Canberra Theatre receives bomb threat for Australia Day billboard with girls in hijabs

ACT chief minister Andrew Barr brands reaction ‘fanatical’ and calls for threat perpetrators to be arrested

The Australian Capital Territory’s chief minister, Andrew Barr, has told people offended by an Australia Day billboards featuring two young Muslim girls to “get over it” after threats were made against the Canberra Theatre.

The theatre is hosting a large billboard featuring the image of two young girls that was taken down from a Melbourne billboard after far-right and anti-Muslim groups made threats.

A crowdfunding campaign in response to the original picture’s removal raised more than $168,000 to republish and spread the image across the country.

The Canberra Theatre had posted on its social media pages that it was proud to display the image, but far-right group Respect Australia called for its members to phone the theatre and complain. Several members also left comments on the theatre’s page.

Respect Australia’s post prompted hundreds of comments, including bigoted and racist remarks, and the theatre’s original post disappeared, the ABC reported.

The ABC reported comments included threats to bomb the building or burn it down.

Barr said the reaction to the billboard was “fanatical”, and the government and the community shouldn’t bow to intimidation. “For those who are concerned about the contents of the signs, I have a very simple message: ‘Get a life, get over it’,” he said.

Barr said if people had made threats then they should be arrested. “There will always be racist rednecks in any community, but I’m not going to give them any succour in the ACT,” he said. “You can’t threaten to blow up buildings in this country without facing criminal charges.”

Last week Barr announced the ACT government would support the #putthembackup campaign, as well as “the concept of multiculturalism” by hosting the image on government assets.

“The ACT government will always support a multicultural Australia and we will always support people of all backgrounds in our city,” he said.

A spokeswoman for the theatre declined to comment. The post no longer appeared on the theatre’s Facebook page and there were no visitor posts. On its Twitter feed, however, two retweets of people complimenting the billboard remained.

ACT police said they had not received any report relating to threats against the theatre.

Dee Madigan, who established the initial crowdfunding, said there were large and small billboards in Brisbane, Sydney and Melbourne. Billboard companies in some other cities declined to host the images, she said, and full-page ads would appear in local newspapers instead.

The campaign itself faced criticism for its apparent disregard of long-running concerns about celebrating the arrival of white settlement and the beginning of Indigenous dispossession. As donations to the crowdfunding page grew well beyond what organisers expected, it was announced remaining funds would be donated to two Indigenous organisations: IndigenousX and Children’s Ground.