Anti-vax, anti-mask, anti-gender: The transphobic turn of the "freedom movement" during COVID-19

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Aotearoa New Zealand (NZ), as with much of the world, experienced a proliferation of far-right and populist organisations resisting public health measures and perceived government overreach. After the repeal of the COVID-19 Protection Framework brought an end to vaccine and mask wearing mandates, these organisations sought new issues to mobilise their supporters. In 2023, coinciding with the visit of a prominent "gender critical" activist and the introduction of new questions about gender to the census, two such organisations-Voices for Freedom and New Zealand Doctors Speaking Out with Science-incorporated an objection to trans identities and a defence of "traditional" gendered social roles into their respective political projects. This pivot to transphobia aligned such organisations with more extreme and explicitly white-nationalist elements of NZ's right, such as the fascist organisation Action Zealandia. This paper presents a secondary analysis of data collected as part of the first author's PhD project which focussed on the engagement of far-right organisations with scientific knowledge during the pandemic. We examine dialogue from the aforementioned organisations to see how this transphobic turn was incorporated into the ideology of the COVID-19 focused organisations, what purpose it served, and how it relates to the broader context of NZ's fascist-right.