Lying Conservative MP Ben Bradley was forced into a grovelling apology today after posting a libellous tweet about Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn on the 19th February. And what’s more, Corbyn’s lawyers not only made the Tory MP donate a reported ‘five-figure’ sum in lieu of damages to a food bank and a homeless shelter in Bradley’s own Mansfield constituency, they also forced him to write the words ‘Please retweet this’ at the end of his tweeted apology. The resultant Twitter carnage, as you will see, was beyond epic.
Predictably, rather than tweet his apology straight away, Bradley took a page straight out of the Katie Hopkins handbook and waited until 22:30 on a Saturday night to publish it – presumably in an attempt to try and quell the inevitable backlash somewhat.
Also, after finally publishing the apology, the Tory MP then went on to retweet 6 pro-Tory posts in some sort of vain attempt to push the grovelling apology down his Twitter timeline.
However, if Bradley had actually known anything about social media (or if he actually had any common sense whatsoever) he would have simply posted a retraction and an apology straight away before this whole sorry story blew up.
However, following today’s silly antics of prolonging the inevitable, and then attempting to whitewash the evidence on his timeline with a flurry of six retweets in quick succession, the Tory MP only succeeded in spurring thousands of pro-Corbyn Twitter users into producing a reaction of absolutely epic proportions.
So, firstly, here’s the grovelling apology that Corbyn’s lawyers forced Liar Ben Bradley to tweet to his followers:
On the 19th of February I made a defamatory statement about @jeremycorbyn. I have apologised to Mr Corbyn and here is the complete text of my apology. Please retweet. pic.twitter.com/6JZc8O9E82
— Cllr Ben Bradley MP (@BBradley_Mans) February 24, 2018
What followed will surely live in Twitter infamy forever.
Firstly, there was an avalanche of truly terrific memes and GIFs:
resign. pic.twitter.com/CmJI7DHhM2
— Richard 4 Deputy (@RB4Deputy) February 24, 2018
— laura (@lauraw97_) February 24, 2018
— Sarah Tomkins (@CH0C0H0LIC) February 25, 2018
— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) February 24, 2018
https://twitter.com/AmanTsays/status/967526783942844416
https://twitter.com/AmanTsays/status/967526920987570176
And now we go live to Ben Bradley desperately retweeting everything possible to push his apology down his timeline pic.twitter.com/sLzI2dh3hY
— Paul Hutchings (@paulbhutchings) February 24, 2018
Then there was James Felton with this piece of extremely observant irony:
Ben Bradley has been charged by the conservatives to connect with the youth.
His most successful tweet of all time is this one admitting to defamation and it hasn’t even been twenty minutes. https://t.co/DbOPSIXphZ
— James Felton (@JimMFelton) February 24, 2018
Many simply did as Bradley asked:
https://twitter.com/alexnunns/status/967532254959370241
https://twitter.com/PeoplesMomentum/status/967536059683876864
https://twitter.com/hrtbps/status/967544900102361088
https://twitter.com/BernadetteB1961/status/967541772267245568
Ben's double-bluff nearly worked… "No, sod you, I WON'T retweet it, Ben!" But nonetheless I will retweet it, as it's important to remind people that the Corbyn spy story was complete bollocks. And I suspect Ben knew that full well, even as he pressed send on his costly tweet… https://t.co/GS5XSJO20n
— Pete Sinclair (@pete_sinclair) February 24, 2018
Understand that the full wording of the Ben Bradley apology tweet was agreed by Labour as part of their settlement. Which means Labour’s lawyer forced him to include “please retweet”. A phrase which is now making this go very viral. Apologies: 2018 style. https://t.co/wd7q4rwWpf
— Jim Waterson (@jimwaterson) February 24, 2018
And let it be known that nothing gets past our Prezza:
https://twitter.com/johnprescott/status/967544643570356224
However, a question we’d all like to know the answer to: did Bradders have enough sense to turn notifications off before posting the apology? It’s debatable:
Ben Bradley's notifications be like… pic.twitter.com/j8Olq1mTqI
— The Agitator (@UKDemockery) February 24, 2018
It’s safe to say the American Ben Bradley definitely didn’t:
https://twitter.com/BenBradleyTV/status/967539761379512321
And then there were the simple but effective replies:
https://twitter.com/SeemaChandwani/status/967551226886983680
Obviously Evolve had to get in a few sly ones:
Every future article we write about Tory MP Ben Bradley will now use the perfectly legally allowable "Liar Ben Bradley" prefix.
— Evolve Politics (@evolvepolitics) February 24, 2018
Do you reckon it's taken Bradders so long to sort this libel case out because he's spent most of the time furiously researching whether or not he can put a defamation legal bill on his expenses?
— Evolve Politics (@evolvepolitics) February 24, 2018
Despite Bradley’s apology racking up over 7,000 retweets in just over an hour, the former Corbyn spokesman Matt Zarb-Cousin was perhaps being rather hopeful with this one:
Hope Ben Bradley’s apology becomes the most retweeted tweet of all time, getting more action than the guy who wanted a year’s supply of nuggets. Thanks a lot
— Matt Zarb-Cousin (@mattzarb) February 24, 2018
This needs to become the most retweeted tweet in UK history.
Help your nan start a @Twitter account if necessary. https://t.co/OC1cJr6AcC
— Aaron Bastani (@AaronBastani) February 24, 2018
Even perennial Tory-bootlickers Guido Fawkes couldn’t resist a little dig at Bradley:
Ben Bradley publicly confirms he is a half-wit. pic.twitter.com/vU2b1pA1Oq
— Guido Fawkes (@GuidoFawkes) February 24, 2018
However, without doubt the pièce de résistance of the entire day was this utterly epic pun:
https://twitter.com/n_blondel/status/967417485183082502
Bravo Twitter. Bravo.
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