Rob Topinka

Jude Wanga | The centre shrinks Much of our politics now consists of performance rather than governance. The calculations are short-term by design: win...

'British centrism tries to defuse extremism by absorbing it, only to find that it hasn’t defused it but amplified it.'
www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2026/fe...

Labour members & MPs need to understand, they aren’t just tarnished by this. They’re soaked through with it. The combination of wealth & sexual abuse is central to the anti-politics worldview (for good reasons). Only slight recovery is possible & it will take a significant purgation.

Sounds great - exciting to hear you've got a book on the way...

How the left can win back the internet – and rise again | Robert Topinka In the final part of this series, we look at how infighting has ripped the left apart online while the right has flourished – and how some progressives are turning the tide, says digital media academi...

This is the last of the three Guardian articles by @robtoes.bsky.social on digital politics - well worth reading

There is a lot to mull on in this line: "The demands of the attention economy exacerbate the age-old leftist tendency toward infighting"

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Thanks Sean! Was afraid to post this one because I didn’t want people coming for me…

These pieces by @robtoes.bsky.social are well worth reading

Yes, good point. Mamdani is a unique talent but it’s significant he launched his campaign talking to Trump supporters and actually presenting an alternative offer instead of pandering

Part 2, on the online right, out now:

“The convergence of monetary incentives with ideologically charged engagement produces a kind of ambient extremism in contemporary politics…”
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

How liberals lost the internet | Robert Topinka In the first part of our series on digital politics, we look at how centrists have lost ground fighting disinformation – when the real battle is over emotion and attention, says digital media academic...

“The overwhelming liberal focus on disinformation misreads how digital platforms work…cutting-edge propagandists now focus less on policy messaging and more on massaging vibes”.

Start of a new series by the excellent @robtoes.bsky.social

How liberals lost the internet | Robert Topinka In the first part of our series on digital politics, we look at how centrists have lost ground fighting disinformation – when the real battle is over emotion and attention, says digital media academic...

“The overwhelming liberal focus on disinformation misreads how digital platforms work: misleading content is everywhere, but the real battleground is over emotion and attention”

A must read by @robtoes.bsky.social in @theguardian.com

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

No worries, I didn’t actually write the headline. Usually subeditors do that. But now that you know it’s not about libs literally owning the internet maybe give it a read if you have the time.

True, and if you read beyond the headline you'll see I make some of these points, and a few others. I definitely agree self-regulation isn't going to help.

How liberals lost the internet | Robert Topinka In the first part of our series on digital politics, we look at how centrists have lost ground fighting disinformation – when the real battle is over emotion and attention, says digital media academic...

The 1st of my 3-part series on digital politics is out in the Guardian.

Read, comment, tell me I'm wrong, attack me. As I argue:

'The real battleground is over emotion and attention, which is what determines whether information – good or bad – finds an audience.
www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

The slopaganda era: 10 AI images posted by the White House – and what they teach us Under Donald Trump, the White House has filled its social media with memes, wishcasting, nostalgia and deepfakes. Here’s what you need to know to navigate the trolling

I got a quote in about how to think about penguin posting in this excellent primer on Trump’s AI slopaganda, its reactionary nostalgia, its clumsy white nationalism, its obvious mistakes - it’s all on purpose.

www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026...

Tuesday briefing: Why efforts to tackle Britain’s long history of antisemitism have fallen short In today’s newsletter: A scholar of antisemitism on how we define it, how it has operated in Britain, and what can be done

Interview by Aamna Mohdin of my @bisa-bkk.bsky.social colleague @dmf101.bsky.social in which he crisply articulates why we need a reset in our antisemitism debate

www.theguardian.com/world/2026/j... @runnymedetrust.bsky.social @shabna.bsky.social

Murray Rothbard wanted to repeal the 20th century. Curtis Yarvin thinks liberalism got out of hand when the Union won the US Civil War.

The 'Donroe Doctrine' fits this line of thinking.

Trump is more erratic now, but his 2nd term is actually more ideologically coherent.
www.ft.com/content/4e0e...

Was great to be on the @overunderpod.bsky.social to talk about Grok and the future of AI porn and how Trump's comments about Civil Rights going too far shows MAGA is not just about being anti-woke - it's also a rejection of the basic idea of equality pod.link/1744973171/e...

nice materialist debunking of Jacob Savage's pseudo-materialist account of DEI hurting white Millennial males.
www.peoplespolicyproject.org/2025/12/17/w...

In a bout of insomnia the night before last I wrote something about Trump’s regime capture in Caracas

leftrenewal.org/articles-en/... #LeftRenewal

I usually go on r/PoliticalCompassMemes to get annoyed but sometimes you find some bangers

Trump’s lies always tell an ideological truth.

The ICE agent obviously wasn’t hit, which is why Trump says he was nearly killed - ICE acts on Trump’s behalf, so anything bad ICE does must actually be the work of the enemy.

The less popular Trump gets, the more detached he’ll become

so when Anthropic let Claude talk to itself, it started blissing out about spiritual unity.

Nice piece from David Berry on how this is the result of LLMs encoding a kind of 'latent hegemony' - in this case, the hippie capitalism of the California Ideology stunlaw.blogspot.com/2026/01/the-...

‘It’s frightening’: How far right is infiltrating everyday culture Extremist messaging now woven into music and YouTube videos, with one expert saying: ‘You can be radicalised sitting on your couch’

Check out this great article by @ashifakassam.bsky.social, featuring yours truly and the fab @gretajasser.bsky.social!

www.theguardian.com/world/2025/d...

Radical right parties in Europe have not moderated. Their positions and rhetoric have entered the mainstream. They have become normalized and legitimized. Unless we understand this, we have little chance of countering their success.

I’m more of a hypodermic needle model man myself

wordcels unite

obviously the Yookay Aesthetics account, devoted to mocking multicultural Britain, is based in South America

Dick Cheney shot his friend in the face the right way.

by Ezra Klein

In these turbulent times, we can always rely on powerful liberal institutions to surrender their ideals and cave to authoritarianism without any fight whatsoever

That’s great to hear, cheers Alan.