Torquay's Loud Fence refreshed

SUPPORTERS of survivors of child sexual assault gathered in Torquy last week to refresh and brighten up the town’s Loud Fence.

The timing of the event on Wednesday last week was among more than a dozen similar Loud Fence events across Australia (including one in Geelong) held to deliberately coincide with the funeral of Cardinal George Pell.

Originating in Ballarat during the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sex Abuse in 2015, the practice of tying colourful ribbons to fences in a show of solidarity has since spread across Australia.

The Loud Fence is located outside St Therese Catholic Church.

“It was about no more silence; that was the tag,” local Loud Fence organiser Merrin Wake said.

“So if we’re not silent, we’re going to be loud, so how do we represent loud?”

Torquay’s Loud Fence was installed outside St Therese Catholic Church in 2018.

The funeral of Cardinal Pell – a controversial figure in the Catholic Church for his hardline views and his responses while archbishop to allegations of child sexual abuse by clergy – was in Sydney on Thursday last week.

The ribbons show solidarity with survivors of child sexual abuse.

Ms Wake said the occasion would be tough for survivors not just of clergy sexual abuse but all sexual abuse during childhood.

“There’s celebrations across the world for a certain cardinal that created a lot of harm and pain to a lot of people.

“Whenever there’s a headline, or there’s something in the media about a perpetrator of harm, it can be really hard on survivors; it can be really hard to be reminded of your own experience.

“A survivor said to me the other day ‘Every time this happens, I feel taken back to that time when I felt I wasn’t worth anything’.”

Former Victorian parliamentarian and long-time supporter of LGBTQIA+ issues Andy Meddick was among those tying ribbons at Thursday’s event, and said Cardinal Pell’s life “should not be celebrated at all”.

“Whether you agree with the court’s decision to clear that particular person’s name of the charges that were brought against them that they were originally found guilty of, what can’t be denied about him is that he knowingly moved perpetrators from parish to parish to protect them.”

Surf Coast Shire councillor Rose Hodge was also at the event, and said she was there to support the community.

“This touches every community, a survivor is in every community, and my heart goes out to them.

“I’m not a survivor, but from what I’ve read and I’ve seen the passion of Merrin and Andy, it really instils in me that people should be supporting the survivors.”