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August 19, 2025 • 16 mins

It was billed as a “vibrant gathering of readers, writers, and creative thinkers” who would spark “ideas, conversation, and inspiration”. 

So what happened last weekend to turn the Bendigo Writers Festival from an idyllic ideas-fest into an event that exemplified “an authoritarian abuse of power”, as the festival’s founder put it?

Today, senior culture writer Kerrie O’Brien on the slow-moving car crash of a cultural event that left dozens of writers stunned, and appalled.

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S1 (00:02):
From the newsrooms of the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.
This is the morning edition. I'm Samantha Selinger Morris. It's Wednesday,
August 19th. It was billed as a vibrant gathering of readers,
writers and creative thinkers who would spark ideas, conversation and inspiration.

(00:24):
So what happened last weekend to turn the Bendigo Writers
Festival from an idyllic ideas fest into an event that
exemplified an authoritarian abuse of power? As the festival's founder
put it today, senior culture writer Kerry O'Brien on the
slow moving car crash of a cultural event that left
dozens of writers stunned and appalled.

S2 (00:50):
So, Carrie, when did you first.

S1 (00:52):
Realise that really something was not quite right with the
Bendigo Writers Festival?

S3 (00:57):
Look, it's interesting, Sam. Bendigo is a beautiful town in
the goldfields in central Victoria, and the Writers festival there
has been held for about 15 years now. I had
just opened my computer to start writing some notes about Bendigo,
and my phone started going a bit crazy, getting texts

(01:18):
from people saying, you know, X has withdrawn, Y has withdrawn.
I got on the phone and it soon became apparent
that a code of conduct had been issued and that
writers were absolutely taking issue with it. People like Jess Hill,
acclaimed journalist Jock Serong, Evelyn Araluen, who is the editor

(01:40):
of overland. The withdrawals were happening at such a rate
of knots. In fact, it was hard to keep up.
You know, the Writers Festival website was sort of lagging,
no doubt, because people were announcing their decisions on social media.
And yeah, it was, I mean, literally a train crash.
The day of the festival. Kicking off the gala event

(02:00):
was on the Friday night. It ended up being just
under 59% of participants pulled the pin on their involvement
in absolute protest at this code of conduct, which was
seen to be overreach and pretty targeted at particular topics.

S1 (02:22):
Well, tell us about this, because as you've written, this
code of conduct was issued to writers, to participants only
two days before the festival was due to begin. So
what was in this code of conduct?

S3 (02:32):
So at the outset, it said things like, you know,
participants must have conversations that are inclusive, thoughtful and welcoming
to diverse participants and avoid inflammatory, divisive and disrespectful topics.
So that first part seems just so basic. It's almost insulting.

(02:55):
You know, these are acclaimed writers and participants that know
their stuff. Seems one. One person said to me latterly
it's treating them like babies. Like it's such a simplistic
sort of thing to even map out. But the second part,
I guess, is the particularly contentious aspect, and that is
to avoid inflammatory, divisive and disrespectful conversations. Clearly, a lot

(03:20):
of the biggest issues that we, you know, discuss at
these sorts of events are potentially divisive or inflammatory. You know,
if you really apply that, you might be then sort
of eradicating any mention of colonialism and violence against First
Nations people, violence against women and children. Yeah. There are

(03:42):
a whole raft of things that could come under that umbrella.
And there were events programmed at Bendigo Writers Festival that
covered exactly these issues. And part of the code of
conduct is the La Trobe University definition of anti-Semitism, which
was also something participants were told they must adhere to.

(04:05):
And that definition is controversial in some people's minds, because
it is said to conflate antisemitism with anti-Zionism or anti-Jewish
Israeli government ideas or discussions.

S1 (04:21):
But it's believed by some people to conflate that, because,
of course, not everyone thinks that that's what it is.

S3 (04:25):
No. That's right. But it hasn't been accepted by all
universities in Australia, contrary to some discussions. And I think
that that is where people drew the line, because there
are a lot of people who object to what is
occurring in Gaza and scenario there is something they want

(04:46):
to be able to talk about if they if they
so wish.

S1 (04:48):
Many writers in particular, who were meant to appear at
this festival, they did take that code of conduct as
as an attempt to stifle discussion about Israel in Gaza.

S3 (04:57):
That's right. Yeah. With a bit of further digging, it
did become apparent that it was probably around an event
called On Reckoning, which featured Randa Abdel-Fattah, a Palestinian, um,
Egyptian Australian writer and academic. Who. Yeah. Who? It it

(05:20):
seemed obvious to me that she was the one being targeted.
The big development came on Monday this week when Deep
Cut News, an independent media organization, published a leaked letter
from uh, two academics who were from a group called Fivei. Um,
they also go by the name the Australian Academic Alliance

(05:42):
Against Antisemitism. And it was a letter written to, um,
both La Trobe University and Bendigo Writers Festival organisers warning
them about the Out the presence of Randa Abdel-Fattah. They
claimed she was anti-Semitic and that she had expressed quite
extreme views that they decreed were not acceptable. They referred

(06:06):
to a number of her social media posts, which have
since been removed. Um, but it was an example of
pressure on the organizers to remove her from the lineup.
That letter was dated July 20th from memory. And I
think that that that was the revelation that, um, this

(06:27):
code of conduct, you know, no wonder it had only
landed a couple of days before the festival instead of
months ago, with all the other literature and information for participants.
So that suspicion that many people had had last week
that this was actually all about Gaza and Palestine was
revealed to be correct.

S1 (06:45):
I think it probably has to be mentioned, though, that
critics would say that including doctor Abdel-Fattah might have been problematic,
given that there's been reports that she helped disseminate a
leak of private details of hundreds of Jewish artists and
publicly stated that, quote, Zionists have no right to cultural safety. Right.
So I guess some had concerns.

S3 (07:06):
The Fivet letter pointed to a series of social media
posts she had made, including ones it asserted had said
Jews had no claim to cultural safety, and that institutions
that considered fragile feelings of Zionists were, in inverted commas, abhorrent.
But responding to the revelations on Monday, she said that

(07:29):
this has been a defamatory smear campaign and word got
around pretty quickly. I think that Randa had resigned or
had withdrawn because she couldn't speak about her experience and
her family living in Palestine under this bombardment without breaching
that code of conduct. So she made the decision to
withdraw and people just saw that as outrageous. The session

(07:54):
she was on sounded really interesting. It was called On Reckoning,
and she was alongside a professor of law, Katherine Bieber,
and a journalist, author, Paul Daley. And they were going
to discuss the ongoing legacies of violence and racism through
fiction and narrative history. So clearly, it's a discussion we'll
never get to here. But it did sound like a

(08:16):
really interesting session, potentially.

S1 (08:21):
We'll be right back. And so our codes of conduct,
a usual thing for writers festivals. I'm hoping you can
give us some insight into this, and you can tell
us how long you've been reporting on writers festivals. So
listeners know the context for this.

S3 (08:37):
Yeah. Look, it's been, I'd say, about a decade that
I've been working in this space and I've never come
across a code of conduct. It's interesting because it's been
talked about, as I think, a statement from La Trobe
University in the context of this event, that codes of
conduct are commonplace at writers festivals, and I've asked dozens
of writers in the last week and also festival directors,

(09:01):
if that is the case. And that is absolutely not
the case. The only place I know of 100% has
one is Canberra, and that actually just talks about avoiding
hate speech or inciting people to violence. So things that
are actually covered in legislation anyway, but they just remind

(09:21):
participants to be aware of those sort of things. Code
of conduct. Specifying what you can and cannot say are
not a thing. And and nor should they be. I mean,
I think as this debacle underlines, um, participants are not
going to cop that. Yeah, I've spoken to a number
of writers who are just dismayed that the one Palestinian

(09:44):
voice on the program, uh, was the one, um, I'm
being silenced. And and we have seen a number of
instances where lobby groups trying to prevent particular perspectives from
taking a public stage or being in a public setting.
And yeah, I think this is another instance of that happening.

(10:06):
And that's what really outraged the writers. There was a
lot of solidarity about the fact that you can't you can't,
you know, add trauma onto trauma. I guess, in this
individual's experience. She has family still in Palestine and is
is living a nightmare actually. So for her to be
silenced again, they just said is not acceptable, particularly when
we live in a democracy. I mean, the whole point

(10:29):
I made before about writers festivals being bastions of discussion
for important big ideas and issues is, you know, not
lost on me. We don't have to look far over
the seas at what's happening in America with the shutdown
of freedom of speech, and it's really quite alarming. One
interviewee made the point that the second thing to write

(10:50):
is festivals in terms of big ideas is universities and
traditionally anyway. And we've seen a lot of obviously news
stories about unions and how they're grappling with protests on campus. And,
you know, this very issue of of what's happening in Gaza. And, yeah,
there's a lot yet to come on that. Um, on
that one as well.

S1 (11:10):
I do think it's crucial, though, whether we speak about
whether there is some legitimacy to the other point of view,
which is that this is a particularly febrile environment that
we now find ourselves in. You know, the war in
Gaza is nearing its two year mark. We know that
there has been a massive uptick in anti-Semitic events across Australia,
you know, really egregious happenings like firebombing of synagogues and

(11:32):
rampant graffiti and children having slurs thrown at them while
they walk to school. It's definitely been a scary time
for a lot of people. And, you know, the organisers
might understandably have wanted to ensure a safe environment for
both the participants and the attendees.

S3 (11:47):
Yeah. Look, I mean, I think most participants of any
event would agree that a safe and welcoming environment is
important for all. I would suggest that that does not
mean you have to censor discussions. I mean, writers festivals
are designed as places for really, um, sometimes really deep

(12:10):
dives into complex, difficult issues. And it's one of the
problems I think we face with what's happening in the
Middle East at the moment. It's very binary. You're either
with or against, and it seems to me that's a nonsense.
We need to have much more nuanced, informed discussions. And
I think that those that were slated for this event

(12:32):
would have been exactly that. It's fairly offensive to suggest,
and I think that, that these issues can't be discussed
without intelligent, intelligent, nuanced discussions.

S1 (12:44):
Well, this does, of course lead me to my next question,
because all of this is transpiring. Just a month after
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese received a report from Jillian Segal,
which has become controversial. She is, of course, his special
envoy to combat anti-Semitism, and she issued a set of
recommendations to the government. Probably the most controversial one was,
you know, that grants to universities and arts organizations could be,

(13:06):
you know, torn up if they facilitate anti-Semitism or don't
sufficiently crack down on it. So I guess my question
is that if this suggestion was adopted by the government
and there's no indication that it will be, we don't
know yet what a festival like this one, the Bendigo
Writers Festival have its funding taken away.

S3 (13:23):
That's exactly one of the concerns that has been expressed
to me by multiple people within the industry. It's yet
to be revealed what the government will do with those recommendations,
and I think a lot of people are watching with
great interest. I have asked a few times if we
can get some insight and, um, yeah, it's a it's
a bit of a holding pattern at this stage, but

(13:45):
there is a lot of concern that it would shut
down many voices and it would suppress discussion of really
important issues, and that people would end up self-censoring. And
I guess the word overreach has been used quite a bit, but, um, yeah,
we'll be we'll be bringing you more on that one,
that's for sure.

S1 (14:05):
And so we know you've been covering this story for
days and days now. Is it done? Like, is this
just going to fade away or are there still many
questions to be answered?

S3 (14:13):
Look, I would say there are many questions yet to
be answered. I'm about to speak to a number of
writers festival directors to get their thoughts on this and
to see what repercussions might be likely. Many of these
events have been held for decades or longer, and they
really are. I mean, if you go along, they're often

(14:36):
filled with really thoughtful people, insightful discussions, and sometimes they
are really, really difficult issues. You know, grief is one
that comes to mind. But colonialism, politics, absolutely, of all sorts,
you know, violence against women, Gaza. And what's happening there
is one of the biggest issues of our time. So

(14:56):
it has to be on the agenda. The idea that
you you can't talk about it seems to me it's
the sort of thing that will have a really negative
effect on all of our interactions. We need to talk
about these things and grapple with them somehow, and that
doesn't mean condemning any other people. It might, you know,

(15:18):
mean criticism of governments and their actions. I think there's
a lot of fear around Bendigo because there's massive reputational damage,
really been badly handled. And it's there's reputational damage to
this wonderful festival. But hopefully there'll be some sort of
analysis after the event and a look at how things

(15:41):
should run and we might get back to normal transmission
hopefully next year.

S1 (15:46):
Thank you so much for your time.

S3 (15:49):
Pleasure. Always a joy.

S1 (15:57):
Today's episode of The Morning Edition was produced by Julia Carcasole.
Our executive producer is Tammy Mills. Tom McKendrick is our
head of audio. To listen to our episodes as soon
as they drop, follow the Morning Edition on Apple, Spotify,
or wherever you listen to podcasts. Our newsrooms are powered
by subscriptions, so to support independent journalism, visit The Age

(16:20):
or smh.com.au. Subscribe. And to stay up to date. Sign
up to our Morning Edition newsletter to receive a summary
of the day's most important news in your inbox every morning.
Links are in the show. Notes. I'm Samantha Selinger. Morris.
Thanks for listening.
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