When hundreds of protesters took over Melbourne’s West Gate Bridge on Tuesday, the Real Rukshan was there to capture it.
With 60,000 people concurrently viewing his livestream, Real Rukshan — the online nom de plume of Rukshan Fernando — was recognised by a man dressed in hi-vis: “Rukshan,” he yelled over the chaos, “you’re the reason we came down.” Later the crowd cheered his name while members of online conspiracy Telegram channels nominated him as leader of the movement.
Fernando is one of a number of Australian content creators such as Avi Yemini and Morgan C Jonas who position themselves as independent journalists documenting the “freedom” movements opposing lockdowns and vaccines.
Fernando’s live streams have functioned as the connective tissue for Melbourne protests and the broader movement, with millions of people watching from his perspective. His content and commentary take an anti-media and anti-government slant while lending credibility to fringe views. In communities that despise the mainstream media, he’s venerated by those who say he’s showing the “real truth”.
In a decentralised, disorganised movement, Fernando has emerged as its surprising narrator.
From wedding photographer to conservative online creator
Fernando is a Sri Lankan-Australia who went to school in Dandenong and studied law at Victoria University, according to his LinkedIn profile. For the past decade, he’s run a wedding photography business, Ferndara.
In a March interview about his career with another Australian creator, Fernando says he’s always been political but didn’t show any interest in domestic matters until Victoria’s second lockdown in July 2020: “When you have the government interfere with your life, that really makes you arc up and be more politically attuned to what’s happening around you.”
In posts on Ferndara’s Facebook page, Fernando says lockdowns had affected it “immensely” and it had received little government support.
But tweets from his account from 2019 and early 2020 show a much more partisan Fernando than he lets on in his videos. He’s a steadfast Donald Trump supporter who believes the United States election was stolen. He’s an avid fan of Jack Posobiec, Mike Cernovich, and Andy Ngo, right-wing American creators who have peddled conspiracy theories and platformed white nationalists.
He doesn’t believe that climate change is real. He called Supreme Court Justice Brett Cavanaugh accuser Christine Blasey Ford a “fake victim of nonexistent events”. He promoted a conspiracy theory that US politician Ilhan Omar married her brother. He called Alexander Downer a foreign spy for his involvement in a meeting with George Papadopoulos that led to the US Russiagate investigation. In short, he was fully immersed in the Trump media ecosystem.
Rukshan did not respond to an interview request from Crikey.
He started making public political content only after a video posted to his personal Facebook page about changing advice on mask-wearing went viral.
“I made a video comparing the statements that Brett Sutton and some of the other health ministers made about masks, and I posted it on my personal Facebook page and it ended up with 500,000 views,” he said. (Advice on masks changed as global health authorities found out more about how COVID-19 is transmitted and became less concerned about mask shortages.)
The interest in this material inspired him to repurpose a Facebook page under his real name into a page called the Real Rukshan. In the first video he produced, in August 2020, Fernando spoke of his desire to eschew traditional institutions and mainstream media.
“Do we always take the word of an authority figure?” he asked. “Is there an area where public opinion or our own feelings or our own understanding of an issue is as valid or as important?”
Early on, his videos covered a variety of topics: many were satirical takes targeting Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews and his handling of the pandemic (such as a video about a monkey running Victorian government computer modelling), but others took aim at George Floyd and US President Joe Biden. In one, Fernando chalked up the backlash to Trump-promoted, hydroxychloroquine-spruiking Dr Stella Immanuel as “religious bigotry”. He even registered murdochhurtmyfeelings.com in an attempt to respond to anti-News Corp campaigners.
‘No one but the government is to blame’
A theme throughout Rukshan’s videos is his anger at what he perceives as hypocrisy, censorship and overreach from institutions — more so than the specific policies themselves.
Fernando criticised the Melbourne Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests in June 2020: “How about these experts lock up all the protesters for a few weeks,” he tweeted. In a video he explained that this was because police had cracked down anti-lockdown protesters early on in the first lockdown and not on BLM protesters.
However, both protests happened at different stages of lockdown (Victoria’s first strict lockdown versus mostly eased restrictions), vastly different compliance with COVID health measures (BLM protests enforced masks, physical spacing and other mitigation efforts) and ignored that BLM leaders were also fined. Crikey was unable to find any criticism from Rukshan of the anti-lockdown protesters breaching lockdown rules before or after, many of which he’s covered.
Fernando has also changed his views. His early videos supported Victorian lockdowns before becoming increasingly critical of them. He initially supported vaccines — accusing the mainstream media of undermining vaccine support because it was linked to Trump — before flipping to sharing negative coverage of them. In particular he seized on reporting about AstraZeneca blood clots. But still, he stops short of being explicitly anti-vaccine, instead criticising government health measures and law enforcement through a libertarian lens.
Fernando doesn’t share false information like others in the movement. But his coverage myopically focuses on news stories and coverage that play to an anti-vaccine, anti-lockdown audience in misleading ways. This explains how he’s able to evade social media suspensions and bans. Where other creators have retreated to fringe platforms like Telegram, Fernando remains on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube and Twitter. But he speaks paranoidly in his videos about his fear that big tech is censoring those people encouraging vaccine hesitancy.
For example, The Daily Telegraph reported in August that Fernando shared a video of a UK official who mistakenly said that most people admitted to hospital for COVID had received the vaccine. That was later walked back (in fact it was that 60% of people admitted were unvaccinated) but Fernando’s video claiming a “cover-up” went viral and was seen hundreds of thousands of times. He never covered the clarification.
Observing or participating?
In his year as the Real Rukshan, Fernando’s most popular content has depicted protests — particularly his livestreams. Since July, his Facebook following has jumped from 30,000 to more than 190,000, mostly off the back of livestreams.
He streams for hours, walking with protesters, while tens of thousands watch. His video on Tuesday’s protest was viewed by more than 2 million people.
Australian Strategic Policy Institute analyst Ariel Bogle says there is a tradition of livestreams documenting protests. One of the world’s most popular political YouTubers, Tim Pool — who Fernando says he admires — pioneered the practice while livestreaming the Occupy Wall Street protests in 2011. But Bogle points out there’s a fine line between documentation and participation.
“Even as they claim to present the so-called ‘ground truth’, they necessarily only show one side of the story,” he said. “More extreme content and confrontation gets more views. Not to mention, people inevitably ‘perform’ for the camera in certain ways.”
Throughout his streams, Fernando has shown his perspective of protests. During a recent general “freedom” protest, Fernando narrated his live stream by repeatedly claiming that all the protesters were being peaceful and that police were instigating violence. Victoria Police say 10 officers were injured, six required hospitalisation, and footage captured by other people show protesters striking and trampling officers.
Likewise, during the Melbourne protests Fernando’s footage failed to capture the vandalism and violence committed by protesters, instead focusing on the actions of police. When protesters started pelting the CFMMEU office with glass bottles, Fernando chose to turn the camera away.
At many protests, mainstream media organisations haven’t had reporters present. In this vacuum, Rukshan and other similar creators are often the only on-the-ground perspective. As a result, mainstream media frequently uses his footage in their coverage. Watchers of the protests — believers and sceptics alike — use his streams to observe what is happening. Rukshan appeared on 3AW and Fox News as an authoritative voice about the Melbourne protests.
Meanwhile, his streams have acted as a lightning rod for the protests. Only a handful of protesters attended the CFMMEU on Monday morning before Fernando arrived. It took off when he started streaming, drawing more attention to a protest that ultimately turned violent.
Like much of Fernando’s work, his live streams are both true and misleading. It’s true that an increasingly militarised police have responded to protesters with heavy-handed tactics and appear to have committed acts of brutality. It’s true that many protesters have been peaceful. But Fernando’s coverage omits the full story: that an unruly, chaotic group that represents a vocal minority ran amok in a city during a pandemic with no regard to its safety or the safety of others. His videos credulously platform people with fringe and extreme views without interrogation.
Fernando is not alone in this practice. In a 2017 New Yorker profile of Tim Pool, Andrew Marantz critiques the YouTuber’s propensity to platform far-right figures uncritically.
“A journalist’s first task is to gather information without fear or favour,” he wrote. “The next task, which is equally crucial, is to scrutinise the data — to separate the facts from the fulsome bullshit.”
Early on, Fernando spent time documenting anti-vaccine group Reignite Democracy Australia. He appeared on the channel of Tim Wilms, an Australian Proud Boy and far-right content creator. He uncritically interviews people and platforms movements that have shown themselves to be inconsistent or even duplicitous. At one point during the protests, he interviewed a known member of an Australian neo-Nazi group, but the subject’s extreme views or group membership never came up.
Unlike other creators, Fernando doesn’t appear to make money from his content. He’s posted about refusing donations and hasn’t made any efforts to monetise his online presence. He claims he supports himself with his wedding photograph work.
Fernando is motivated by a desire to spread his perspective. In his first public video he said: “The reason I’m doing it is to share my opinion on social issues, world issues.”
And it’s working. With millions of views on his videos, Fernando’s perspective has been the dominant lens through which the Melbourne protests have been viewed by people around the world.
“If you look at the statistics, people who are sitting in their kitchen or their office with their camera talking to people,” he said. “They’re getting through to more people than the media ever imagined.”
Editors note: This article originally misattributed credit for an observation about Monday’s protest. It has been corrected.
An egomaniac to avoid watching
Dangerous egomaniac and some here are calling him the symbol of a healthy democracy….FFS world gone mad
Subscriptions to the HermanCainAward subreddit are increasing exponentially,… If that rate is any indication, rage is growing toward anti-vaxxers deliberately prolonging the pandemic out of an anti-social and deadly understanding of their rights.
https://slate.com/technology/2021/09/hermancainaward-subreddit-antivaxxer-deaths-cataloged.html
Whether he is doing it for money or for notoriety, he is still a misanthrope gaining kudos and street cred from his fellow Deplorables.
Fellow deplorables I love that phrase
You can be a protestor or you can be a journalist covering the protests. You can’t do both.
Or perhaps you can, in the same way as the Wehrmacht Propaganda Troops from 1938 onwards were part of the German army as well as reporting about it.
Exactly, not a real journalist, merely a protestor with a camera doing propaganda work for the Anti-Vaxxer “freedom” movement.
He needs to be jailed for helping to incite the desecration of the Shrine of Remembrance and helping to publish and promote a super spreader event.
Anyone who does this is a danger to the public.
Many have tried but none can ride, ole Outlaw Rockinghead – the Duke, HST.
Many wannabes think that arcane words and obscure allusions gonzo make (hi, grundle!) but fail to understand the need to ..err, understand… stricture and structure before even thinking about attempting to step over.
Hang on – I’m frequently an organiser of protests. And then we also cover our own live feeds. When we are not covered by professional journalists, our own movement people frequently cover what we do on podcasts and radio shows and online social media. Movement journalism is OK.
What is different is that we are trying to tell narratives imbued with truth – a continuity of truth. Our own sacrifice or gift of nonviolent action gives a solidity to an emerging truth or a truth revealed.
These crew are looking to manipulate a situation to increase their own control – also not too different to what we do. What is different is the set of values that their actions are LEADING to. what is their vision? They are looking for a highly militarised society based on the use of violence to subdue and control elements of the society that presumably are not them. They frequently mention that they want to be able to run people over they disagree with or hit people or cut people down. In the US they talk about shooting people. The proud boys meet in boxing clubs and practice arming themselves and shooting. They promote the use of violence. And they use cultural supremacy as a base for their positioning. They are embedding themselves in police forces where people have access to weapons.
This journalist guy is playing a game to promote himself. Positioning himself for some positioning in the future. Just like Alan Jones has done in a paid role.
The question is what are WE doing to promote a DIFFERENT set of values. And how do we contain THEIR values.
Excellent post accurate information but it will not go down well here I think if the nut job was white you might get somewhere.
As I said perhaps a safe Liberal seat in some diverse community electorate, one where a white right wing Amanda Stoker is not cluttering up the diverse landscape
What’s with the media’s lack of discernment involved in linking people with pro choice views about vaccines, to anti-vax (which is NOT the same thing) and then linking both of those to the ultra right movement in a way that suggests to be pro choice about vaccination is to be part of the ultra right? It’s poor journalism in my view and playing into the governments hands of distracting us from the REAL issues of climate denialism, corruption and ineptitude as we go into election mode.
Nice pick-up.
The inability of nu-skool scribblers to recognise, let along grasp nuance or differentiation or, basically, any of the skills once regarded as necessary to lead an informed life gives us these slabs of virtually indistinguishable verbiage in place of journalism.
I agree, but in part I think it’s the result of a dumbing down of political discourse, particularly by the Right, who want us to be relaxed and comfortable rather than worrying our pretty little heads with critical thinking.
There is the chicken/egg question – did political discourse (ha! – when was the last occurrence of that olde worlde phenomenon that you recall ?) become so banal to appeal to the electorate or to exclude them?
One poster here has an obsession with Freud’s nephew Bernays who wrote the book on political manipulation as advertising (NOT vice versa) – noting the damage done by the rise of a political class that is now a caste.
In the 60s around the Haymarket there were at least 3 WEAs that I remember where labourers or artisans could learn what they needed to know about how the world worked – they’d be banned now if the IPA had its way.
Perhaps it was the arrival of colour TV – who needs reality when the blinds are down, the A/C is roaring and the cricket is on.
Pajama cricket is so last century – today throughout Blighty there are areas known as pajama estates when the men, after getting up after noon, wander down to the pub with just addressing gown over their ‘jammies.
The last occurrence by commercial media generally was at the time of the sacking of Whitlam, the ABC hung on for a long time but it, under Howard and the rest since then, have been brought into line.
The chicken and egg analogy is not appropriate either, and gone are the days when what you regarded as your forum was populated with the pro Green, Labor bagging, Coalition baiting points of view. Now we have the rabbit hole dwellers championing their brand of reality TV life, mixing with us newcomers, the unwelcome Greens baggers and Labor supporters.
As far back as the 30’s the mange ridden fox was out hunting the chicken and its eggs in Australia. During WWII it was rampant at first in England with the aristocracy’s very own Harold Sidney Harmsworth the Tory Lord Rothermere. Tory Lord Rothermere, the media baron and pioneer of popular journalism. One of the mange ridden foxes of his day and friend of Benito and Adolf.
Here we had to contend with the Murdoch clan doing their best to emulate Lord Rothermere. And it’s got worse the mange ridden fox is totally unhinged and uncontrollable.
It was the likes of Candanian billionaire Aitken (Beaverbrook), and the Harmsworths (Northcliffe & Rothermere) which led even so bellicose an imperialist as Kipling to compare their ‘power without responsibility’ with the 2nd oldest profession.
Yes I wrote a post about that and Harmsworth but it was not posted
Workers’ Educational Association – WEA Sydney is an Australian educational institution which began in 1913 as the Workers’ Educational Association (WEA), inspired by the British organisation of the same name. It is a democratic and voluntary adult education movement. Its current educational program ranges from humanities, languages and arts, to computer, business and vocational training. It is a member of Community Colleges Australia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WEA_Sydney
I agree, and that began in Australia with a vengeance in the 30’s thanks to Ketih Murdoch.
Keith Murdoch, father of Rupert, had to rely on the establishment to get a job in journalism. Keith disapproved of the censoring of how the war campaign was going by the Brits and disobeyed orders to bring it to the attention of authorities.
“Although his letter, written from memory, contained many mistakes and exaggerations, the main points were supported by other evidence and Hamilton was relieved of command”
So you see the family trait was there from the start. Back home Keith decided he should be the arbiter of ‘facts’ no matter how many mistakes and exaggerations he chose to include in his version of “REAL”
For three years, Keith Murdoch and other newspaper owners insisted that the ABC be restricted to no more than 200 words a day of overseas news, and limited its presentation of news bulletins to five minutes in the evening – but not before 7.50pm, by which time it was thought people would have finished reading their newspapers.
When, by 1936, the ABC had begun to develop an independent news service, Murdoch was greatly displeased.
His newspapers demanded a reduction in the ABC’s income from licence fees so that it would: ”stop competing improperly with private enterprise”.
It is to be acknowledged that Labor’s Paul Keating enshrined this notion in legislation with his competitive neutrality competition insanity.
In an early show of defiance, the vice-chairman of the ABC, Herbert Brookes – a leading conservative and son-in-law of Alfred Deakin, Australia’s second prime minister – attacked Murdoch for his self-interest and his attempts to cripple the ABC’s news service, as well as his ”conspiracy of silence” about the success of the ABC.
Private commercial interests were not the only enemies.
At its inception and for many years later, the ABC was the responsibility of the Postmaster-General’s department.
The politician to hold the office of Postmaster-General in 1938 was a South Australian Country Party man with a military background, A.G.Cameron. When the chairman of the [ABC] commission and two of its members first met him, Cameron did not mince his words:
”I know nothing about broadcasting. I’m not interested in it. If I had my way I would stop all broadcasting. No time for these mechanical things. Don’t know anything about music. As for people who give talks and commentaries over the air, if I had my way I would poison the blank blanks – would bring them under the Vermin Act.”
[But the ADF military background Cameron did know upon which side of the desk his paper bags were served]
And the downticks are welcome in my posts as they demonstrate the anti democratic stance of many here, now let’s all bow down and have a Greens love in while mouthing platitudes about diversity and how good it is for this nation regardless of what it’s been used to do by the Coalition; don’t criticize the diverse compliance of the Coalition and their business mates which sees our nation becoming a basket case of corruption and greed as the ones from where they fled.
My lord, you seem to have a bit of a bee in the bonnet about ‘diversity.’ Are you a follower of Pauline Hansen?
How clever of you you just out of me very clever aren’t you
..toucheeee!
Touchy?
Because there is evidence of a clear cross over with the right elsewhere e.g. the US, UK and Europe, includes the ‘well being’ community, that promotes sentiments and beliefs over science.
According to DeSmog UK it is also part of the anti-science architecture of influence used for decades (round Koch Networks also responsible for seeding Tea Party ‘grassroots’ movement), to promote climate science denialism and stop or delay any measures to ameliorate.
Radical right libertarian trap…..
Loves Trump, doesn’t believe in climate change, totally ignorant of the Covid virus….and is allowed to vote. Scary
And unfortunately due to his diverse background appeals to those who are already ignorant uninformed and covert hesitant in the migrant suburbs