UK Independence Party Hashtag Hijacked Before Elections

For the upcoming European elections, UKIP, the party of Nigel Farage, decided that it would good for their campaign to use social media to boost their popularity and encourage others to vote for them. The hashtag #WhyImVotingUkip was created for individuals to share their reasons and thoughts on why they are going to vote for UKIP. However, Twitter users thought that it would be more interesting to poke fun at the party instead. The hashtag #WhyImVotingUkip started to trend well on the social media site as users shared funny and sarcastic tweets as to why they choose to vote the party in the elections. The hashtag initially started well, with real members of UKIP sharing their good reasons for joining the party and other lofty objectives set by the group. Later on, funny tweets followed. On May 21, 2014, the hashtag of the UK Independence Party was hijacked just before the elections for the European Parliament. The hijackers took the opportunity to attack the party as well as people who intended to vote for UKIP. Some of the tweets talked about previous red flags committed by UKIP. In a span of three days, this is how huge it became: Other actions by Nigel Farage were also criticized, which forced him to say sorry for particularly saying that he would be worried if a Romanian family lived next door to him. He was accused of being a racist. The party was further mocked for presenting an election poster which featured the graves of British soldiers who died in combat. There were also tweets that pointed out to the local councilor of UKIP for blaming bad weather and floods in various parts of the country which spurred the government to make gay marriage legal. Other funny and creative tweets were posted on #WhyImVotingUkip. Some of the noteworthy tweets posted on the hashtag include: