Ballarat students call for change as state government announces ad campaign

"I am seeing people talking and advocating for change and that's what we need to do," diversity captain Tunmise Ilesanmi told The Courier.

"We want to live in a safe environment and we need as many people to talk about this situation as possible."

Premier Jacinta Allan attended the high school on Friday, May 31 to announce a four-year-project to "saturate anti-violence awareness and action" in Ballarat.

Online and social media will be a focus of the saturation plan.

The government is expected to work with "local influencers who can counter harmful attitudes to women" and will spend $10 million over four years.

It follows a range of measures announced on Thursday, in a $100 million package for the state to reduce gendered violence.

Tunmise said watching protest movements in Ballarat and the increased attention paid to violence and misogyny made her comfortable to call out bad behaviour.

"It's given me a lot of courage and encouragement to say, 'this is wrong' and I need to say something about it," she said.

Respect Victoria will work with organisations in the city, including schools, sporting groups and Grampians Health, to educate and prevent violence.

The premier said the saturation model would be an Australian-first, based on international evidence and led by data collected by Respect Victoria.

Respect Victoria chair Kate Fitz-Gibbon said they will now begin working with different community groups to coordinate and add value to "the great work that is already under way across Ballarat".

"We want to be able to stand here in four years' time and tell you what's changed. I think you will see it in your lives," she said.

In a press release, the government says it will "bring together new and expanded programs, politics and services".

How this will be done will be decided in consultation with Ballarat organisations, Respect Victoria acting chief executive Serina McDuff said.

Professor Fitz-Gibbon said they will make sure there are messages "in every single environment" residents are in.

Ballarat High School leaders told the media, an influx of AI generated images and algorithms make being online difficult.

"Deep fake, AI generated images have exploded over the past six months," vice captain Hamish Jones said.

"You could be looking at sport-related videos and next you scroll down and you see unwanted stuff. It makes you uncomfortable to have that forced upon you," he said.

"You can scroll past it, but the algorithm knows that you've then looked at it, so it's going to keep providing that to you."

Hamish said it could be easy for people to get sucked in to the money, power, status and influence negative online influencers can have.

School captain Maxine Yu said it was scary to see the influence phones and the internet can have on young people.

"They're getting exposed younger, some even primary school students ... you can really see it in the way they speak to each other and the way they act with each other."

Maxine said she is also having more conversations with her peers, particularly through the state government's Respectful Relationships program, which has expanded.

She said it was helpful to speak about what is a healthy relationship in a school environment rather than learning those lessons in a potentially dangerous situation.

The Courier's parent company ACM's campaign, How Many More? is calling for the state government to fund grassroots community organisations in the regions to run regular education and discussion about family and gendered violence.

Ripon MP Martha Haylett said the announcement felt like "the first day this community had true hope for the future".

The government said they are pulling all the levers they can to help tackle the issue.

Time will see if the saturation tactic is beneficial in driving down the rates of family violence and men's violence against women, and rolled out to the rest of the state, with organisations still waiting for detail after Thursday's announcement.

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