A moderator over on [boards.ie](https://boards.ie) has discovered that a regular poster who spent his entire day defending and promoting Sinn Fein was in fact behind at least 10 other accounts which thanked and replied in support of his main account posts. These other accounts also ‘piled on’ and went on the attack when other [boards.ie](https://boards.ie) users criticized Sinn Fein.

The whole saga is just bizarre but there’s a very interesting thread outlining how he was caught.

Bizarrely, another prominent Sinn Fein zealot (with 50,000+ pro-SF posts to his name) used this very thread to talk down the sock-puppetting, attempting to deflect away from Sinn Fein, but was then outed as owning 2 accounts, both posting in the same thread, defending Sinn Fein trying to appear as 2 different people.

It stinks to high heaven. Who has the time and resources to post 17 hours a day on multiple accounts, in multiple Sinn Fein threads? The terms ‘shinnerbot’ or ‘SF online army’ is thrown about quite often. But the evidence here is quite damning.

Makes you wonder why r/Ireland is so overwhelmingly pro-SF…

40 comments

  5. People have been making extra accounts to talk to their other accounts since forums began on the internet.

    Each one has their own interests. Guess this guys was SF.

  6. > Makes you wonder why r/Ireland is so overwhelmingly pro-SF…

    Demographics alone would explain that.

    Not saying it’s not happening to an extent, I’d say it is, but there are so many people here it would be really difficult to have any meaningful impact.

  8. There was a user on here who had 4 sockpuppet accounts that all hated diesels, the green party and travelers.

    They would regularly post in the comments of the same post and I provided conclusive proof that it was the same person behind all 4, based on how he would follow me around and abuse me on all 4 accounts forgetting to switch between them (leading to me e.g. replying to account A and him accidentally replying to me with account B).

    He was never banned, but over the next 18 months each account individually fell foul of site-wide rules and ended up banned.

    It was /u/dasautoasphyxiavw /u/magentaspammer /u/johngourmet and I can’t remember the last username.

    There was another poster on the /r/rugbyunion (and occasionally /r/Ireland ) who had 2-3 accounts going but would regularly delete them and re-open new accounts with different names but the exact same posting style. He never got banned despite myself and another user providing ample evidence. He’s still doing the exact same thing years later.

    The point, I guess, is that the same happening on /r/Ireland is never going to be discovered and even if it is, the mods will do nothing. The secondary point is that these people, in my experience, are always people with mental illnesses – not nefarious party shills, even if it seems that way.

    Party shills don’t need to sockpuppet and know better than to even try, it’s more effort than it’s worth.

  11. These sock puppet accounts. Where in the fuck do people have the time, and how fucking sad is your life if you’re online all day agreeing with yourself?

  15. >Makes you wonder why r/Ireland is so overwhelmingly pro-SF.

    I rather vote for something new-extreme than go with same crap in fairness.

    I am willing to take risk of radical changes (whether good or bad) than deal with same **shitty** crap every year.

    P.S – I am willing to give SF a chance (Since FF and FG are failing a big ass on it)

  18. Look, I like the Sinn Fein. They have great policies! But why do some people feel the need to staunchly defend any political figure to the death?

    Politicians are public servants, not deities. Political idolization is a poison!

  19. “Who has the time and resources to post 17 hours a day”
    A boards.ie user
    Thank you thank you I’m here all week

  21. R/Ireland is not overwhelmingly SF, I don’t think. I get upvoted all the time for calling them out on their bullshit when necessary. I am not anti-SF, but as a nordie I know what they’re like, how false they are and how cultish they are. They do have less wankers within their ranks as the big two but they still have loads of pricks. I think most people here agree with this.

  24. This happens literally everywhere online and is fairly common. I dont know why anyone bothers or how they find the time, but it happens.

    Its easy enough to get around, don’t believe what you’re told online. Read into topics yourself and think for yourself.

    Shit, forget about duplicate account. Half of the pages you follow are probably run by troll farms, like farms or angler phisers. Crap, there are industries in places like Russia for this stuff.

  26. It’s quite common over on Facebook also, you can spot the accounts popping up before they eventually get taken down. It’s the world we live in sadly, fanatics will do anything in their power to get their message across

  27. Shocking! A sock puppet account on the internet. How long before this appears on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Telegram, Cheese & Ham and Youtube?

  28. Wouldn’t surprise me if most arguments on Reddit are just 2 people with multiple accounts getting progressively more angry until threads get locked

  31. I got banned from boards because I informed the mods of what was going on in regards to Sinn Fein. I made numerous attempts to make them aware and in the end they banned me.

  33. All the links to boards in the OP but not to the specific thread(s) makes me wonder if the OP isn’t a sock puppet account by the owner of boards trying to draw traffic back after their disastrous update.

  34. The thing I can’t understand is *why*?

    If disdain for the government parties is genuine then all astroturfing praise for Sinn Féin is gonna do is (very rightly imo) lend every other party a stick to beat them with. If I were Mary Lou’s advisor I’d get her to order the party grassroots and interns to calm their shit down because it’ll be incidents like this that cost them votes

  35. Don’t make things seem more bipartisan here than they really are. Criticising Sinn Féin on this sub even harshly usually gets you a decent amount of upvotes.

  36. I presume all parties have youth wings that are up to this.

    I doubt the SF support on here has anything to do with bots (I am sure they have them) but more likely the cross over in party support and demographics. The age ranges of SF support and Reddit use are largly the same. Theres no point in JAQing off when the details are there.

  37. >Makes you wonder why r/Ireland is so overwhelmingly pro-SF

    SF are more popular among younger voters. Reddit’s demographics skew younger. It’s hardly a mystery.

  39. I like this sub but I’d never join it. I like the political discourse and am aware this is quite a left wing sub (I’m pro FF) but it is just too anti establishment, hard left for me. Now I know why.

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