3 days ago
Festival anti-social conduct ‘deeply stressful'
Dunedin Fringe Arts Trust co-directors Kate Schrader (left) and Ruth Harvey. Photo: Gregor Richardson
Inflammatory rhetoric from political leaders is to blame for a "significant" rise in anti-social behaviour, including hate speech and sexual harassment, at this year's Dunedin Fringe Festival, organisers say.
Festival co-organiser Ruth Harvey, who lived in the United States during the first presidency of Donald Trump, said New Zealand needed to send a message as a country that "everyone is welcome here".
"That is the thing that we champion in our work and our expectation is that others, including community leaders and politicians, should be doing the same thing."
A final report on this year's festival, which ran for 10 days in March, said there was a "significant uptick in anti-social behaviour" of a level which had not been experienced in the past three years.
Organisers cited "imported culture wars; a rise in misogynistic, racist, queer-phobic and ableist attitudes generally; and the erosion of social cohesion due to political and civil divisiveness" as contributing to the rise in such behaviour.
"We had multiple instances of both in-person and online abusive behaviour, including two instances of hate speech, an [instance] of sexual harassment and multiple instances of disruptive audience behaviour in both our venue and others around the city."
It was "one of the most challenging aspects of the entire festival" and created an unsustainable workload.
Leadership dealt with each situation and the fallout as younger staff were left with too much to do and had their confidence shaken.
"It was the first time staff have felt genuinely scared to do their jobs," the report said.
There needed to be better behaviour and leadership from politicians and civic leaders, who set the tone for what behaviour was acceptable within communities, and significantly more funding to help community organisations address the "fraying levels of connectedness in our communities", the report said.
Ms Harvey said the disruptive behaviour — which included heckling and involved inebriation — was experienced particularly during late-night events.
Police were not contacted, and it was noted some of this behaviour was directed at events involving the city's queer community, she said.
"I think that both locally, nationally and internationally you have quote unquote 'leaders' in our communities who are espousing some very racist, misogynistic and homophobic ideas.
"It's given people permission to act in a similar way and it was so evident during the festival."
Ms Harvey drew a connection to "very nasty" incidents in the North Island earlier this year, which included the actions of Destiny Church members who stormed a children's drag science show held in a library in Te Atatu.
She knew of other businesses and event organisers in Dunedin who had also faced anti-social behaviour.
"So I think it is indicative of the broader environment politically and socially."
However, the "vast majority" of the thousands of audience members who attended events this year had been well behaved, Ms Harvey said.
Fellow co-organiser Kate Schrader said the incidents were "deeply stressful" and they were not experts in dealing with anti-social behaviour.
It was only a small team working behind the scenes at the festival and such behaviour took them away from their work running it.
With more funding, the festival could increase the number of hours it employed security for, Ms Schrader said.
