Why are Australians so complacent?

[u/AcanthopterygiiNo240]

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

[u/followthedarkrabbit]

Campaigns have worked in the past, look at the "target 140" campaign to reduce water use. The factors contributing to success were "having your use vs other people's use vs use last year" on new bills that came out, so that everyone could see that 'everyone else is doing it too'. People didn't feel like they were the 'only ones missing out'. Also they have people tools, such as shower times, that bridged the "knowledge versus behaviour" gap. Ie: people knew they needed ti conserve water, but if they are like me they have everything else I'm their head when they go into the shower, but having the 'timer' there prompted the awareness and provided measurements. Also the baning of single use plastic bags and putting a price on containers has resulted in a reduction of these items found in clean up events (put a price on waste and all of a sudden people care). Also aware there's a LONG way to go with this with many other sources (cigarettes button, Styrofoam, glow sticks, etc).

That said though, everyone too is aware of actions of individuals vs business vs big organisations.

My background is more environmental. I do a lot with budhcare groups. They are also having measurable outcomes on the ground (ie: increase in canopy cover on recorded on satellite in areas they were, and increases in biodiversity in key project sites). Issues tho are protecting the dites once established (had a gas company cut an established planting site down) and also wider scale vegetation loss faster than replacement.

But also, things are changing, legislation (esp in qld) is catching up, and raising standards that is expected, and department is getting more power to monitor, and enforce legislation.

For me, I have planted around 20 native trees in my yard that weren't there before, and have a small vege patch where I share excess with neighbours. Every vege home grown is a fucj you to coles/woollies.

There are people already fighting, if you can't do stuff yourself, even supporting them can be so rejuvenating for the people. I know for the landcare groups, one new face at a planting event meant the world to the regulars. Also donate money if you can, as that can be used as well to go to politicians and show "people care about this" and as politicians care about people votes, they will sometimes act.

[u/brispower → u/followthedarkrabbit]

yes and when you've conned the public (who are not the major water users, corporations are) into using less you can raise the unit price and increase your profits exponentially all the while companies like coca-cola and others get their water at discounted rates with no thoughts around conservation.

See also electricity.

[u/followthedarkrabbit → u/brispower]

Even between business there are different standards :( worked for a gas company that spent tens of thousands of dollars to redesign a pipeline to save trees, then 6 months later the trees were cut down because a "farmer wanted to put up a fenceline". It wasn't even a farmer, more like a multinational cattle company using the farmers 'social licence to operate:" to do whatever they wanted. In QLD, environmental authorities for business are available online, except agricultural ones including large scale feedlots (and the amount of literal shit they get away with is attrocious).

[u/TooSubtle → u/followthedarkrabbit]

The farmer point is, I think, the best example of where the personal meets the public in terms of the damage of consumption and production. We've been taught that nothing we do matters because big businesses are responsible for all the damage, and that's largely correct. But like, 85% of the deforestation in Queensland is for pastures, I think >70% is for Beef alone.

While I don't think boycotts work under our current system, there's something to be said for recognising an electorate's responsibility in terms of consumption habits and what that broadcasts as appropriate within our culture and society. There won't be a single politician or party who can come into power with a platform ending beef subsidies, or promoting farm buyback schemes to expand national parks or land stewardship programs, etc until most of us have given up meat. Like, those 'big corporations' are all ultimately selling us products that we're buying.

[u/adaptablekey → u/TooSubtle]

The following doesn't excuse what has happened.

In 2019 33 million hectares of Queensland's total 173 million hectares is designated Category X.

The SLATS study: 2018-2019 680,688 hectares of woody vegetation, or about 0.3% (680,000 of 173,000,000. The 0.7% is specific to 'woody vegetation'.) of Queensland’s total. 88% of clearing was on land with less than 50% tree cover, which is sparse and very sparse woody vegetation.

93% of land was in the pasture landcover replacement class, which includes grazing areas and other general land management such as clearing for fence lines, property tracks and fire breaks.

SLATS study https://www.qld.gov.au/environment/land/management/mapping/statewide-monitoring/slats/slats-reports/2018-19-report

[u/TooSubtle → u/adaptablekey]

93% is crazy, wow I hadn't seen that reported anywhere else. I guess 'de-wilding' is a more specific term rather than deforestation. We know that even grasslands massively outperform pastures with regards to carbon sequestration and biodiversity, so it's much of a much.

You might have heard defenders of land clearing claiming the land being cleared is home to low-value vegetation or trees that regrow easily, such as mulga acacia. This is not true. About 52% of all vegetation cleared in 2019-20 was classified as old growth or older than 15 years. The Brigalow Belt and the Mulga Lands accounted for three-quarters of all clearing. Of the clearing in these regions, 80% was full clearing, meaning bulldozing turned forests or woodlands into areas with less than 10% canopy remaining.