Make ‘em laugh: how One Nation uses comedy to normalise harmful ideas
The party’s Please Explain cartoon series has ignited a political firestorm, but behind the punchlines and backlash is an insidious way to spread propaganda.
The satirical animated series "Please Explain" on One Nation's YouTube channel has sparked a political firestorm. The July episode titled "Don't Be Hastie" depicted Andrew Hastie, a Western Australian Liberal frontbencher and former Australian Defence Force member, as a "traitor" for testifying against a war criminal and supporting Labor's legislation.
This led to a fierce response from Hastie, who called Pauline Hanson and Barnaby Joyce "lying cowards" and demanded the deletion of the video. Tasmanian senator Jacqui Lambie also responded, calling Hanson "nothing less than a bloody coward". The episode highlights the role of humor in contemporary far-right politics, as the far right seeks to launder extreme and exclusionary ideas through humor and popular culture.
This strategy, known as metapolitics, aims to shift perceptions of what is permissible in public discourse and normalize exclusionary ideas. The use of humor allows the far right to test the waters of social acceptability while simultaneously dismissing criticism by claiming something is "just a joke".
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