Opinion: How right wing populism is damaging your brain

Right-wing populism does not work because it is clever. It works because it is crude, repetitive, emotionally charged and largely consequence-free. And it is literally damaging your brain.

Populism works because it offers the emotional release of certainty without the burden of proof, in a world where certainty is hard to come by. The simple slogans and cheap lines are cognitively easy to process, deliver a nice dopamine hit, and make scared people feel safe.

Culturally and economically, populism feeds on real anxiety. Rapid technological change, housing stress, insecure work, climate disruption, demographic shifts. These are genuine pressures and real concerns. But populism offers a shortcut: instead of grappling with complex causes, it assigns simple villains. Immigrants. Activists. Bureaucrats. “Woke elites”. The solution is always vague, immediate and emotionally satisfying, and almost always impossible.

Politically, populist leaders cultivate an image of authenticity, usually via a very fake persona. They present themselves as blunt, plain-spoken truth-tellers, even when they are career politicians who have spent decades inside the system they claim to despise. They blame the elites, when they themselves are the elites.

Think about it – Barnaby Joyce, for all his bluster and posing, is a elite private school and university educated professional, and heir to a historic New England grazing property, which as close to New England royalty as you can get. He may present himself as plain spoken, but sprinkles Latin in conversation more than a law professor. He may write about the weatherboard and iron, but that’s not him.

Populists also drive up support for their alternative truths by undermining trust in systems and institutions. They attack the very back bones of our society because undermining trust makes manipulation easier. If courts, media, experts and democratic norms are all “rigged”, then only the strongman can be trusted.

In Australia, prominent right wing populist figures like Pauline Hanson and Barnaby Joyce say a lot of things that do not mean very much. They promise sweeping fixes, declare permanent crises, and insist that “elites” are to blame for everything from power prices to social change. And they can do this endlessly because they will never, ever have to deliver.

Like the Greens on the opposite flank, right-wing populists are structurally insulated from responsibility. They can shout, posture, inflame and accuse without ever needing to govern. There is no budget line to reconcile, no department to run, no hard trade-offs to explain. Failure is impossible, because success is never defined.

Ah, but what about Trump, I hear you say. Well, there is no presidency or other single elected role for the right wing populist to lust after here in Australia, so no chance of a Trump-like wannabe dictator getting their hands on power and trashing the nation as Trump is currently trashing the United States. But Trump is a pretty clear example of how the populist may offer certainty with their simplistic promises, they can never deliver. Not even the global rules based order that has kept us safe and thriving for the entire post-war era is certain anymore.

But the real danger, and the reason New Englanders and Australians everywhere need to reject this stuff early and loudly, is that right-wing populism does not just persuade. It changes how people think.

There is a growing body of neuroscience and behavioural research showing that fear-based political messaging alters brain function. When people are repeatedly exposed to narratives about threat, invasion, cultural loss or looming catastrophe, the brain’s stress systems are activated. The amygdala, which governs fear and emotional response, becomes dominant. Cortisol and other stress hormones rise. The brain shifts into survival mode.

Under these conditions, nuance and reason dies.

Researchers describe a “threat-based neural switch” that occurs during periods of sustained stress, such as economic insecurity or rapid social change. This is exactly the environment populist movements thrive in. Once that switch is flipped, the brain prioritises fast, simple, emotionally charged information over slow, complex, evidence-based reasoning. Black-and-white thinking replaces grey. Habit replaces analysis.

This is why populist slogans work even when they are demonstrably incoherent – and Hanson and Joyce are easily two of the most incoherent people in the country. The thinking part of the brain is not being invited to the conversation.

This is why right-wing populism is so resilient to fact-checking. You cannot reason someone out of a position they did not reason themselves into.

Populist rhetoric is deliberately simple and aggressively confident. “I could fix this.” “They are useless.” “You are being betrayed.” These are not arguments, they are deliberately manipulative lies. They are designed to bypass critical thinking and land directly in the gut. They feel good because they turn frustration into anger, and anger into belonging, and that belonging delivers the satisfaction of the original frustration being justified.

Populist rhetoric also hijacks the brain’s reward system. When people hear messages that validate their anger or confirm their worldview, dopamine is released. It feels good to be right. It feels good to belong to an in-group that “sees the truth”. Social media supercharges this process, amplifying high-arousal emotions like outrage and fear, and feeding them back in endless loops. The angrier the content, the more it spreads. The more it spreads, the more it feels true.

Over time, staying in this threatened state and on a dopamine drip-feed produces what psychologists call cognitive rigidity. People become less willing, and sometimes less able, to update their beliefs when confronted with new information. Contradictory evidence is not processed as information, but as threat. It is dismissed, mocked or attacked.

I know of one couple who got divorced because the husband started watching a little too much Sky News, this exact psychological process and decline to cognitive rigidity kicked in, and it reached the point that he wouldn’t even accept information like “you haven’t put out the bins” without perceiving it as a threat.

On the flip side, the automatic “yeah Barnaby” or “go Pauline” response is not engagement. It is a conditioned reaction. Programmatic and detached from actual thought. Like a dog chasing a ball, those sucked into the One Nation vortex can’t help themselves.

Repeated exposure sets this psychological corruption in stone. Over time, fear-based propaganda can rewire neural pathways. Stress responses become habitual. “Us versus them” thinking hardens. Memory itself becomes unreliable, with people recalling events and facts in ways that align with their existing beliefs. The propaganda stops feeling like persuasion and starts feeling like common sense.

The alternative facts becomes the truth.

This is why Trump.

So what can people do to avoid getting sucked in?

First, slow down. Populism relies on urgency and outrage. If something is designed to make you angry immediately, that is a cue to pause, not share.

Second, diversify information sources. Algorithms feed you more of what you already engage with. Actively seek out credible reporting that challenges your assumptions, not just content that confirms them. Search for information, don’t just wait for the algorithms to deliver you more propaganda. Use screen time limits on devices to help force yourself to take breaks.

Third, demand detail. Vague enemies, sweeping claims, and constant crisis framing are warning signs. Ask the boring questions populists hate: How? With what money? Through which laws? And then what?

Fourth, reconnect issues to reality. Complex problems rarely have single causes or instant fixes. Anyone promising otherwise is selling emotion, not solutions.

Finally, reject the shouting. Shouting is not strength. Shouting is a reliable indicator of someone trying to hide or distort the truth. Democracy is slow, imperfect and frustrating because it has to accommodate complexity and disagreement. That is not a flaw. It is the point.

And if all else fails, switch it off. Turn off all the news and social media, even for just a week, and see if you still feel the same once you’ve given your brain a chance to reset.

RK (Kath) Crosby is the CEO of research and strategy company KORE CSR, former strategist for the Australian Democrats, and a well known migraine advocate. She is also the Publisher of New England Times and North Coast Times.

Read more by RK Crosby here

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