The Holly Valance of it all.

Engaging with the news in any capacity in the Year of Our Lord 2026 is an exercise in dystopian absurdism of the highest order.

We know this, and yet, somehow, Holly Valance re-releasing her noughties hit 'Kiss Kiss' as an anti-woke anthem for Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party still wasn't on my bingo card.

In case you missed it: Valance's re-release, entitled 'Kiss Kiss (XX) My Arse' was dropped by the One Nation leader on January 26 to promote Ms Hanson's self-promotional film A Super Progressive Movie.

The song — which mocks trans people, 'woke culture' and 'snowflakes' immediately shot to the top of the iTunes chart — though it must be pointed out that in the streaming age, an iTunes number one is less a measure of musical talent and more a receipt for a coordinated digital sausage sizzle. If you can get a few hundred dedicated fans to spend $1.99 at the same time, you can buy yourself a headline, even if the rest of the country is busy listening to something else.

The lyrics can be found online but I refuse to sully my keyboard with them here. Imagine everything horrible that Pauline Hanson might say about a marginalised group of people and then imagine those slurs with a s*itty synth underneath them and you've got the bones of the single.

Watch: Who is Holly Valance? Post continues below.

From pop to populism: Holly's far-right rebrand.

The Neighbours star-turned-pop star made headlines in 2024 after speaking at the launch of Popular Conservatism (PopCon) — a right-wing faction within the UK Conservative Party headed up by former Prime Minister Liz Truss.

"Everyone starts off as a leftie and then wakes up at some point after making money, working, trying to run a business... and then you go to the right," she said at the time.

From there, Valance — who last year confirmed the end of her 13-year marriage to UK billionaire Nick Candy — has continued to throw her support behind the kind of political views usually reserved for your Sky News-watching uncle.

Nick Candy and Holly Valance at the Reform UK press conference, where it was announced Nigel Farage will become the new leader of the party. Image: Getty.

Valance is a close personal friend of far-right UK politician Nigel Farage, and is credited with "whispering in his ear" to encourage him to stand for Parliament in the 2024 UK General Election, reportedly donating approximately £100,000 to the party.

Considered something of a UK poster girl for Trump's 2024 campaign, Valance has helped raise millions towards his presidential push, has dismissed the climate crisis and famously called Greta Thunberg a "demonic little gremlin."

Just this week, the 42-year-old appeared on the GB News show Free Speech Nation, and used a derogatory slur that the host immediately apologised to the audience for.

"During COVID, it was the r****d metre, and Australia was pretty high on that," she said.

When host Josh Howie — not exactly a bastion of leftist ideology himself — informed her that some people might be offended by her ableism, she hit back: "Hey, are we not a Free Speech Nation over here?"

Yikes.

We need to take 'unserious people' very, very seriously.

On this week's episode of Out Loud, Holly, Jessie and Em discussed Valance's grasping attempts for relevance through the filter of some sobering real-world developments.

Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party is experiencing an historic surge in popularity. According to the latest Roy Morgan poll (Feb 2, 2026), One Nation has hit 25 per cent nationally, which for a party once considered little more than a horrific joke, represents a massive evolution.

"The Right is trying to reclaim comedy," argues Jessie, "we've always thought of Pauline Hanson as a kind of unserious person — now she is leaning into that."

And that in itself deserves our attention.

Because there is another unserious person who not too long ago was considered an international joke.

Listen to the episode of Out Loud here. Post continues below.

I'm old enough to remember when the idea of having to say "President Trump" unironically was unfathomable.

Now he's in his second term — an unserious person causing some deadly serious global consequences.

Let's apply that same filter here at home. With the rise of populism, anti-immigrant sentiment, support for far-right ideologies and the platforming of people like Holly Valance and Pauline Hanson, it's no longer hard to imagine a future where — as Jessie warns — "being a joke doesn't marginalise you anymore - it might mainstream you."

From the mouths of babes.

The real danger of the 'joke' here is that it softens the blow of the real-world harm ideologies and policies like the ones being spruiked here can cause. It touches on the very real public sentiment that people are sick and tired of being 'preached to' about what they can and cannot say, and effectively dehumanises entire portions of the community.

Because this is what it's really about — reducing the belief that people deserve equal human rights to a giant kick-me sign on the back of 'woke culture'. It's an attempt to yank the Overton Window forcefully back over to the right — and the view out of its panes is grim.

Because while we might laugh at the synth-pop and the bad animation and Pauline's haircut, the 25 per cent of Australians currently looking at One Nation aren't laughing. They're listening.

In 2002, we were told to 'Kiss Kiss.' In 2026, the message is far less playful — and if we continue to treat these movements as cringey side-shows, we might just wake up to find that the circus has moved into the Lodge, and the joke is well and truly on us.

Feature image: Getty.