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They’re not even hiding it any more: Melbourne’s leftist antisemites are slapping up big ol’ ‘Juden Raus!’ notices everywhere. These are not skinhead neo-Nazis or the ‘far-right’: they’re here, they’re queer and they’re goosing-stepping Jews outta here.
The latest front in this open season on Jews is the Fairy Floss Real Estate Facebook group – a sharehousing platform with nearly half a million members, heavily pitched at the homosexual community. Its very name and imagery of same-sex couples signal the target demographic. Yet the group’s own rules proudly declare that “bullying of any kind isn’t allowed” and “degrading comments about things like race, religion, culture, sexual orientation, gender or identity will not be tolerated”.
Unless the target is Jewish, of course.
Sharehouse advertisements on a Melbourne flatmates Facebook group have adopted the words “no zios” or “anti-zio”, short for anti-Zionist, as part of a list of household requirements – right next to “looking for someone … friendly, clean and socially warm”.
Many of them included “no zios etc” in the same way other users added “no couples” or “no pets” at the bottom of the listing.
“Absolutely staunchly no Zionists, or recovering Zionists,” one of the posts said in the Fairy Floss Real Estate Facebook group.
“Acab, queer friendly, zio free etc pls,” said another.
“Interests: tea, rice, beans … clean kitchen benches … music, poetry. Dislikes: Zio scum, fascists, Vic Pol, Islamophobes, Zio apologists, gas industry lobbyists.
Maybe they ought to dust off the yellow star badges while they’re at it. I’m sure they’ll find them right next to their collection of pointy white hoods. Because the same people who shrieked that ‘It’s OK to be white’ was a ‘Ku Klux Klan slogan’ are parroting an actual KKK slogan.
David Duke, the former grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan popularised “Zio” as a pejorative shorthand. While the abbreviation “Zio” for “Zionist” existed earlier in various contexts, Duke transformed it into a recurring antisemitic dogwhistle and compound prefix across his media platforms from the 1990s onward.
Duke’s usage framed “Zio” (and compounds like “Zio-”) as code for Jewish influence, control, or conspiracy, often in the context of media, finance, politics and global events. This allowed him to attack Jews and Israel while maintaining a thin layer of plausible deniability by claiming he was only criticising “Zionism” or “globalism”. Sources across the political spectrum, including investigative reporting and academic-adjacent commentary, document this pattern extensively.
David Duke did not merely use “Zio” casually: he helped weaponize and mainstream it within antisemitic discourse for a new generation of online and activist audiences – on the left.
“The same exile, the same smiling cruelty, the same little word doing the work the old slurs used to do. Strip off the disguise and the message is naked: No Jews. Not here. Not ever,” [Anti-Defamation Commission chair Dvir Abramovich] said.
“Let no one pretend ‘zio’ is politics. It is a slur, popularised by Klan leader David Duke, a code word for ‘Jew’ dressed up for a younger crowd.
“And here is the obscenity of it: the people writing these ads call themselves anti-racist in the very same breath. Their compassion comes with a blacklist, and every name on that list is a Jew.”
We’ve seen these ads and placards before: in 1930s Germany.
The Fairy Floss group’s moderators claim a zero-tolerance policy on discrimination and say they will act when notified. Yet the posts proliferated openly in a community that markets itself as queer-friendly and anti-bigotry.
This is not fringe. It is happening in a mainstream rental platform used by thousands of young Melburnians. It comes amid the post-October 7 explosion of antisemitic incidents and while a royal commission into antisemitism and social cohesion is still sitting. The same people who scream about safe spaces and inclusive language have decided that Jews are fair game.
The Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission and Consumer Affairs Victoria should investigate. Meta – to deepen the hypocrisy, a Jewish-invented and owned platform – should remove the ads. But the deeper problem will not be solved by bureaucrats.
It requires the left to confront the antisemitism it has incubated in its own ranks for years. So far there is little sign it intends to do so. The “zio free” signs keep going up, the emojis keep smiling and the old hatred keeps finding new respectable clothing.
