If we silence voices we don't agree with, we're doing the work of extremists for them | Peter Greste

"To be clear: the Bondi attack was horrific. It has left people shaken, grieving and afraid, particularly in communities already living with heightened vulnerability. That fear is real and it deserves empathy and compassion, and the board may well have believed it was acting in good faith. But fear also has a way of reducing our moral and intellectual horizons."

"Abdel-Fattah has through what might well turn out to be a defamatory association been cast as one of the unsafe ones. But her removal rests on a logic that should trouble anyone committed to open civic debate. It suggests that participation in public cultural life is no longer based on what a writer might contribute but on whether their past words might be uncomfortable in a suddenly volatile climate. That is an alarmingly fragile basis on which to curate ideas."

Freedom of speech underpinned a career in journalism, a campaign to secure release from prison in Egypt, and prompted a withdrawal from Adelaide Writers' Week. The Adelaide festival board removed Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah from the program because of past statements reassessed after the Bondi attack and judged not culturally sensitive at an unprecedented time. The Bondi attack was horrific, leaving people shaken, grieving and fearful, especially in already vulnerable communities, and that fear deserves empathy and compassion. Fear can narrow moral and intellectual horizons, simplifying debates into safe versus unsafe voices and risking silencing contributors. Removing a speaker based on potential discomfort shifts cultural participation from contribution-based evaluation to fragile, fear-driven curation.

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