Bungaree.org

Abstract

This article presents a comprehensive examination of the cultic and conspiratorial nature of the non-Aboriginal group known as the GuriNgai and its allied entities, including Coast Environmental Alliance (CEA), Coasties Who Care, Community Voice Australia (Kate Mason), Save Kariong Sacred Lands, Save Kincumber Wetlands, and Save the Northern Beaches Bushland. Drawing on academic literature in conspiracy psychology, cult behaviour, ecofascism, settler colonial mimicry, and Indigenous identity fraud, the paper establishes that these groups form a loosely coherent but ideologically cohesive network that systematically undermines Aboriginal land rights, cultural authority, and democratic institutions. We argue that the GuriNgai and their affiliates operate as a settler-colonial spiritual-political cult, fusing ecological mysticism, far-right conspiracy beliefs, and fabricated Aboriginal identity into a potent form of oppositional activism that displaces genuine Aboriginal voices and sabotages lawful Aboriginal governance.

Introduction: Settler Spirituality as a Political Weapon

In recent years, the rise of conspiratorial spiritual movements has increasingly blurred the lines between environmentalism, identity politics, and settler resistance to Indigenous sovereignty. Nowhere is this more visible than in the Central Coast and Northern Beaches regions of New South Wales, where an elaborate settler-led movement has coalesced around the non-Aboriginal group known as the GuriNgai and its network of anti-development, anti-Aboriginal organisations. These groups—ostensibly grassroots and environmentally concerned—construct a narrative of sacred land protection while actively obstructing legitimate Aboriginal land councils, promoting historical falsehoods, and weaponising spiritual rhetoric against lawful governance and cultural restitution.

The GuriNgai and their affiliates mirror the characteristics of what scholars term “conspirituality” (Ward & Voas, 2011; Asprem & Dyrendal, 2015)—a syncretic fusion of New Age spiritual beliefs and conspiracy theories. Their campaigns exhibit patterns associated with cult dynamics, including charismatic leadership, sacred claims of cultural authority, rejection of mainstream institutions, persecution narratives, and the use of misinformation to recruit followers. These dynamics are underpinned by a broader structure of white possessiveness (Moreton-Robinson, 2015) and ecofascism (Miotto & Droogan, 2024), where non-Indigenous activists co-opt Aboriginal identity and ecological discourse to defend settler interests against Indigenous sovereignty.

False Identity and the Cult of GuriNgai

Central to this movement is the GuriNgai, a self-styled Aboriginal group founded by non-Aboriginal individuals including Tracey Howie, Warren Whitfield, and Neil Evers. Despite repeated rejection by legally recognised Aboriginal land councils, anthropological experts, and verified descendants of Bungaree, the GuriNgai persist in asserting custodianship over lands spanning from Palm Beach to Lake Macquarie. As demonstrated in the Kwok Anthropology Report, claims linking Tracey Howie’s family to Bungaree are genealogically unfounded. There is “no evidence to substantiate claims made that Sophy was the daughter of Bungaree,” despite repeated invocation of this ancestry to legitimise land claims (Kwok, 2020).

These fabricated identities are not merely personal fictions but are strategically deployed to seize cultural authority, access funding, and obstruct the lawful exercise of Aboriginal land rights. The GuriNgai have appeared before local councils, media outlets, and community consultations as supposed Traditional Custodians, despite having no legitimate cultural standing. As the Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council stated in its formal letter to the NSW Premier in 2020, such identity claims by these Guringai claimants “lack any credible genealogical or historical basis” and pose a serious risk to the integrity of Aboriginal governance (MLALC, 2020).

Cultic Dynamics: From Self-Indigenisation to Spiritual Warfare

The GuriNgai group exhibits multiple features of cultic organisation as outlined in the social psychology of new religious movements. These include the development of a charismatic leadership core (notably Howie, Whitfield), unchallengeable doctrines (e.g., claims of being the sole legitimate custodians of Country), an “insider vs outsider” epistemology, and a totalising spiritual worldview that fuses politics, cosmology, and identity. Such traits echo the diagnostic criteria used in Barkeley’s (2021) and Forberg’s (2022) accounts of conspiracist cults, where belief systems become isolated from critical scrutiny and embedded in emotional and moral absolutism.

Followers of the GuriNgai movement demonstrate ideological loyalty through participation in rituals (e.g., cleansing ceremonies), use of specialised terminology (e.g., “Guringai Country,” “GuriNgai songlines,” “Grandmother Tree”), and the adoption of alternative histories that centre the group’s own mythical origin narratives. This represents a form of narrative enclosure, wherein dissenting views—including those of actual Aboriginal people—are dismissed as corrupt, inauthentic, or “colonised.” As Forberg (2022) argues, such groups do not tell their followers to “think for themselves,” but rather to believe in a sacred, persecuted truth which only the group can access.

Additionally, GuriNgai participants and sympathisers often display patterns of affective isolation from broader Aboriginal community networks. As shown in Cookson et al. (2021), conspiracy belief and cult adherence are strongly predicted by a sense of marginalisation, in-group conformity, and the desire for epistemic certainty. The group’s claim to be “the real traditional custodians” is reinforced through a feedback loop of social media affirmation, local government endorsement, and spiritualised group rituals that act to sever external scrutiny and cultivate emotional dependency (Anthony & Mazerolle, 2018; Frost et al., 2025).

Critically, the GuriNgai leadership also demonstrate hallmarks of authoritarian spiritualism, where dissent is not tolerated and counter-evidence is reinterpreted as persecution or “government interference.” Their narrative structure mirrors that of sovereign citizen cults, which conflate legal frameworks with spiritual truths and position the state as illegitimate. In this way, GuriNgai functions not only as an identity fraud but as a closed epistemic system—a belief cult that shields itself from accountability through emotional appeals to land, belief, and fictionalised ancestors (Singh, 2024).

Ecofascism and the Weaponisation of Environmentalism

The anti-development activism of groups like CEA, Save Kariong Sacred Lands, and Save Kincumber Wetlands follows a familiar pattern observed in far-right ecological discourse. Ecofascism, as defined by Miotto and Droogan (2024), refers to the appropriation of environmentalism to reinforce exclusionary, often racialised notions of cultural purity and land belonging. Cassar and Mason’s organisations frequently assert that Aboriginal land councils are “selling out to developers,” while refusing to acknowledge that the developments in question are legally permitted under the Aboriginal Land Rights Act 1983 (NSW) and aim to support Aboriginal economic self-determination (NSWALC, 2023).

This settler ecofascism is cloaked in aesthetics of nature reverence and environmental defence, but its underlying purpose is the preservation of settler control. In social media content and public rallies, members of these groups romanticise the bush while vilifying Aboriginal-controlled development. This reflects what Bruns et al. (2020) call “reactionary environmentalism”—a façade that masks deeper anxieties about race, land loss, and authority.

Settler Conspirituality and the Rise of Far-Right Mysticism

These networks are not merely cultural but political. Cassar, Mason, and their associates are enmeshed in the broader “My Place” movement, a far-right network that blends New Age rhetoric with sovereign citizen ideology and Christian nationalist politics. Their rhetoric around “sacred land” and “we’re all custodians” echoes the discourses identified by Singh (2024) and Gillespie (2025) as key features of settler-conspiritual extremism: rejection of state authority, mythic reclamation of land, and identification of Aboriginal land councils as enemy institutions.

Mason’s Substack writings and speeches frequently reference conspiracy theories about smart cities, global governance, and climate “hoaxes”—a convergence of ecological paranoia and apocalyptic Christianity also described by Miotto & Droogan (2024). Such rhetoric fosters ideological recruitment by promising followers hidden knowledge, moral superiority, and resistance against evil elites.

Cultural and Legal Consequences of False Authority

The proliferation of such groups has significant consequences. First, it actively displaces verified Aboriginal communities and disrupts intergenerational cultural transmission. Second, it causes irreparable harm to the integrity of heritage assessments, planning consultations, and policy engagement. The appearance of GuriNgai representatives before local councils like Hornsby, Ku-ring-gai, Northern Beaches, and Central Coast undermines Aboriginal self-determination and promotes a regime of pseudo-consultation rooted in false identity.

As noted in the NSW Standing Committee Report on the Culture is Identity Bill (2022), there is an urgent need to protect Aboriginal cultural heritage from rogue actors, particularly in relation to identity verification and cultural authority (NSW Parliament, 2022). This aligns with broader recommendations from NSWALC and the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP), which Australia is obliged to uphold (Australian Human Rights Commission, 2014).

Conclusion: Naming the Cult, Resisting the Network

The GuriNgai and their allies constitute more than an identity fraud—they represent a settler cult engaged in spiritual warfare against Aboriginal sovereignty. By blending ecofascist rhetoric, false cultural authority, and anti-democratic conspiracism, they form a potent barrier to truth, reconciliation, and justice. Their influence must be met with rigorous cultural, legal, and institutional resistance.

This includes formal disavowal by councils and government agencies, adoption of stringent identity verification protocols, and the amplification of legitimate Aboriginal voices. Most critically, there must be clear public education around the distinction between environmental activism and ecofascist obstruction, between spiritual rhetoric and cultural authority, and between self-Indigenisation and true Aboriginal identity.

The battle for land, culture, and justice in New South Wales is not merely a legal one—it is epistemological, ethical, and spiritual. Naming the cult is the first step in defeating it.

JD Cooke

References

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