idea to implement.”

“Play this how you want, but in my experience, this is just one of the many 'unofficial' loony brigade hoping to make a point by twisting a few words posted in a tweet to offend themselves, whilst not getting it's gag!

“The amount of abusive/negative comeback we get each time I post ‘we will aid asylum seekers by putting up more signposts to the asylums’ is astounding, and just makes me post it more often than I should!”

On comments relating to the Black community, Chinnery said he has “always steered clear of issues like that”, but recalled posting a “satirical message” to Mr Khan during lockdown, “questioning why he allowed some [Black Lives Matter] marches to go ahead” when people were “supposed to be social distancing”.

When approached directly for a further comment about the Official Monster Raving Loony Party’s tweet about Walliams and Lucas, Mr Chinnery said it was “quite obviously loony sarcasm” at “the trend of people having to apologise for things that were acclaimed by many a few years earlier”.

“Nothing more, nothing less,” he added.

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