Earlier in the week there was a story that didn't gain too much traction from news.com concerning a new ticketing trend that has seen certain major organisations and events offering discounted tickets to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. The article in question can be read if you click here
I have to admit, I actually became aware of this practice the night prior to this article when I was looking at tickets for the Melbourne Fringe Festival and I was left a bit confused as well.
The event I've chosen to go to does NOT have this ticket and the ticket prices for this are reasonable and what I would expect for an event of this sort.
Then I had a cursory glance at another performance and this is where I started to get confused;
These ticket prices for Bradbury the Musical left me baffled on a couple of fronts. Firstly, there's no concession pricing which is absolutely strange. Secondly, Blak Tix are $10 cheaper than full price except for Hump Day when they are only $2 cheaper.
If you find that bizarre, then here's one more example;
Now if this isn't the most bewildering of them all. They have concession prices which come in at $30.50 but Blak Tix comes in $10.50 CHEAPER than concession at $20. To try and put some of this into perspective though; In the 2021 Census, First Nations unemployment was at 12% which is far too high. [1] In the 2021 Census, 52.2% of First Nations People aged between 15-64 were employed. [1] From an employment perspective, this isn't where we want to be and the less people employed means less money for First Nations people. Then we turn to wages and the story there is interesting. In the 2021 Census, the median weekly equivalised income for First Nations households was $830 compared to other households $1080. [2] This shows that other households clearly do have a financial advantage compared to First Nations households and naturally as part of the diversity of crowds, we want to encourage people from all cultures to attend events. I am not against diversity at all when it comes to attending events but is this the answer? Right now in Australia, we're currently having a debate over a referendum proposal to create an advisory body called The Voice which is an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander body that will be able to advise the government on matters concerning First Nations people. If you believe the YES side, it will encourage equality and Closing the Gap between First Nations and Non-Indigenous people. This pricing at events however for the Melbourne Fringe Festival could be interpreted as equality based on the wage gap between First Nations and Other households but at the same time, it COULD also be interpreted as racial discrimination through preferencing one group ahead of another and that's a slippery slope that we need to be careful of. While there could be issues around racial discrimination at play, there is another issue that is extraordinarily troubling. ANY PERSON, First Nations or otherwise could go ahead and buy the Blak Tix with no questions asked. Obviously, it is important to be discreet when it comes to this issue and I do applaud the Fringe Festival for this however given the cost of living crisis currently at play, what's to stop a non-Indigenous person from buying a Blak Tix? Essentially you are relying on people to be honest but I cannot see people doing it especially if events are $10, $30, $50+ cheaper for First Nations people compared to anyone else.
Even more bizarre is that there is nothing mentioned about Blak Tix in ANY of the Terms and Conditions outlined on the Fringe Festival website Where does this end though? Going down that path is one thing and if this is a path we're going to go down, does that mean people on the NDIS should also be entitled to cheaper tickets below concession prices? In an article on May 1, 2022, the NDIS reported that only 23% of working-aged participants are in employment and the participation rate for adults is declining. [3]
This is worse than the employment situation with First Nations people and given the whole purpose of NDIS is to allow the participant to have an improved quality of life while living with dignity, surely that is something that would need to be explored.
I want it to be clear and in no doubt whatsoever; I am not opposed to this in principle. I think we need to encourage ALL Australians, whether First Nations or not to attend events. This however is a strange way to go about it though, by basically encouraging racial discrimination through pricing and why? Is it simply a box-ticking exercise? A virtue signalling exercise? The truth is, a lot of these events that are doing this sort of pricing are based in the city and given that an estimated 353,000 First Nations people live in the city, compared to an estimated 560,000 who live in regional and remote areas [4], shouldn't we also be looking at taking events to them?
For me, this is something I've never encountered before and having seen it for the first time, I am still trying to process it. It is something that I have spent all week trying to make sense of in my mind before putting this together and now that I have done so, I've been left more confused. It's certainly an issue that needs further clarification going forward because I don't know whether this is equality or racial discrimination.
[1] https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/australias-welfare/indigenous-employment [2] https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/australias-welfare/indigenous-income-and-finance [3] https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/ndis-fails-to-get-more-people-into-work-20220428-p5ah0k [4] https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/australias-welfare/profile-of-indigenous-australians#population
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