At a glitzy wedding venue in south-west Sydney on a cool August night, a woman kicked off the Sydney’s Freedom Summit with some housekeeping.
“We have 28 speeches so if we don’t get started soon, we’ll go all night… which wouldn’t be so bad,” she joked awkwardly into the microphone. The audience was quiet.
Monica Smit, the event’s organiser, is the founder of Reignite Democracy Australia. The anti-vaccine activist group was a driving force in Australia’s anti-government, conspiracy-fuelled “freedom movement”, leading a loud campaign against lockdowns, vaccine mandates and masks since 2020.
As politicians, business people, activists, doctors, authors, documentarians and people who said they’d suffered side effects from vaccines took to the stage during the five-and-a-half-hour talkfest, the unspoken but uniting aim of the evening became clear: the leftovers of the freedom movement are trying to create their own separate Christian society.
‘At the moment we’re in a bit of a lull’
After vaccine hesitancy’s peak in 2021, the interest in the anti-vaccine and freedom movement collapsed. Almost everyone got vaccinated. Most COVID-19 restrictions were lifted. Those who became involved in the endless protests and bombardment of conspiracy and misinformation in online freedom communities began to drop off. A few were arrested (including Smit), others were driven out due to infighting and controversy; many just burned out or lost interest because there was little left to fight against.
Smit herself acknowledged the aimlessness of the movement: “At the moment we’re in a lull,” she told those gathered.
The Freedom Summit’s attendance showed there are still true believers clinging to opposition. I was among 500 or so attendees who paid $90 to learn about tools and strategies to “live peacefully and prosper, even in chaos”, along with a canapes-and-drinks package.
“I’m doing the summit because I’m sick of organising. We need to start living a life that makes government obsolete,” Smit said at the beginning of the evening.
The event’s vibe was equal parts formal ball, “get rich quick” seminar and sermon. When I walked into the venue 15 minutes before the speeches began, the large room was filled with people chattering. INXS played softly over the speakers. Some people posed in front of a photo wall emblazoned with “FREEDOM SUMMIT DOWN UNDER 2022” and Reignite Democracy Australia’s logo. There was a faint whiff of body odour.
The crowd seemed unremarkable from a glance. While skewing older, there were people of different ages, genders and races. Only a few people stood out for wearing freedom movement attire — “I have an immune system” one T-shirt read — but most people were dressed inconspicuously, save for the handful of people wearing tinfoil hats. One attendee donned an outfit riffing on the classic Australian character “Conspiracy Dundee”.
One woman I sat next to, Kathleen from Liverpool, told me that she was there because she wanted “freedom for myself, freedom for my children, freedom for my grandchildren”.
Another attendee, Anya, was a beautician who lost her job because of vaccine mandates. We chatted a little between speakers. She spoke quietly with a faint European accent about her choice to have another child rather than go back to work, and how her husband moved to Sydney to avoid having to get a vaccine. When she noticed I was taking notes, she eyed me suspiciously and asked if I was a journalist.
“Yes, I am,” I said.
“Who for?” she asked.
When I told her “Crikey — it’s an independent news publication”, it didn’t seem to register but she seemed satisfied that I wasn’t part of the mainstream media and relaxed back into her chair.
Many of the speakers, drawn from the freedom movement across Australia, were warmly welcomed by the crowd who knew them from viral Instagram or Telegram posts. A few of the headliners even received standing ovations like former federal MP Craig Kelly.
“My name’s Craig Kelly and my pronouns are Australian, proud, free and unvaxxed,” he started to a roar of approval.
Many people disregarded the five-minute speech limit, the most passionate ignoring Smit’s attempts to wrap them up. There were multiple “freedom chants”. One woman, lawyer and former WA Liberal candidate Andrea Tokaji, even broke into an impromptu rendition of Destiny Child’s “Survivor” mid-speech.
There were common themes in the speeches. Australians had been terrorised by the government’s tyrannical public health restrictions, they claimed, and those who had stood up against them had been treated like second-class citizens. They painted themselves as freedom fighters on the right side of history. Christian Mack, a former weightlifting and boxing coach who runs an anti-vaccine mandate group for frontline workers, literally called his fiery pep talk a “half-time speech”.
If you weren’t paying attention, you could be forgiven for forgetting it was a night organised by anti-vaccine campaigners for like-minded people. Every now and again, however, their fringe beliefs slipped out.
During a surprisingly rousing speech about hope, self-described “income acceleration coach” Pat Mesiti asked: “How can you not be angry when they’re trying to microchip your children?”
Steiner school teacher Roger Richards cited a study claiming water changes its behaviour based on human thoughts and emotions.
Lyn McLean said electromagnetic radiation from 5G, 4G, even Bluetooth connections from wireless headphones like AirPods is making people sick, particularly those without thick skulls.
There were some who explicitly spoke about vaccines, but the two major themes of the evening were the hardship of failing to comply with COVID-19 health restrictions, and planning for the future.
Dr Robyn Cosford regaled the audience about her decision to give up her medical licence rather than face disciplinary action over prescribing disproven COVID-19 treatment ivermectin and handing out vaccine exemptions. Firefighter Jan Hausoul complained about being stood down over vaccine mandates, which prompted him to create anti-vaccine group Australian Firefighters Alliance. Tony Nikolic of NSW law firm AFL Solicitors was upbeat about the unsuccessful legal challenges to vaccine mandates and dismissals. For figures like Dr William Bay, who had recently been suspended from practising, the consequences they faced had transformed them into martyrs for the movement in the eyes of attendees.
The foes mentioned throughout the evening included — take a breath — governments, politicians, chief health officers, the media, experts, police, teachers, universities, big tech, the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (APHRA), communist regimes, energy companies, QR codes, central banks, Klaus Schwab, and the World Economic Forum.
However, no enemy was mentioned more than Dan Andrews, even though the event was in NSW.
God, and an alternative vision for the future
These speakers came prepared with solutions. Many promoted their own businesses, from demountable homes to precious metals sales to weight-loss coaching (“We’re not an MLM [multi-level marketing], not that it’s a bad thing — good on you if you can make it work,” said Melissa George, who goes by the online pseudonym The Woke Mumma).
Topher Field, director of a documentary about Victoria’s lockdowns titled Battleground Melbourne and a libertarian activist arrested for inciting anti-lockdown protests, stressed the importance of building a community within the movement.
After running down the aisle and up onto the stage when his name was announced by Smit, Field cracked a few jokes before talking about the Greek families who came to Australia after World War II. He asked the audience how these immigrants were able to amass wealth and build “big houses” in Melbourne in just a generation. The answer, he said, was that Greek immigrants supported their own businesses in their communities — an ethos he urged those in the freedom movement to adopt.
“You’re going to be offered a smorgasbord tonight. Choose to engage in your community,” he said.
After a few of these, I realised that the movement had launched a constellation of its own “freedom friendly” business alternatives, networks and institutions. Laura Dogan spruiked using her company, Freedom Recruitment Agency, to connect businesses with unvaccinated jobseekers. Dumped One Nation candidate Rebecca Lloyd said her freedom movement business directory, Fair Business Australia, would eventually be an “Australian version of Amazon”.
Smit floated the idea of the anti-vaccine doctors association COVID-19 Medical Network replacing Australia’s medical registrar APHRA. Australian Firefighter Association’s Hausoul talked about expanding the group into an on-call service for the movement “in a parallel society … when it’s us versus them”, he said.
Even an alternative to participating in the education system was presented as multiple speakers promoted homeschooling for parents in the freedom movement dodging vaccine mandates or other feared forms of “indoctrination” like sex and gender education.
Another commonality between speakers was their Christian faith, and its centrality to their support for the freedom movement. Many speakers referred to God or Jesus as guiding their decision to refuse to get the jab. Smit compared Dr Bay’s speech to that of a pastor’s address. Author Geoff Shaw warned of a rise in “anti-Christian sentiment”. Homeschool Academy Australia founder and contestant on Australian Idol Lydia Denker said she was inspired to start the business when God spoke to her after three weeks of fasting.
Without mentioning it by name, Fair Business Australia’s Lloyd introduced attendees to a fringe, political Pentecostal theory that encourages Christians to change society by taking over the seven “mountains” of public life, including business, government and education.
The crowd became increasingly unsettled as the event’s runtime ticked over to three hours without a break. Then Smit announced the intermission and people began pushing their way around the packed room. Crowds gathered around the single door where waitstaff brought out trays of food, mobbing them as soon as they came out. One woman saw me holding an arancini ball and mimed biting it out of my hand. After the event, Smit sent out an email apologising for the food service.
When I walked around the room, I overheard snippets of conversations of people waiting for service at the bar. People talked about the Agenda 21/2030 conspiracy theory or the conservative satire website Babylon Bee.
The audience was rowdier after the break, milling around the back of the room, near the bar, and ignoring Smit’s attempts to get their attention. Only the remaining politician speakers, Queensland Liberal National Party Senator Gerard Rennick and One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts recaptured the audience.
While introducing Rennick, Smit mentioned that she’d told him about a plan to change her name legally to Dan Andrews, move to his electorate, and run against him in the state election to confuse voters. Rennick advised her against it, she said.
Rennick used his time to encourage attendees to join a political party. Notably, he didn’t specify which party and he spoke about being in the Coalition in the past tense. (The next day, Rennick told me via text that the freedom movement should join the Coalition “if it is a political solution they are looking for”.)
“Who here is going to sign up for a party?” he asked the crowd. The response was lukewarm, with a few people putting their hands up. The room began to lose interest again.
Historically, the freedom movement has been apathetic towards electoral politics and politicians, even those who are sympathetic to their cause. Craig Kelly spent part of his speech earlier in the night cursing people in the movement who attacked him because “some idiot on the internet said that I was a Freemason”.
Finally, One Nation’s Malcolm Roberts received the loudest welcome from the audience. Small in stature, Roberts roamed the wide stage as he spoke. He ping-ponged between encouraging people to love each other and spouting conspiracy theories about election fraud. He even hinted at his sovereign citizen past by declaring “everyone in this room is a voter, is a sovereign citizen of this country”.
The only time I felt uncomfortable throughout the whole evening is when Roberts mentioned the “three lefty journalists who are recording this”. I looked around uneasily, but no one seemed to notice me.
Roberts sparked the most heated response from the audience. When he asked “What’s the solution?”, an audience member behind me yelled, “Kill them.” At one point someone yelled “Kick the commies out” and Roberts stopped mid-sentence to agree.
Eventually, Smit edged onto the stage to try to get Roberts to wrap up. He finished by repeating his promise from the event’s promotional material to “hound down” the “perpetrators”. (What’s been perpetrated is left unsaid.)
Smit concluded the evening by promoting her latest attempt for a global vaccine protest (“We can all agree COVID-19 is a symptom of globalism”). Abruptly, she said that the drinks package had ended during speeches.
“The licence is over and everyone needs to leave,” Smit said unceremoniously.
We filed out of the room and back into the world, ready to put their plan into action.
