The Racist ‘Not Racism’ Nature of Islamophobia within the Reclaim Australia Movement

Abstract

This article tracks the Islamophobia within the Reclaim Australia movement. The movement organized several anti-Muslim rallies in regional and urban areas across Australia. The formation of this movement in 2015 was entirely based on anti-Muslim racism, as the movement’s pioneers gained traction through their interactions with white supremacist groups. The nature of the movement’s Islamophobia had illustrated how Reclaim Australia’s proponents saw their racism as indistinguishable from celebrating Australian patriotism. This article uncovers how an explicitly racist movement commonly argued that their anti-Muslim positions were ‘not racism’, revealing how denial is at the heart of contemporary Islamophobia. Within these ‘not racism’ narratives, Reclaim Australia enthusiasts utilized strategies that both mobilize notions of race and then denied such mobilization.