Ever since 2005, the FBI has cited eco-terrorism as the number one domestic terrorist threat. (Never mind the fact that there are probably more important and more threatening security issues for them to be worrying about.)
The FBI has gone so far as to send undercover spies to events as innocent as vegan potlucks. This scares me, because I’m not one to risk attending protests and things that might reasonably get me in trouble with the police or FBI, but a vegan potluck is something that I’m likely to attend. In fact, whenever two activists connect, the FBI has their antenna out.
In January of 2006, the 109th Congress signed the Animal Enterpreise Terrorism Act, and a couple of weeks ago, according to Green is the New Red, four California activists were convicted under it, with charges of (as quoted from GITNR):
- Protesting outside the home of a University of California Berkeley professor. Some activists, “wearing bandanas to hide their faces, trespassed on his front yard, chanted slogans, and accused him of being a murderer because of his use of animals in research.”
- At another protest, activists “marched, chanted, and chalked defamatory comments on the public sidewalks in front of the residences.”
- At one protest, a group of five or six activists allegedly “attempted to forcibly enter the private home of a University of California researcher in Santa Cruz.”
- Fliers titled “Murderers and torturers alive & well in Santa Cruz July 2008 edition” were found at a local coffee shop. They listed the names, addresses, and telephone numbers of several researchers. The fliers said “animal abusers everywhere beware we know where you live we know where you work we will never back down until you end your abuse.” The FBI says three of the defendants are tied to the “production and distribution of the fliers.”
Now, only the third charge is actually illegal, and even the “threat” in the flyers is too vague to prove anything. Now, I don’t disagree with the act in itself- the provisions seem to be reasonable, being based around things that are indeed illegal. I guess what strikes me as weird is that they felt like they had to create it at all. We already have laws in place against arson and theft. So I guess my biggest complaint about it is that it paints the picture of activists as being “bad guys” and encourages others to think the same.
What do you think?
