2024 Darwin Pride parade draws smaller crowds after bypassing the traditional march to parliament
Community members fear one of the Territory’s longest running events has lost touch with its political roots, after the annual Darwin Pride festival bypassed the march Parliament.
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A decision to bypass parliament in this weekend’s Darwin Pride march has raised the ire of some queer Territorians, who worry one of the Top End’s longest running festivals has lost touch with its political roots
For years the annual Darwin Pride march has cut through the city and ended with a ‘party with purpose’ on the steps of the NT Parliament, however the 2024 Festival chose to move it to the Darwin Waterfront with a few hundred people joining the parade on Saturday.
Parade attendee Yasmin Clarke said she noticed that this year’s event was significantly smaller than record-breaking crowd of thousands that marched last year.
Ms Clarke said while she had concerns going into this year’s festival she was “willing to give the benefit of the doubt … bring your whole heart and see what happens”.
“Sometimes big changes to a long-standing tradition can be a mistake, but sometimes it can be great. So I was interested to see how it played out,” Ms Clarke said.
“For me personally, this Pride wasn’t as fun as last year.
“The parade felt a lot smaller and there wasn’t as much energy from within the community, both leading up to and on the day.
“And it didn’t seem like we had that many more spectators — since that was the justification for coming down to the Waterfront.”
The NT News understands that a number of complaints were raised with the Top End Pride Committee about the march to parliament.
After initially refusing to comment, the Top End Pride Committee said the decision to move the event was to increase the number of spectators.
“While we’ve always had great attendance from members of our community, there have been very few spectators due to the lack of foot traffic in the CBD on Saturdays – which means our presence has had less impact,” it said.
The Darwin Waterfront was a major “gold” sponsor of this year’s Pride festival, with the Committee stating the partnership allowed it to “take over the entire precinct during Darwin Pride weekend”.
“The visibility we will achieve here far surpasses what we’ve experienced in the past, and allows us to come together in a location that is unmistakably Territorian,” it said.
The Top End Pride Committee also highlighted that the NT government were also sponsors of the event, with a $250,000 community benefit fund donation.
“Without them, we simply would not have been able to put on such a varied programme of events that we hope all members of our wonderful and diverse community can benefit from,” it said.
Multiple parade attendees also raised their concerns over the corporate sponsorship of this year’s event by Sportsbet, who held advertising banners during the LGBTQI+ parade.
Darwin resident Jess said the Committee’s decision to move to a non-political venue and rebranding the annual march as a “parade” felt like “they have corporate interests at heart”.
“At the end of the day I’d much rather have a smaller event with more sponsors that feels like its rallying for the community and its celebrative of our history and what exists here — rather than trying to be a mini Mardi Gras,” they said.
Darwin Pride was born in 1985 after a group of LGBTQI+ Territorians chose to celebrate their community, even as a new era of fear and moral panic hit Australia during the AIDs crisis.
Those who marched 39 years ago had been forced to live in secret for most of their lives, with the first parade occurring just two years after “homosexual activity” was decriminalised in the Territory in 1983.
The Territory was the last jurisdiction in Australia to wipe the historical “homosexual offences” charges from the record in 2018.
While critical of some of this year’s decisions, Jess said the festival itself remained an important event for many queer Territorians and said they appreciated the work of the volunteer-run organisation.
But they believed the Festival should be more reflective of the diversity of the Territory LGBTQI+ community, including giving greater emphasis to local artists and performers.
“It’s a bit of a slap in the face to the local queer community,” Jess said.
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