Husic is right to say that “a lot of people were warned” that these “rallies were whipped up by far-right extremists and neo-Nazis”. He therefore assumes attendees turned up knowing this, and must be ideologically aligned with them: fascists one and all. It’s here that I think Husic’s formulation falters. What it gains in moral clarity, it loses in social accuracy.
Protesters during the March for Australia anti-immigration rally outside Parliament House in Canberra on Sunday.Credit: AAP
Reporting from the ground paints an enormously varied picture, much as you’d get from any protest. Some openly admitted to being neo-Nazis and racists. Others lamented the far-right presence and insisted “most of us don’t stand with them”. Lots were focused on housing affordability, a problem for which they blame high immigration. Some specifically said they don’t oppose immigration, as long as it doesn’t outpace infrastructure. One held up a sign saying “Prosecute Dan Andrews for Treason”. You don’t make sense of that by calling the whole thing a fascist rally.
Albanese clearly sees something quite different to Husic. Not so much a rally of true believers, but a conveyer belt carrying people from an anxiety about immigration levels to extremist politics. I think that’s a more accurate view, not least because the far right seems to acknowledge this themselves. To listen to that neo-Nazi speaker in Melbourne was to see a man who knew the crowd was not quite his. He asked them to overlook their differences “on historical events or versions of ideology” – a colossal euphemism for something like the Holocaust – in support of a common cause. He implored attendees “to learn to make friends” with those with whom they disagree. Amid the cheers, there were also boos. This was a man speaking not to the converted, but to the convertible.
In that context, Albanese’s remarks are worth more detailed attention: “I’d just say to people – and I have no doubt that there would have been good people who went along, heard about a rally, concerned about [social problems] … have a look at who you were with on Sunday. The motivation that they have … isn’t actually about housing or our economy or anything else. It’s about sowing division. Neo-Nazis have no role.”
Later, when challenged in caucus, he explained his approach: “We have to make sure we give people space to move away and to not push them further down that rabbit hole.” Albanese is speaking to the convertible too.
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That makes no sense if you think they don’t exist. But if they do, it’s hard to see how calling them fascists will achieve much other than encouraging them to become exactly that. We’re watching a process of radicalisation on the margins of our society gaining momentum since at least the anti-lockdown protests of COVID. The far right was active then, too, and it’s now pretty clear that yelling at all who attended while a conspiratorial fringe offered them a home wasn’t a winning strategy. That Dan Andrews sign wasn’t out of nowhere.
Radicalisation relies on a cycle of alienation and rejection. That isn’t broken by condemnation. It’s broken by giving people an off-ramp; a way of stepping back from the brink without feeling humiliated.
The point isn’t whether or not the protesters really are “good people” – whatever that means. It’s to appeal to them in the hope they might live up to the billing. Perhaps then they might have no need to care for these new Nazis either.
