Thread by @CounterActOz

💥BREAKING💥

Tweeting live from the Downing Centre on unceded Gadigal land as peaceful climate activist #VioletCoco seeks bail after being sentenced to 15 months jail after blocking a road for 28 minutes.

This is a democracy!
NO JAIL FOR CLIMATE ACTIVISTS!

#ProtectProtest

Coco is the SIXTH peaceful climate activist to be sentenced to jail in NSW in the last year or so.

More than a dozen other activists are facing jail time under the Perrottet government’s bipartisan anti-protest laws.

#ProtectProtest #ClimateEmergency

amp.theguardian.com/australia-news…

Perrottet claims that disruptive protest is inconvenient to #OurWayOfLife?

Protest is what’s given us our way of life!

#ProtectProtest

We’re now hearing from Paul Peady representing @unionsnsw who is here in solidarity to remind us that the rights we’ve taken for granted can no longer be so.

“Climate activists fight is now our fight.”

#ProtectProtest

“The struggles of all working people are connected,” says Paul Keating of the @MaritimeUnionAU.

“These are the most authoritarian laws this country has ever seen! We’re must break unjust laws!”

#ProtectProtest

AMAZING solidarity from over 220 unions, large environmental organisations, social and climate justice groups and many more standing with us to #ProtectProtest and speak out today to #FreeVioletCoco.

Read the open letter and see the signatories:

counteract.org.au/millions-raise…

While repression increases, so does our movement!

Stand with us to protect our international rights to freedom of movement, association, peaceful assembly and political speech.

Email NSW MPs and federal Labor rep:

counteract.good.do/protectprotest/

Nonviolent disruptive protest draws attention to injustice where polite requests may go unheard.

Actions decried by the majority as extreme or “inconvenient”are now, through the filter of history, seen as necessary and worthy!

#ProtectProtest

thelancet.com/journals/lanpl…

“This is a rank and file, grassroots movement,” says Paul Keating of the @MaritimeUnionAU.

“Environmental activists have the full support of the MUA.”

See MUA’s statement of solidarity:

“It’s not Violet in the dock today, it’s Australian democracy,” says Arthur of the South Coast Labor Council.

“Violet could be any one of us. Climate activists, we’re with you until these laws are repealed.”

#ProtectProtest

“This is the judicial system working as intended, protecting extractivist industry,” says Jay from @stopffsubsidies

“The fossil fuel companies have raised $76 trillion in income after production costs. That’s $4.1 billion a day in unearned profit.”

#ProtectProtest #StateCapture

“No human should be jailed on stolen land,” says Wiradjuri @StrikeClimate activist Ethan.

“These laws are disgusting acts of violence. They’re modern day acts of colonial brutality.”

#ProtectProtest

This crackdown on protest is a global phenomenon!

“If Australia doesn’t fix these laws Australia will lose its authority on the international stage,” says Veronica from @amnestyOz.

“No one should be jailed for protesting.”

#ProtectProtest

“The government has given half a million dollars in hand outs to fossil fuel companies,” says Greens senator @DavidShoebridge.

“Protest isn’t the crime. The crime is in government! They should be in court, not activists.”

#ProtectProtest

“We have a state election coming up in March. We need to organise like it matters, protest like it matters and vote like it matters where we work in collaboration with First Nations people and save the planet,” says @DavidShoebridge

#ProtectProtest #ClimateEmergency

“We built this country on protest,” says Darren Greenfield from the @CFMEU

“If we didn’t protest with the BLF in the 70s, we wouldn’t have the Rocks. These laws are a disaster. We need to vote these bastards out.”

#ProtectProtest #GreenBans

LET’S GO!

We MUST build a cross-struggle movement to stand up to anti-protest law, state repression and the fossil fuel industry.

Solidarity is essential when democracy is at stake! We’ve seen this today ✊

Time to organise, kindle and grow 🌱

#ProtectProtest #OurWayOfLife

📣📣📣

Violet has been granted bail!

Now for the dozen or more peaceful climate protestors facing jail terms under NSW’s repressive anti-protest laws to be granted bail or, better yet, have their cases dismissed.

NO JAIL FOR ACTIVISTS!

#ProtectProtest #ClimateEmergency