An analysis of social media data by Sky News shows that the far-right anti-immigrant movement had much greater reach and popularity across all social media platforms than the pro-immigrant anti-racist movement last week.
Anti-racist organizerslargely led by the groups Stand Up To Racism and Hope Not Hate, mobilized to counter the right-wing demonstrations that began last week in response to the attack in Southport that left three children dead on July 29th.
To compare the online discourse on both sides, we analyzed posts that mention at least one of the three hashtags most used by the far-right movement, versus posts that mention at least one of the three hashtags most used by the anti-racist movement.
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Data from social media monitoring tool Talkwalker shows that posts with anti-immigrant hashtags – #enoughisenough, #farrightthugsunite or #TwoTier – increased over the weekend of August 3, as far-right riots spread across the UK .
These posts outnumbered those that used hashtags that were pro-immigration in nature.
Two-tier policing is a phrase that has been used to suggest that the police have been tougher on people on the right of the political spectrum.
In the days that followed, the number of posts using these hashtags decreased, but as more protests are expected, this could quickly increase again.
The data also shows that posts using anti-immigrant hashtags had approximately four million interactions between July 29 and August 7.
Posts mentioning #RefugeesWelcome, #AsylumSeekersWelcome or #noracismnofascism were engaged just over 22,000 times, in comparison.
This suggests that a week after the Southport attack, far-right protesters are organizing and gathering on public platforms in much greater numbers than anti-racists.
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A car catches fire on Parliament Road, Middlesbrough, during an anti-immigration protest. Photo: PA
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The contrast is also present in the terrain.
Sky News analysis of the Telegram and X channels shows that of the 39 locations where far-right protests were expected to take place, 21 counter-protests were planned.
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Police sources told Sky News that on Wednesday night they were aware of more than 100 events, with 30 counter-protests planned, but Sky News has not independently confirmed this.
This story originally appeared on News.sky.com read the full story
