"You're condemning young people like me to a life of climate disasters — of course we have poor mental health issues!" cried protester Alexa Stuart, a 21-year-old from climate action group Rising Tide mid-way through Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's press conference today.

"When will you listen to young people?"

Albanese was announcing a $1 billion dollar increase to mental health access and support, including $500 million for Youth Specialist Care Centres. The funding announcement follows Opposition leader Peter Dutton's own pledge of $400 million towards mental health during his budget reply speech.

"Mr Albanese, you say you care about young people — and yet since getting elected your government has approved 33 new coal and gas projects!" Stuart yelled as she was hauled away by security.

The Australia Institute's Coal Mine Tracker says the federal government has approved 10 new coal mines since it was elected in May 2022 and there are another 22 proposals for new or expanded coal mines awaiting approval.

Two-thirds of young Australians believe climate concerns are having a negative impact on youth mental health, while over three in four young people are concerned about climate change, according to a survey conducted by YouGov sampling 1,000 Australian citizens aged 16-25 in 2023.

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[–] null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com -3 points 2 weeks ago (15 children)

I can't believe I need to spell this out but ...

As regards climate change ALP is not perfect but they're infinitely better than LNP.

When you protest against ALP you inform low-information voters (which are the majority, by the way) that both parties are the same as regards climate change.

In a few short weeks either the ALP or LNP will form government. If it's the LNP they will roll out plans for nuclear power which is really just a license to keep burning coal for another 30 years.

If you'd like Australia to continue deriving it's energy from coal, then by all means protest the currently sitting government, during an election campaign.

[–] Sasha@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 points 2 weeks ago (11 children)

Just because one party is bad doesn't mean we should settle for the slightly better one who are still actively burning our future, that's an absurd argument on the face of it.

We need to call out everyone for the shit they do because the fact is these guys are not good enough, they are not infinitly better than the LNP, they're marginally better and their entire climate change plan mostly relies on doing nothing and letting industry progress the way it's already been going.

Rising Tide is not lying about anything and misleading voters, the fact of the matter is Labor is doing all this shit and an election is the best possible chance to force them to be better. If they lose the election then that's on them for not shaping up and doing better, as people are literally shouting at them to do.

Fuck the ALP and the LNP I won't settle for ecocide in any form. If the ALP doesn't change then it doesn't fucking matter because the end state is going to be the same regardless. We are not at a point where we can sit on our fucking hands and wait for slow change to save us, people are actively dying and we're blazing past tipping points like there's no tomorrow.

[–] null_dot@lemmy.dbzer0.com 0 points 2 weeks ago (4 children)

All I can do is reiterate what I said.

If LNP wins we will continue to burn coal as our primary source of energy for another 30 years.

Is that what you want ?

What can you do to avoid that outcome? The options sure as shit do not include protesting about climate at ALP pressers.

[–] Sasha@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

If LNP wins we will continue to burn coal as our primary source of energy for another 30 years.

This is what the ALP is actively trying to do, if you haven't been following along... They've approved new coal and gas extraction projects for 2050 and beyond. You know, when we're supposed to be at net 0???

When they announced a bunch of these last year we immediately called a bunch of snap protests at Labor mp offices around Melbourne and the only one who came to talk to us was Ged Kearny (everyone else either literally ran away or just rolled the shutters down), and all she did was offer excuses for why we actually have to keep digging up fossil fuels and burning them for decades to come.

And Tanya Plibersek goes on the news and has the audacity to lie and say they've approved no new projects, almost immediately after she approved a new project and expansions to another.

They're not doing anything to prevent this, they're not taking climate change seriously and they are sucking up to the industry at the expense of everyone else.

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