It is with a light heart that I respond to Margot Hay’s letter (2 September).
Our children’s young years should be full of joy – and many still are, even amid a dreadful situation: accelerating climate devastation and looming ecological collapse, with all its social consequences.
Protest is often the only avenue left for them to express their unhappiness at a crisis enabled by politicians – Pauline Hanson among them – who wield their power and privilege with little thought for future generations.
The right to protest is a cornerstone of democracy, and young people are well within their rights to exercise it. In my experience, they are thoughtful and articulate about the anger they feel toward the existential threats bequeathed to them by their elders’ lack of political will.
Perhaps protest is itself a form of joy – an insistence that a future worth living for is still worth fighting for. I feel that way myself, and I am grateful for others who do.
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
