Funding from major sponsors is drying up

ABC News has posted an article that Queer festivals could be relegated to a thing of the past as several Australian festivals have reported sponsors pulling out and withdrawing funding.

Giants like Coles are claiming they want to share the sort-after dollars around to other community groups.

Wagga Wagga Mardi Gras president Holly Conroy said major sponsor Coles was no longer going to provide its annual $15,000 to that festival.

“If there's no sponsorships, and we can't get businesses to come on board, then we may see the last of Wagga Mardi Gras," she said.

The festival is due to be held again in April next year.

In a statement, Coles said it withdrew support for Wagga Mardi Gras "to ensure that we are sharing the support that we can provide to other communities".

"We support and celebrate a variety of regional and metropolitan based community-led pride events," the statement said.

Other major sponsors of such events are following suit.

Another previous sponsor, Charles Sturt University, said in a statement that its budget for 2025 was still being finalised and a decision was "yet to be made" about continuing its platinum sponsorship of $27,500 a year to the Wagga Mardi Gras.

It is a similar story for Rainbow on the Plains, a queer festival held at Hay in south-western NSW over the weekend, which has also seen sponsors pull out.

The Drag'd Out festival at Beechworth, in Victoria's high country, has scaled back its festival from three days to one afternoon, after major sponsor Billson's went into administration.

Billson's had previously provided $10,000 a year in sponsorship.

They won’t come out and say it but hopefully this is a sign that these companies are beginning to recognise that if “you go woke, you go broke.”

Australian families have had enough of queer communities attempting to sexualise children and erase women’s sex-based rights. 

There is no need for queer sexuality to be rammed down anyone’s throats. No one is saying they can’t exist, they simply need to stop infringing on children’s innocence and women’s sex-based spaces, services and sports.