We Need to Talk About Kevin: How Australia’s Men Became a Market for Rage

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The Demographic Stampede

Something has shifted in the Coalition’s heartland, and it’s not policy. It’s identity. Australian men who once mumbled their vote—and only when prompted—like reluctant schoolboys, are now marching into populism with their arms folded and their patience short. Disaffected Gen X and late-stage boomers; the men who once backed the Nationals out of habit, are defecting to One Nation in numbers too large to dismiss as a protest or a tantrum. It’s a demographic realignment.

One Nation now polls between 14 and 17 per cent nationally. Among men over 55, that rises to nearly one in four. That is not a minor tremor. It is a market.

These men are not doing worse than women economically; women are facing higher rates of poverty, unpaid care, housing stress and workforce insecurity. What distinguishes the men sliding into Hanson’s camp isn’t hardship; it’s status dislocation. They feel their place in the world has changed without consultation. Women’s workforce gains, multicultural workplaces, environmental transitions, and a generation of younger voters unmoved by culture-war dog whistles; together, these are interpreted not as social progress, but as personal downgrade.

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The New Product Category: Dislocated Patriarch

Into this insecurity steps Barnaby Joyce. His shift toward a Reform UK-style, culture-driven platform is not random, it’s targeted. He has found the voter who sees climate targets as moral lecturing, multiculturalism as queue-jumping, gender equality as a conspiracy, and renewable energy as a plot against his identity. Not evidence against his livelihood, but evidence against his centrality.

This is no longer the rusted-on National Party voter. It is a new product category: the insecure traditionalist male. Call it the dislocated patriarch, the status casualty, the affable bloke refashioned as a grievance consumer.

Populists do not sell policies to this voter. They sell recognition. They say: You haven’t changed. The country has betrayed you. We’ll restore the hierarchy you remember.

It’s not a ballot. It’s a time machine.

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The Co-Authors of Grievance

Joyce understands this market better than any strategist. He spruiks coal as if it were a beloved family pet, (helped of course by HELE, base-load and other coal-lobby propaganda myths) condemns the “inner-city elites” who allegedly threaten the natural order, and insists the problem is not failed governance but failed obedience. Pauline Hanson does the same through border nostalgia, anti-expert populism and a curated sense of cultural nostalgia pitched directly at male disaffection. They are not rivals; they are co-authors of the same script.

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Branding the Resentment

The media is not creating this anxiety, but it is bottling and selling it. Sky After Dark, red-neck talkback, the new algorithmic X, YouTube channels trading in “anti-elite” masculinity, and meme factories that turn resentment into belonging; they don’t persuade Kevin. They recognise him, package him, and serve him back to himself as a loyal market segment. This is not propaganda. It is branding. It uses the same materials that helped elect Trump: nostalgia, suspicion of experts, and the promise that the problem is not inequality, but equality arriving too late for him.

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The Economic Story They Won’t Tell

Meanwhile, the economic story is not marginal. Housing is hostile, work is insecure, and the cost of living crashes through the weekly budget like a drunk ex-husband through a screen door. But in the populist marketplace, the cause is never structural, never corporate gouging, privatised monopolies, regressive tax systems, or stagnant wages. It becomes something symbolic, moral, or foreign. The villains are migrants, climate targets, city feminists, and “inner-city elites.”

The sociologist calls this status threat. The politician calls it opportunity.

And the algorithm calls it engagement.

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Grievance as Business Model

This is how grievance becomes a business model. It is marketed, monetised, and shaped for profit across talkback echo-chambers, conspiracy-meme Facebook groups, sports betting platforms piggybacking political advertising networks, and YouTube channels built on masculine angst. The object is not persuasion; it is addiction. It rewards outrage, not reason. The question, then, isn’t whether Kevin is angry. The question is: Who is selling him his anger, and what do they plan to do with the proceeds?

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CODA: The Market For Men Who Feel Replaced

Kevin didn’t wake up one morning radicalised.

He was recruited.

He was identified as a profitable demographic, targeted with nostalgia packaged as political rescue, and sold a worldview tailored to soothe a fear deeper than economics: the fear of no longer mattering.

Populists don’t promise solutions. They promise restoration. Not a better future, an older one. One that looks like him and answers to him. With a V8 motor and bull bars.

This is how democracies don’t collapse; they regress. Not toward dictatorship, but toward hierarchy nostalgia, a longing for a past where someone like Kevin didn’t have to negotiate his relevance.

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The Data That Defines the Moment

• One Nation’s strongest support comes from men aged 50–69
• Among men over 55, One Nation support approaches 1 in 4
• Women in the same demographic are half as likely to vote One Nation
• Women face worse economic pressure yet don’t respond with far-right votes
• Support spikes in regions experiencing cultural change more than economic collapse

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Research Box: Why Grievance Markets Work — Evidence & Insight

1. Gender, Populism & “Status Threat”

• Studies of political masculinities show a clear gender gap in support for radical-right / populist parties: men disproportionately back them when they believe their social status or traditional roles are under threat.
• In Australia, research into young masculinities and right-wing populism suggests that as male-dominated industries decline and social expectations shift, some men react by seeking identity through populist, culturally reactionary politics.

2. Digital Platforms & Algorithmic Amplification

• On platforms like X / formerly Twitter, algorithms systematically amplify right-leaning political content, giving it greater visibility than centre-left or centrist content.
• This effect is not incidental: personalized content-feeds and recommendation engines privilege emotionally charged, identity-based content over reasoned debate. That makes grievance, outrage and cultural fear highly “clickable.”

3. Grievance as a Media Commodity

• Research on social media ecosystems highlights how alternative media, algorithmic feed design, echo chambers, and “follow-train” networks can manufacture, magnify, and monetise resentment or cultural grievance — often under the guise of “authenticity.”
• In this “information economy,” outrage becomes a product: more engagement = more revenue. Political actors and marketers recognise this and increasingly shape messaging to exploit fear, nostalgia and perceived loss.

4. Populism and Democracy Risk

• Scholars consider populism; especially when grounded in grievance and identity fears, a structural threat to democratic norms, social cohesion and pluralism.
• When political messages are adapted to feed grievance-markets rather than foster public deliberation, democratic discourse becomes transactional and polarised.

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Key Structural Patterns: What This Evidence Tells Us

Mechanism	Effect on Voter Behaviour / Politics
Status threat / identity anxiety	Makes traditionalist-leaning men vulnerable to grievance-based messaging, even absent economic loss.
Algorithmic amplification of polar content	Prioritises emotionally charged content that triggers identity fear/closeness over nuance or policy nuance.
Grievance commodification	Turns resentment into media content and political currency; you don’t need persuasion; you need attention and reinforcement.
Populist exploitation of media-market dynamics	Political actors leverage monetised grievance to build support; democracy becomes a market for outrage, not argument.

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What This Means for Coverage & Commentary

• Blaming voters for their beliefs misses the point. The shift is not rooted in ignorance or stupidity; it’s rooted in a calculated marketplace that trades in fear, status, identity and belonging.
• To challenge this market, commentary must go beyond moralising or mocking. We need to expose who’s profiting from grievance, how the system works, and what the real alternatives are (not just another brand of outrage).
• Recognising grievance as a business model helps explain why populist movements persist even when their policies worsen material conditions. It’s not about winning hearts; it’s about maintaining a voting brand.

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