ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the goals, ideologies and activities of the anti-gender movement. The movement forms a complex web of organisations and network connected ideologically, organisationaly and financially, which promotes socially conservative discourse and fights for legal changes such as a ban on abortion or limiting the rights of LGBT+ people. The analysis focuses on two powerful organisations – one transnational and one operating in Poland – with the aim to answer the question whether these ultraconservative organisations should be seen as a sign of ideological diversification of civil society or as a threat to liberal democracy. The chapter identifies key discursive strategies employed by the anti-gender movement: the vilification of opponents, victim-perpetrator reversal, constructing moral panics and normalising extreme ideas as “defence of the family.” It argues that while the activities of the anti-gender movement are generally non-violent, its discursive strategies and campaigns should be further analysed as possible conveyor belt to engagement in violent extremism.
