Emerging from a pub after his campaign launch in Clacton yesterday afternoon, Nigel Farage was milkshaked. A 25-year-old woman has been charged with assault by beating and criminal damage. The incident has, quite rightly, been widely condemned. Farage’s Conservative opponent in Clacton, Giles Watling, tweeted that ‘every candidate has the right to campaign without fear of violence or intimidation’. Shadow home secretary Yvette Cooper called it a ‘disgrace’ and ‘completely unacceptable and wrong’. They were right to condemn the attack: this act of narcissistic nihilism is an affront to the democratic process, whatever side of the debate you are on.
Farage has done his best to shrug off the attack
So it has been disappointing to see that, since the news broke, some people have essentially suggested that Farage had it coming. In doing so, they have allowed their ill-concealed contempt for Farage and his politics to get in the way of the basic principles of a civilised democracy.
Take Sky News, where one correspondent informed viewers that the milkshaking had been ‘quite a humbling moment’ for the now leader of Reform UK.
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