Nigel Farage in a Wetherspoons in Ramsgate ahead of the local elections, April 2025. Photo: Getty
The Great British pub is essential to the image of Nigel Farage, Reform’s leader and the once and, he hopes, future MP for Clacton. So I have spent the last two weeks going into pubs trying to find one that matches Nigel Farage’s description.
Last month, Farage said, in a written speech delivered at a podium, that the deeply misogynistic statements made by Reform UK’s candidate in Makerfield, Robert Kenyon – including the public sexual harassment of Carol Vorderman – were “the kind of comments you’ll hear in every pub in the country, every night”. In the same speech, Farage said “that Kenyon’s comments were taken wildly out of context” and that “we should be unapologetic” about “a few laddish things [he said] on social media 10 years ago”.
As a point of information, the worst things Kenyon said were not 10 years ago. To give the full context, which I understand is important to Farage, the sexual harassment of Carol Vorderman happened on her birthday, Christmas Eve 2021, just over five years ago. Someone called @lewyruss wrote on X/Twitter, tagging Vorderman, “Happy birthday Carol. My god, I’d love to smell and lick your a***h*le”. Another Twitter user flagged this post, suggesting that @lewyruss’s hard drive needed to be checked (implying he might be a sex offender) and copied in @twitter to have the post removed. It was to this safeguarding post that Kenyon replied: “He’s only saying what we’re all thinking, Chris” Reform MP Danny Kruger said on Radio 4’s Today programme that they were the “private” comments of “an ordinary man” but in fact this one was made in public, in a thread that copied in Carol Vorderman. I agree with Farage that we needed to see the whole context, because it makes it much, much worse.
Kenyon lost and will no doubt not stand again, so why is this relevant now? Well, because on Good Morning Britain, after Burnham won Makerfield, Farage said: “Our candidate: great bloke, plumber, rugby player, ex-army guy, drinker, one of the lads … What was said by him was lads’ banter.” When challenged by presenters Ed Balls and Ranvir Singh, Farage doubled down and said: “And it will be [said] in every pub tonight.”
A man who is a leader of a political party has claimed twice that sexual harassment and other ugly misogynistic comments are normal. But more than that, the implication here is that it is just what “great blokes” do down the pub. How are young men hearing this meant to respond? If this is indeed, as Farage tells us, “laddish banter”, how does a lad who wants to be good at banter think he must act? Surely, by joining in. In a time of hot and cold running manosphere for boys and young men everywhere, this message from a public figure who holds responsibility and influence is extremely dangerous.
Farage claimed in his breakfast TV interview that he “doesn’t approve of it”, but that is hard to square with him also saying in his prepared speech that “we should be unapologetic” about it and dodging the question of whether he had asked Kenyon to apologise for it. The top line here from Farage is that, like it or not, women should expect to be harassed by men they do not know in “every pub in the country, every night”.
This troubled me so much I brought it up at a Guilty Feminist Open Space Day, a place where we come together to brainstorm ideas and take action. As a group we decided to go to pubs, sporting clubs and other likely places, and ask men if they did indeed consider the kinds of things Kenyon said as “laddish banter” and if it was, in fact, something they expected to hear every night.
The first two men I approached were sitting on the pavement in the heat, outside the Dolphin pub in King’s Cross. They both had pints and their feet were in the gutter. They looked like the kind of men who kept traditional English boozers open.
“Would you mind if I asked you if you heard what Robert Kenyon said about Carol Vorderman?” I asked, aware that this story might be an obsession of my bubble but not theirs.
He seems to imagine working-class men, ‘good blokes’, say degrading things about women as a matter of course. This is insulting, patronising and obviously inaccurate
“Yes, I did,” said the older of the two men, pulling a contemptuous face. “And I thought it was absolutely disgusting. That’s not how you talk about women.”
“So it’s not normal pub banter?” I asked.
“No!” he said. His friend added: “Although you have to admit, misogyny is rife.”
This was not the reception Farage had led me to believe I’d get.
Over the following weeks, we have not found one man who has said that this is normal. Here are some quotes our group has garnered from our vox pops:
A Glaswegian man in a pub called Bob: “If a man was talking in this way, I’d take the opportunity to take him aside and say ‘this is not acceptable’ and tell him why.”
A publican pulling pints in Bristol said he’d bar a man who spoke like that in his pub.
A man called Jeremy, found cutting up wood with a chainsaw: “I’m a man and I don’t think that’s a normal thing to say. I don’t think it’s how men speak, typically. To degrade someone like that, that’s being a bully.”
From Dave, a musician: “That’s not normal. I don’t think I’ve ever heard anyone say that to me in the pub.”
One of our number approached a group of four men aged from their 30s to their 50s in a south London pub during an England match and reported that every one of them was furious about Farage’s misogynistic remarks, saying: “It’s just not normal.”
Bill, a man in a football shirt: “What Robert Kenyon said wasn’t banter, it’s misogyny. It’s not how I talk. It’s not how my mates talk. Don’t use decent men to excuse misogyny. I am raising two boys … Don’t normalise contempt for women. Call it what it is.”
A man in the gym: “I did see the comments by Kenyon. Pretty shameful… For Nigel – it’s not normal. Never in any gym. Never in any locker room.”
Writer and podcast host Emily Clarkson had the same idea and asked her male Instagram followers what they thought. She received an overwhelming number of messages from men, summed up best by this one: “I’m a plumber, I like beer, I watch football. I’m as much a male stereotype as you can get. Farage and his crew hide behind me as an excuse for their hate and fear spreading and it’s a complete lie. It’s not right and it’s not normal.”
I think what is at the heart of Farage’s normalisation has been identified by this man, and can be found earlier in Farage’s speech: “They’re the sort of comments that you won’t necessarily get if you’re an Oxford-educated career politician living in a nice postcode in London.” Farage himself was educated at Dulwich College, which currently charges £10,000 a term. Many of his contemporaries went to Oxford and Cambridge while he chose to go straight into the City and become a commodities trader, where he tells us he did very well financially. He is a privately educated career politician with several houses in lovely postcodes. He seems to imagine working-class men, “good blokes”, say degrading things about women as a matter of course. This is insulting, patronising and obviously inaccurate. Of course, he may be in a bubble where men do speak like that and if so, that is an indictment of his party. But it is not indicative of working-class men.
Now that he has stepped down to force a byelection, may I answer the final question of that speech of his as he makes his exit?
The question was this. “[Robert Kenyon] said a few laddish things on social media … So what?” What comes after degrading, violent, bullying words, Nigel, is degrading, violent and bullying actions. That’s so what. On average, a woman is killed by a man in the UK approximately once every three days. Annually, police record over 70,000 rape offences (and most people don’t report them). Approximately 94% of survivors are women, with one in 30 women experiencing rape or sexual assault in a year.
The day after Farage’s breakfast TV appearance, a group of construction workers walked 10 kilometres to Downing Street in high-vis vests and hard hats, in a sweltering heatwave, to demand that men open up and challenge each other to do more to end violence against women and girls. Metro reported that “organisers behind the Hard Hats & Open Minds Walk for Change are demanding that heavily male-dominated industries confront abuse at home and in the workplace – urging construction workers to challenge misogyny at work and look out for warning signs that colleagues are abusing their partners at home.” Those men know the answer to “so what?” – and they’re all good blokes who get their hands dirty for a living, Farage. It’s not all men and it’s not all pubs. And soon, I hope, you and your views won’t be in any pubs of ours.
Deborah Frances-White hosts The Guilty Feminist podcast which has been longlisted for three British Podcast Awards. Her latest book ‘Six Conversations We’re Scared to Have’ has just been published in paperback by Virago.