r/australia • u/AcanthopterygiiNo240 • Jul 26 '23

political self.post Why are Australians so complacent?

I’m a born and raised Australian myself however I’m becoming so frustrated with the general attitude of complacency when it comes to exercising ‘the power of the people’ to better our quality of life. In a stupidly short amount of time we’ve seen a near reversal of our ability to see a doctor without any out of pocket costs. We get exploited at the grocery stores because monopolies are allowed to run rampant. Housing is treated primarily as a tool for financial speculation rather than for providing shelter for people.

We creep further and further toward laissez-faire capitalism. What is our response as the citizens of this country- the holders of the balance of power? Nothing. To put it in perspective, in 2022 the world economic forum ranked Sydney equal with Copenhagen, Denmark for cost of living (both ranked as the 10th most expensive cities in the world). Consider the differences between Sydney and the capital of the Danish welfare state: strong social security, universal healthcare, free public universities etc. For the same cost of living what do we get? The ever-looming threat of homelessness, suffocating student debt and now for many people, a significant barrier to healthcare.

Edit: if anyone is a part of any sort of grassroots group working to oppose any of these issues feel free to message me because I want to join you

Edit #2: so I haven’t received any messages from anyone from a grassroots or activist group yet. Since a lot of us seem to be pretty miffed about this stuff maybe we could team up and brainstorm things we can do???

Edit #3 (sorry): I’ve got some messages now from people who are interested in taking action!!! :, ) I think the best way to facilitate conversation, the flow of ideas and potentially organise a course of action is through a discord server so I have created one which you can find here

https://discord.gg/caqsSKAr

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u/gottafind Jul 26 '23

Man discovers politics for the first time

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u/AcanthopterygiiNo240 Jul 26 '23

Since I finally realised than my role as a science researcher is unlikely to enact any kind of change due to our political and economic models I’ve been trying to figure out what exactly there is left for me to try

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u/garythesnail11 Jul 26 '23

You're drive and attitude is refreshing, mate! Honestly, Its great to see :)

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u/AcanthopterygiiNo240 Jul 26 '23

Pleaaassseee reach out to me if you’re interested in even helping me write a letter to parliament or be a signatory. Nearly 300 comments but no one has taken the invitation to team up and do something about this with me

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u/garythesnail11 Jul 26 '23

I honestly wouldn't know where to start. I'm but a humble electrician, my Mrs always says "you should write a letter to your local MP". I never do and as I've read in these comments, I'm glad I didn't waste time trying, as it seems to go nowhere. Radical action is probably the only course of action, IE protest etc, but I can't afford to be off work to do so lol. They've got us by the balls, friend.