On the face of it, the tactics described below shouldn’t work.

The average person is guarded enough against deception to scrutinise narratives that can be quickly debunked with a few Google searches. The payoff for people consuming fascist propaganda must be so valuable that any caution goes out the window.

This post will analyse four recent lies and distortions sold by Thomas Sheridan to his audience, the methods used and some of the responses by audience members.

Symbolic substitution (using symbols to mask facts) – Enoch Burke’s “victory”

The observation that far-right crusades are tickets to failure outside of a fascist environment (such as modern day US), and devoid of logic, is to be fought at all times. The facts involved in a situation can be replaced with one iconic image, for instance one of defiance.

Such was the case with the footage paraded around by the Irish far-right, of former teacher Enoch Burke once again on the grounds of the school he was sacked from years ago.

In July of this year, Enoch Burke was released from prison, the reasoning being that material circumstances had changed: the school year was finished and he had been permanently dismissed from his teaching job, after years of appeals. Presumably, the chances of him reoffending straight away (by turning up at the school, breaching the court order) were reduced at the time.

The court order still stands. It was made clear to him upon release that continuing to show up at his former place of employment could land him back in prison. He did it anyway, on the first day of the new school year. Garda were called by school staff, as usual. Burke is not back in prison at the moment – but if he continues, he will be.

A much trumpeted “win” had to do with a person involved in his employment case having a conflict on interest, which he managed to prove in 2025. This was a delay and nothing more. Procedural and overblown. The issue was sorted, the case went ahead and Burke lost it.

What exactly did he win in the end? Absolutely nothing.

He spent hundreds of days in prison, of his own insistence, he still lost his job and income, he still has an injunction against him and he owes the state in excess of 200k euros in fines. Through his insane behaviour, he has likely made himself unemployable as well.

Imagine any institution or business willing to subject itself to that man now, given how he treats employers and former employers. Even if you agreed with him ideologically, you probably wouldn’t hire him. He could cook up a brand new moral transgression on your part and you’d be stuck with him at the doorstep for years.

Leave it to Sheridan and other fibbers to describe Burke’s pointless return to the school grounds as a victory.

To people of this ilk, every win can be purely symbolic, designed to infuse the crowd with a sense of triumph, even if it’s devoid of practicality. Burke could be in a prison van, heading back there; he could be destitute and homeless, and on the brink of insanity, but it wouldn’t matter to these people, since they don’t care about him in the slightest. He’s sticking it to the wokies in spirit.

The underlying message seems to be that he is worth copying, even if it ruins the life of anyone doing so.

Why was Burke back there? What was he going to achieve, apart from risking imprisonment again? What was the end goal? Giving the middle finger to the state for five minutes? Is that what he lives for? Imagine this was any other venue, like a bank, a McDonald’s or a train station, and an employee dismissed years prior kept returning to make the point that he shouldn’t have been fired. Anybody would see the obsession as disturbing.

He will never be undone in what sense? He will never stop saying that he was right and they were wrong? He can do that comfortably from his own house. He can write a book about it. He does not have to keep breaking a court order and put his freedom at risk. He never did.

It was a sideshow run by a highly narcissistic individual claiming to engage in a holy war. It’s very likely not over yet, though for everyone’s peace, I hope it is.

Meanwhile, Sheridan’s audience:

From himself? When someone loses legally in every conceivable way, do people just get to decide of their own accord that they have won? Apparently they do. This applies to every uncomfortable outcome these people are confronted with.

Shysters like Sheridan depend on the belief that these stunts are worth doing and following. Their business depends on it.

Adding fictitious elements to real events to reinforce a grievance narrative – “Yvonne Woods framed innocent, possibly white men”

It’s much easier for fascists to manipulate by distorting real events than to make things up (although as you can see below, some of them do that as well and get away with it). This is particularly easy when an issue involves obscure technical knowledge.

The Yvonne Woods case shook the US and travelled the globe. As a retired DNA analyst, she was recently sentenced to 10 years in prison, which is fitting, for tampering with evidence in criminal cases. Out of what she now claims was her wish to process cases faster and show high productivity, she deliberately omitted certain results, affecting the outcome of those cases. Given the implications of her actions, this was beyond despicable. We’re talking almost Paolo Macchiarini levels of despicable. And it went on for decades. Science is precise, but it’s still handled by humans. In this case, a very flawed one.

From CBS, linked to above:

Regardless of the article you read, and there are many, you will find one commonality: no false positives discovered. She most likely allowed guilty men to get away with sexual assault, but she did not frame any innocent person. I will expand below on how that would have been logistically impossible.

Sheridan’s audience, of course, doesn’t bother with such details, doesn’t check primary sources (they trust him) and the ideologically convenient narrative he spins is always good enough. It makes them feel vindicated in their approach to the world.

The narrative had to be that she had victimised men and most likely white men to deliberately protect genuine offenders (likely not white, given how he puts it).

Again: no false positives were found.

To clarify that it was Yvonne Woods he was talking about, and that his lie was the main issue at least one viewer retained about this case (the viewer hasn’t returned, after presumably reading a few articles, to correct him):

Yvonne Woods’ actions harmed victims in the cases she was contributing to, not random innocent people. Her actions harmed women and children. This clown, at some point during his rant, claimed that she should be skinned alive for framing innocent men (this is at least the second time he claimed someone should be skinned alive, it reminds me of an Ed Gein predisposition). He then claimed there would probably be a Me Too campaign for her. Again, in reality, she harmed female and child victims of sexual assault. Would there ever be a Me Too campaign for her based on that? Quite the opposite.

The distortion is sickening.

Moreover (and this is crucial) no one in his audience wondered how a DNA analyst could successfully frame innocent people for crimes committed by others. Imagine what would need to happen:

  • access to a DNA database of random people to frame (which she did not have), she would literally need a sample from a person she intended to frame;
  • other people involved in the investigation concluding somehow that an innocent person was responsible;
  • the cooperation of victims in those cases, who would point to innocent people as their attackers in court;
  • etc.etc.etc.

Criminal investigations are very complex; Woods’ reports were a cog in the machine. An important one, but still. Sexual abuse victims would not misidentify their attackers to the point of confusing their skin colour, as he claims happened, never mind that in many cases the attacker is known to the victim.

A forensic analyst cannot “plant DNA on innocent people” as he claims; even if she had a sample from someone, she could not access the crime scene evidence held by the police to “plant” or remove anything. Evidently, re-examining her work was possible later, which is how she was caught in the first place.

What he claims, especially as common practice, is not possible.

The case Sheridan got this framing narrative from was likely the overturning of a murder conviction. A man named Michael Clark in Boulder County had been convicted of a murder in 1994. Since Yvonne Woods had processed DNA samples, this alone was grounds to overturn his conviction and release him for the time being, although the DA intends to prosecute him again (there is likely other evidence than DNA).

There is no evidence that he was framed by Woods. But tell that to simple minds that cannot process anything complicated.

Of course every single case she contributed to should be re-examined. Of course her carelessness, sociopathy (I don’t even know what to call it) could have led to wrongful convictions based on police being led away from guilty suspects and ending up focusing on the wrong people. Again, criminal cases are very complex (especially murder cases) and don’t rely on DNA alone.

How does the audience respond? Do they ask any questions? Do they go read a few articles, watch a few news videos? No. They just take his word that Yvonne Woods was out to frame innocent men for SA, when in reality, she was harming women and children by claiming no male DNA had been found. How many of these cases ended up listed as false allegations in statistics, the exact type that bolster Sheridan’s claims that men are falsely accused all the time?

The typical response was not inquisitive, but along these lines (we love and trust your every word, Thomas).

Only one person very gently and respectfully nudged him to separate facts from speculation (not realising perhaps that Sheridan had made a false statement to build his speculation on), while acknowledging the cultish nature of his audience.

Pathologising opponents and reality inversion – “People who support the Palestinian cause suffer from mass psychosis”

Sheridan speaks as if the institutions he foresees analysing and determining this pathology in the future agreed with his point of view, or were likely to at some point. He denounces society from the top down, placing himself and his group outside of it, yet he continually uses its frameworks and institutions as an imagined appeal to authority.

Psychosis involves being unable to see reality as it is.

In this case, he’s referring to a genocide that has been going on since 2023, preceded by numerous war crime sprees and a decades-long occupation and oppression of Palestinian people by Israel. Acknowledging these amply documented facts, established over and over in international courts, is what he calls psychosis.

He doesn’t care about using the term incorrectly or appealing to the authority of two fields he constantly tears down, as in psychology and psychiatry. He doesn’t care that acknowledging reality will never be classed as suffering from psychosis, by anybody in a position to do so.

This is basic comprehension of the English language.

The spark that lit the trash fire was a protest against Ireland playing 2 football matches against Israel. Sheridan was befuddled. What happened to impartiality? What happened to minding your own business? Are Irish football players Arab Muslims?

Apparently, if people care about anything that doesn’t affect them directly, they are psychotic. That isn’t even the case with Israel, as their war on Iran is causing economic havoc all over the world. One can absolutely detest their actions for selfish reasons. But never mind.

I reiterate an older rhetorical exercise (I am NOT actually advocating for people to behave like this): if you see anything happen to Sheridan or people who talk like him out there, follow his own principles:

  • Mind your own business.
  • Remain impartial; what did the attacker do to you?
  • Do not document or report the incident and do not provide evidence as a witness, even if it happened in front of you.
  • Don’t try to help; it’s not your responsibility.
  • Do not care. If you do, it means you are psychotic.

Making stuff up: “They’re doxing Israelis and Jews in Ireland”

In the same video quoted above, Sheridan makes a bombastic claim: Irish pro-Palestinian activists are doxing Israelis and Jews in Ireland. Sounds alarming, doesn’t it?

There is ZERO evidence of this (note that he doesn’t provide any, as usual) and no such reports from any institution or group monitoring anti-Semitic incidents. You can look it up yourself.

The Jewish community in Ireland is very small. A campaign of this type would be very easy to document and would be widely publicised.

From Jewish News:

The second paragraph notes that at least some of the modern day anti-Semitism is fuelled by the far-right, which Sheridan is part of, based on conspiracy theories his viewers routinely express.

If you’re a follower of Sheridan’s and you stumble across this post, do yourself a favour: look up this claim. Use 3 different search engines. Use AI agents as well, which sweep the internet. Read every article about anti-Semitic incident in Ireland. There is absolutely no evidence of a doxing campaign and not even a mention of a doxing incident.

What Sheridan might be drawing on is an incident that happened in Australia in 2024, when the names of 600 people in a WhatsApp group were leaked. It was widely publicised and legislation was passed to deal with doxing more efficiently. Nothing to do with Ireland, obviously.

The absolute audacity of this individual, whose audience is full of neo-Nazis, to accuse people protesting a genocidal state of waging war on Irish Jews.

Does anybody question him? Does anybody look this up? Of course not. They’ve been listening to lie after lie after lie for years.

Thomas Sheridan is just one grifter. There must be many thousands of them all over the world, although there is no established number. They all use the same tactics and their followers live in a parallel reality.

It will certainly be over someday, but sadly, not soon enough.