As Brexit demolishes our political system stone by stone, it is uncovering species that have long been hidden in its deeper recesses. One new group has been particularly exposed of late: a sub-section of the Brexit ultras, who are starting to resemble a bespoke spin-off of the incel movement – let’s call them the Brincels.

These politicians – who include, but are not limited to, the MPs Mark Francois, Andrew Bridgen, Steve Baker, Bernard Jenkin, Bill Cash and Christopher Chope – are notable for continuing to hold out for a no deal Brexit, even as colleagues such as Jacob Rees-Mogg cave for strategic reasons. These are the MPs who voted against Theresa May’s deal on Friday, as it wasn’t hard enough – an approach which has led directly to May’s current plan: finding a compromise with Jeremy Corbyn, and potentially a softer Brexit.

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This lot are experiencing an altogether different parliamentary crisis to their fellow MPs, who can at the moment be mostly found looking white and haunted in corners, bursting into tears at the horror of it all. The Brincels, by contrast, are bristling with excitement: they have spent more time on television in the last few weeks than at any point in their preceding careers. They are full of energy, purpose, and righteous anger. It is as if, after years spent festering with barely any political action, they have converted their resentment into a kind of religious zeal.

According to Tory colleagues this group may be separated from the rest of the ERG on two principles. First, that “they are not as smart”, and second, that they “would rather lose and fight on the streets than strike any sort of compromise”. The second is reflected in the language they use to talk about Britain’s departure from the EU, which is very much as if they were Mel Gibson in Braveheart.

First up, Francois, who between 1983 and 1989 was a part-time officer in the Territorial Army, and since then has relied heavily on military terms in everyday conversation. (In the early 1990s he named his campaign to get elected as councillor “Operation Basildon Storm”). Since entering government in 2010 he has been given various minor roles mostly involving the army, much to the alleged irritation of the soldiers who dealt with him, before being summarily demoted by Theresa May in 2016.

But over the last few weeks the outpost he occupies in the Brexit debate has been gradually abandoned, meaning he has started to be invited on TV, and can finally talk about being a soldier on there. He has talked about why he can’t accept May’s deal (“I was in the army. I wasn’t trained to lose”), about parliament’s indicative votes on Monday (“a coup against the British people”), and about his mild-mannered Brexit opponent Philip Hammond (“my eternal message to you is ‘up yours!’”). Last night, after a narrow Commons vote to delay Brexit, he briefly graduated from corporal to deity: “Forgive them father, for they know not what they do”.

Then there is “pre-washed potato magnate” Bridgen, a Royal Marine drop-out with a striking physical resemblance to Francois, whose family vegetable farm is said to be behind the unkind nickname colleagues have for him: “spud-u-hate”. As the Brexit debate raged last summer, he posted a photograph of himself in his office in front of a sign reading “Freedom is in peril. Defend it with all your might”. In recent weeks he has appeared on TV to tell viewers the “overwhelming majority” of the rest of the EU has no steel industry (untrue) and that all English people are entitled to Irish passports (also untrue).

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Neither Francois nor Bridgen have yet expressed themselves with the passion that Baker has, perhaps only because they are not able to. (One Tory Brexiteer describes the three men thus: “Mark Francois: idiot, Andrew Bridgen: 75% idiot, Steve Baker: sometimes lets his emotions cloud his judgment”). When members of the ERG started to say last week that they would fall in behind May’s deal, Baker wrote in a WhatsApp group: “I could tear this place down and bulldoze it into the river. These fools and knaves and cowards are voting on things they don’t even understand.” On Monday, in keeping with what some are calling the “little corporal” theme on his side of the argument, Baker introduced himself on Sky News as “Brexit hardman Steve Baker”. “He thinks he is on a mission from God to save us from Europe,” a Tory colleague told me.

Then there is Chope, best known for blocking attempts to tackle female genital mutilation and upskirting, and advising in recent weeks that those at risk from knife crime could protect themselves by “being fitter”. There is Cash, who complained that May’s deal would “castrate” the house, and there is Jenkin, who has attempted to answer Scottish objections to Brexit by saying that England had “let” them vote “in our referendum”.

These are the MPs whose actions are now likely to result in a soft Brexit or no Brexit at all, meaning they will be able, in martyred fashion, to go on talking about betrayal for the rest of their days. It almost makes you wonder whether they did it on purpose.

• Martha Gill is a political journalist and former lobby correspondent