By the way, the phrase "virtue signalling" is, of course, only ever use these days as a sort of leper's bell to warn of an approaching asshole, but "signalling" in general is an interesting little bit of economics ...
... consider if you wanted to identify reliable Tory Party cadre for the future. You can't ask them to donate to cancer research or Greek wildfires, because too many people who didn't really have the property you wanted would be able to do that.
... but if you ask them to donate to the crowdfunding of someone found guilty of election fraud, you're making a request that would be very psychologically repulsive for a normal person, but much less so ...
... for a conservative ideologue. Which is the kind of person you're looking for. A signal has to be costly (not "cheap talk", in the jargon). So the people publicly announcing their donations to this Darren Grimes thing ...
... at least partly conveying the information "I'm on the team, I'm not put off by this very unattractive proposition, I'm either in favour of what the Leave campaign did or prepared to swallow it for the benefit of Team Tory".
that's signalling for you. It's a much more accurate use of the term than just applying it to anyone who says they're upset about something horrible happening somewhere in the world.
