Nearly 60 per cent of participants at Bendigo Writers Festival withdrew from the event after the code of conduct – which covered the La Trobe Presents component of the festival – was issued, according to figures released by Bendigo City Council on Monday.
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While La Trobe and the City of Bendigo say codes of conduct are common at writers festivals in Australia, industry insiders disagree.
According to Abdel-Fattah, “the code belongs in an Orwell novel”. “It’s a gag order and exposes an astonishing contempt for, and infantilisation of, writers and artists and the right to free speech, to thought-provoking commentary, to robust debate, to speak out against genocide and oppression. Alarmingly, it reflects the willingness of institutions to placate organisations and lobbyists hellbent on silencing voices who threaten the status quo.”
She argues that festival organisers must have known that such a code would meet resistance. Bendigo Writers Festival contracts were issued to participants months ago.
Cecile Shanahan was lead curator of the Bendigo Writers Festival last year and has been an organiser and presenter since 2015. Now a co-curator, this year she programmed all the youth sessions and helped other curators as needed.
Shanahan believes the code of conduct was issued “to appease external bodies who have lost touch with the purpose of writers festivals and the importance of open and honest dialogue”.
Cecile Shanahan talks to John Marsden at Bendigo Writers Festival in 2019.Credit: Peter Weaving
“I was deeply concerned about its existence and the implications of what it was asking of festival participants,” she says.
“I received the code of conduct as a festival participant at the same time as every one else, just a few short days ago,” she continues. “I, too, was immediately concerned at its wording and the implication that those in the La Trobe sessions should behave themselves or else. It was completely inappropriate to ask anyone to adhere to such requirements.”
Shanahan resigned from the City of Bendigo eight weeks ago for personal reasons, after having been involved with the Bendigo Writers Festival for a decade.
“We have never had a code of conduct or placed any attempt to guide the direction of conversations upon writers before,” she says.
5A and La Trobe University have been contacted for comment.