The RPRN's two new publications are open for submissions! Red Lines is a space for political interventions on resisting reaction. The Reactionary Politics Working Paper series aims to publish cutting-edge scholarship on reactionary politics. Submit your work below! reacpol.net/publications/

My story on Elon Musk cutting safeguards at xAI is on the front page of today's @washingtonpost.com. I’m also among 100’s of reporters laid off. I absolutely loved my job my brilliant coworkers & the thrill of reporting @ the center of forces upending the world: AI & Silicon Valley’s political power

Micheál Martin has been a TD for 37 years. He’s been in government for 25 of those years and in cabinet for 20 of those years. He’s been either Tánaiste or Taoiseach since June 2020. And every time he’s asked to anything other than build a data centre, he acts like he’s just been handed the job

A very large thank you to @briony.bsky.social for taking the time to engage with my research and to the folks at @reacpolrn.bsky.social for facilitating this interview!

Imagine if the hype was around the Greens' rise rather than Reform Imagine if instead of putting far-right issues on the agenda, mainstream parties talked about hope, justice, redistribution, public services etc That would put real change on the table and that's why Reform is a safer bet for them

The idea that journalists, politicians, groups or - you know, women, people of colour, LGBTQ+ people - should "stay on the pitch" doesn't really hold up. Foreign Minister's account has 60k followers - 40 likes, 13k views? Blue ticks straight to the top of the queue with misogyny, bile.

New Gist: The Abuse Factory It shouldn't be difficult to act swiftly and without hesitation when the question posed is "Is it OK to work with the child sexual abuse material factory?" But our state failed this most straightforward of tests this week. www.thegist.ie/the-gist-the...

New blog post! Joshua Farrell-Molloy explains how Irish #far-right groups use #masculinity and republican symbols to frame themselves as defenders of #Ireland. www.sv.uio.no/c-rex/englis...

🚨NEW PAPER The Logic of Connective Faction: How Digitally Networked Elites and Hyper-Partisan Media Radicalize Politics w/ @yunkangyang.bsky.social & @mikecowburn.bsky.social Online radicalization doesn't just affect the public. It also reshapes how elites & parties behave. doi.org/10.1080/1058...

1. Headlines everywhere today read "Grok apologizes." This is bullshit. A chatbot is not something that can apologize. Pretending otherwise is simple laundering these companies' bullshit about what AI is, while diffusing blame away from the human beings that developed and released this system.

📃 NEW PUBLICATION 📃 I’m very happy to see this article published in the latest issue of @meejatheory.bsky.social. The article conceptualises the generative role of audience antagonism in the mediation of reactionary politics and is available to read open access here: lnkd.in/ew5jr-Yh 🧵

Join us for the book launch of Global South Creator Cultures on Tuesday, 20 January, 17:30–19:00, at King’s College London. Further information and registration details: www.tickettailor.com/events/digit... @kingsdh.bsky.social @digitalculturekcl.bsky.social @mediaindustries.bsky.social

My latest in @lawfaremedia.org: Nihilistic Violent Extremists (NVE) closely resemble two other forms of mass violence that have evaded simple characterization: incels and school shooters. Ambitious efforts to better classify such violence should be applauded. www.lawfaremedia.org/article/a-te...

I am looking for a Senior Researcher (at least 2 years postdoctoral exp.) for the LivePlatforms project into how people make livelihoods in the platform economy; a 5-year FT post based in the School of Info and Communication Studies at UCD. Do share widely! universityvacancies.com/university-c...

New paper out with @dasalgon.bsky.social: “Far-Right Agenda Setting: How the Far Right influences the Political Mainstream” doi.org/10.1017/S1475676525100066 #openaccess in @ejprjournal.bsky.social🧵

Anyone who perceives Kirk as “civil” or as “doing politics the right way” is betraying their comfort with the ablative world Kirk worked so hard to create, secure in their belief that the grinding wheel will never touch *their* skin. One wonders where that belief arises from.

This feels like a *very* strange time to be revising an article that looks at how Kirk’s fans and followers engaged with his coverage of the 2024 US presidential election. Certainly some major updates required 😬

New special tribunal for Ukraine will pave the way for holding Russian leaders to account for the invasion. Piece by DCU's Dr Andrew Forde @drandrewforde.bsky.social for @uk.theconversation.com. Read more here: launch.dcu.ie/4lyWwSn

🚨 One day left to apply for the @vox-pol.bsky.social next gen conference happening in Prague on the 25-26th of September. We are bringing together ECRs to build a proper community researching (violent) online extremism. Submit your proposal: lnkd.in/esikzmnK Full CfP and details: shorturl.at/3YIKk

New publication 📢 📢 lnkd.in/eDkiZejm Very pleased to share our new publication (with Fiona O'Rourke) in Men and Masculinities journal, which focuses on how our research about misogynistic and homophobic banter in digital spaces fed into an educational toolkit (download for free men4change.co.uk ).

We were delighted to have supported @anthonypkelly.bsky.social 's recent symposium "Reaction(ary) Media)" on situating influencers, audiences, and antagonisms. Read more on the event and its findings at the blog link below 👇 digitalpolicy.ie/reactionary-...

Now it's all official, I can let people know that I have been awarded an #ERCAdG ERC Advanced Grant for my LivePlatforms project to critically examine the actors involved in determining how - or whether - people make livelihoods in the platform economy. #PlatformWork #DigitalLabour

I wanted to take a moment to say THANK YOU to everyone who was involved in making last week’s symposium—Reaction(ary) Media: Situating Influencers, Audiences, and Antagonisms—a huge success. What a fabulous gathering of speakers, chairs, and audience participants. Here are some of the highlights! 🧵

Hi folks! I’m very excited to announce details of a one-day international symposium I’m hosting on Thursday 29 May 2025 (09:00–17:30) at @ucddublin.bsky.social. You can find more information on @ucdischool.bsky.social’s website: www.ucd.ie/ics/events/r... 🧵

Graffiti beneath Calgary’ Centre Street bridge. #yyc

"As with the resurgence of the far-right, the rise of tech oligarchs is the result of a long series of mainstream failures" A few thoughts on reactionary tech oligarchy by @jfarkas.bsky.social and I for @bylinetimes.bsky.social bylinetimes.com/2025/01/26/t...

Hi friends! Now that the inauguration and its theatre of power, privilege and white supremacy is over, @kat-hig.bsky.social and I wrote something on Trump’s victimhood politics in his era of absolute power. @lseblogs.bsky.social and @lsemedia.bsky.social

great thread here, and nicely illustrates how far into the margins this type of people are - despite what Twitter amplifies #GE24

This looks fascinating! Looking forward to checking our Fandom Cultures Research, and following fandom studies more broadly a bit more closely on BlueSky!

Quite bereft to learn that this little angel has passed away. It would be too hard to put into words how magical Roxy’s blessings were when we met him at Dzogchen Beara on New Year’s Eve in 2022. An angel, an icon, a legend. And just so incredibly sweet. Truly blessed

One way to analyze the 'Harris Flop' from the perspective of the political sociology of emotions might be through the concept of 'emotional capital', the lack of which is having a negative effect on his political capital. See my paper on this if interested: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.... #GE24

Open access >> Political Communication Research is Unprepared for the Far Right Curd Knüpfer,Sarah J. Jackson & Daniel Kreiss www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Bluesky's firehose is a treasure trove of public data for researchers and developers, and it's completely free. Check out our developer docs: docs.bsky.app

The ethical oversight committee has some questions about your proposal

I'm very excited and also very very grateful to be one of the 2024 recipients of the NUI (@nuimerrionsq.bsky.social) Grant for Early Career Academics. Here's a very short thread for anyone who may be interested in the work that I've been doing recently. 🧵 1/7

A shameless plug for all the season one episodes of my podcast, Ill Effects. All retweets appreciated as I was building this in a year when I wasn't on Twitter! If you're unsure where to start the Beatles episode is my fave!

#jobad: Two 3-year postdoc positions in the 'Power over Platforms' project (PI: Rasmus Kleis Nielsen) at the Centre for Tracking and Society. Application deadline 13th of December. More info: jobportal.ku.dk/videnskabeli...

this is extremely lol

👀 NOW OPEN! We’re excited to share ALL EYES ON US, our brand new exhibition, with you! In this exhibition, we are scrutinized by the eyes in 75 contemporary and historic portraits from the Collection, but what happens when we return their gaze? 🎟️ Open daily | Free entry

I wrote this short piece for RTÉ Brainstorm discussing how far-right figures use the strategies of influencer culture to spread reactionary messages and monetise their politics. It builds on my current work examining how social media users engage with reactionary influencers, funded by the IRC.

imagine being this adorable

very excited to be the recipient of an irc 2023 government of ireland postdoctoral research fellowship. over the next 2 years, i'll be exploring the toxic fan practices of political influencer social media audiences (with @kylzjarrett.bsky.social as my mentor) research.ie/2023/09/11/m...

the scream