The Writers' Week controversy

has now expanded - and not just writers but musicians are withdrawing from the Festival. The chair of the entire Festival has resigned too. Three other board members have gone with her.  I am not sure where this leaves the Festival.  

What is perhaps interesting is that this furore has been developing for some time. It is not the sudden thing that the media first led us to believe. It is quite possible the media was unaware of what was going on. If this is the case then I cannot help wondering what has happened to their spy network - were their spies afraid to speak out?

Apparently someone else resigned half way through his tenure on the board because he was concerned about the invitation given to the person who has been "disinvited". His concern related to the fact that this person succeeded in ensuring someone else, with much less radical views, was not able to attend. Perhaps he had in mind that the same person had also withdrawn herself from another festival event in another state. The reason? That festival had made it clear that the sort of controversial statements she is in the habit of making were not acceptable. They were simply asking people to be "respectful". 

That resignation happened months ago. It should have rung alarm bells because it appears to have made clear the concern about the bias and the lack of balance in programming. One former board member is the wife of a prominent politician. Another person who has "withdrawn" her attendance is a presenter on the ABC - and well known for her far left views.

In all this the rest of us, the readers, the music lovers, the visitors to other events and the like are the losers. What should be a vibrant, lively, thought provoking series of events is in danger of being lost forever. Can Writers' Week survive, indeed can the festival as a whole survive? No doubt the next few weeks will tell us which way things are going. 

Now I wonder if this controversy will be raised at the upcoming Royal Commission. The terms of that mention "social cohesion". Is that a term for "multiculturalism" or something else? There isn't too much social cohesion right now.