Over the past couple of days the camp behind the convoy to Canberra has slowly broken up. After an eviction notice from the ACT government the majority of protesters left on their own on Sunday, with a few holdouts finally forcefully evicted on Monday. Observing the livestream of those who tried to hold on, I and many others noticed a deep sense of despair.
Much of this desperation came from an intense belief in the goals of the movement, and a promise that was made that the protests would keep going until these goals were met. But it was about a lot more than that. Throughout the event many participants spoke about the strength of community at camp, with some describing it as one of the best times they’d had in years, or even their entire life.
Observing this has led me to think about the convoy as being what theorists, including myself in my own PhD, describe as an “intimate public”. Intimate publics refer to groups who bond over a shared worldview and “emotional knowledge”. Individuals come together both through connections to ideas as well as through a collective feeling about their position in the world. They reject politics, believing they can change the world through the sheer force of their community and the feeling behind it.
Intimate publics exist throughout our community, and this idea can be used to describe groups across the political spectrum. In her research, Lauren Berlant argued that the first intimate public was comprised of (primarily white) American women, who used texts such as romantic novels to create a collective complaint about their lives.
Thinking about the convoy in this way provides valuable insights into the movement, how it formed and how we may respond to it.
The makeup of the convoy was diverse and included those who are solely against mandates as well as anti-vaxxers, members of the far right, sovereign citizens and some grifters who were just there to make a buck. Community wasn’t central to everyone, with people turning up with disparate goals. Yet, elements of the convoy to Canberra certainly had many of the traits of an intimate public. Specifically, the movement was about more than just about ideology, but instead created a space in which individuals could be heard about their ideas and feelings of being shunned by society.
Speakers on the stage did not just talk about their political beliefs, but also about their experiences of being critical of vaccines or mandates, and how they were rejected and ostracised by those around them because of these views. At one point a speaker asked the crowd: “How many of you have lost friends over your views?” Almost everyone put their hand up.
In these movements this becomes reinforced by the creation and sharing of joint knowledge. Individuals share resources, ideas and materials, which become common texts through which they can understand the world. The convoy protests for example featured some doctors, nurses and other professionals who used the platform to speak out against vaccine mandates. Other protestors criticised those who disagreed with this view as being “fake news”. This approach separates them from the rest of the world, reinforcing a group sense of a shared worldview.
Many are rightfully concerned about the rise of these movements and what they mean for politics in Australia. While I agree with some of their positions (I am critical of mandates), I also find the rhetoric and tactics of some very worrying.
At the same time, I have despaired as I have watched how those around me have responded to these movements. Being condescending and talking about everyone in the convoy as a stupid moron who has been duped by disinformation will not achieve anything except to push people further into these spaces. These attacks reinforce a sense of the convoy being under siege from those around them, resulting in groups bunkering down rather than reaching out.
This is particularly true when we fail to recognise the genuine fears many of these individuals hold. The last two years have seen a huge societal upheaval. Yet many have acted shocked when individuals have raised concerns about decisions made by governments. They were often screamed at and accused of wanting to “let it rip”. It is no surprise then that these individuals are more inclined towards movements where they feel that people empathise with and listen to them.
If we want to understand the convoy and the movements around them, we need to grasp these group dynamics. People are not simply being “duped” by misinformation, and calling them “cookers” achieves nothing but making ourselves feel superior. Individuals are finding a community in a world that is often deeply lacking in it. Some of them are expressing genuinely held feelings that we must seek to understand and address rather than simply dismiss.
• Simon Copland is a PhD candidate in sociology at the Australian National University, studying online men’s rights groups and “manosphere” communities. He has research expertise in masculinity, the far right, online hate and digital media platforms
