Today is the 40th anniversary of Earth Day and everyone, it seems, is “going green.” With widespread oil shortages due to peak oil looming within five years, and the startling effects of climate change becoming shockingly clear, environmentalism is more accepted and urgently needed than ever.

So why is the “number one domestic terrorism threat,” according to the FBI, the “eco-terrorism, animal rights movement”?

The environmental movement, like all social movements, has a wide-range of elements. There are people who leaflet and write letters. And there are underground groups, like the Earth Liberation Front, which have vandalized SUVs, burned ski resorts, and destroyed genetically-engineered crops. Even at their most extreme, none of these tactics have injured a single human being.

Nevertheless, they have been called “terrorism,” a label which has had extreme repercussions for those targeted. An environmental activist named Daniel McGowan was sentenced as a terrorist for his role in two ELF crimes, and for that he is now in a secretive prison facility called a Communications Management Unit, for “domestic terrorists.” The inmates and guards call it “Little Guantanamo.”

The “eco-terrorist” label has not been confined to the ELF and acts of sabotage. Corporations and the politicians who represent them have campaigned to stretch the label as far as they can. For example:

Utah Bill Would Make Environmentalists Like Tim DeChristopher “Eco-Terrorists”

“Animal Planet Collaborated with Eco-Terrorists”


Mafia Law Used Against Environmentalists for Tree Sits, Civil Disobedience, Blog Post

So how do government agencies and industry groups rationalize this? How do they justify labeling activists who have never harmed anyone with the same term as people who have flown planes into buildings?

A report by the Department of Homeland Security called “Eco-terrorism: Environmental and Animal Rights Militants in the United States” reveals part of the answer:

“All of these beliefs stand in direct contrast to the notion of individualism as promoted by Western culture..”

Put another way, the beliefs of a growing segment of the environmental movement go beyond urging people to switch lightbulbs or drive hybrids. Their critique challenges widespread cultural values, and questions deeply-held beliefs about whether humans have the right to exploit the natural world. Fundamentally, these activists question the unspoken dogma that human beings, and their interests, trump those of all other species.

That is only part of the explanation, though. It is not just that activists hold these beliefs. That, alone, is not a threat. The threat is when they act on them. Effectively.

That last word is critical. When activists take direct action to put their beliefs into practice, and in doing so threaten corporate profits, they become worthy of government reports and national security warnings.

For instance, the State Department warned corporations in a PowerPoint presentation:

“Although incidents related to terrorism are most likely to make the front page news, Animal Rights Extremism is what’s most likely to affect your day-to-day business operations…”

Forty years after Earth Day, the message from corporations, politicians and government agencies is clear. Shop and consume and shop some more, perhaps signing a petition or two along the way, and that is “going green.”

But if you go further, if you start demanding substantive, systemic change and shaking the economic and political power structures behind the green-washing, that is “eco-terrorism.”

NOTE: I apologize that comments are closed, I think it is a glitch in WordPress or Disqus (the comment system). I have not been able to resolve it yet, unfortunately.

The Supreme Court has struck down a federal law targeting “depictions of animal cruelty,” including dog-fighting and “crush” videos. And that’s a very good thing for the animal rights movement.

That might sound incongruous, at best, and heretical, at worst, to animal rights activists. Many people who care about animals have treated the ruling as a defeat, an attack on their attempts to protect animals from being tortured in the name of entertainment. However, the ruling in US v. Stevens is an important one for animal rights activists for three reasons:

1. Similar legislation could undoubtedly have been used against supporters of the Animal Liberation Front, Earth Liberation Front, and direct action. Proponents of the legislation, 18 U.S.C. 48, argued that the animal cruelty depicted in such videos is illegal, and it has “minimum redeeming value.” To be clear, I am not taking issue with either point. This conduct should be illegal, and it has no more redeeming value, in my opinion, than child pornography. However, the legislation itself is too broad and too vague. Denying First Amendment rights based on whether the media depicts illegal conduct with a “redeeming value” is incredibly dangerous. As the court said, it reflects an “alarming breadth.” These are standards that could easily be tweaked to apply to the publications of animal rights activists themselves.

   Within the animal rights and environmental movements there are publications that support property destruction and direct action. Magazines such as No Compromise, Bite Back, and the Earth First Journal support illegal tactics and sometimes include “how-to” style columns. There have also been full-length films and activist campaign videos that unabashedly support direct action, and clearly urge others to do the same. (The trailer above is a good example, as are the videos in the campaign to shut down Huntingdon Life Sciences).

   I have no doubt that the same industry groups who have sponsored “eco-terrorism” legislation would seek to use a similar rational to defend their attacks on publications like Bite Back or films like Behind the Mask. Does that sound far-fetched? Well, “eco-terrorism” legislation out of Washington State proposed exactly that.

2. Similar legislation could be used to target depictions of animal cruelty produced by activists themselves. This may seem like another overly-worrisome claim. But if you have been following the tactics of industry groups, it is clear that they are willing to use any and all tools at their disposal, including distorting existing laws and proposing new ones to attack even the most mainstream organizations.

   For examples, see these two articles:

   *Ringling Bros. Sues ASPCA Using Mafia Law
   *Mafia Law Used Against Environmentalists for Tree Sits, Civil Disobedience, Blog Post

   The mob law was never intended to target animal rights activists protesting the circus, and this law was never intended to target undercover investigations by animal rights activists, but in the hands of well-funded corporate industry groups and ambitious prosecutors, vague legislation can be exploited.

   What was even more worrisome about this case is that the government defended this fluidity. “Whether a given category of speech enjoys First Amendment protection,” the government argued, “depends upon a categorical balancing of the value of the speech against its societal costs.”

   Chief Justice Roberts rebuked the Obama administration for that, and rightly so: “As a free-floating test for First Amendment coverage, that sentence is startling and dangerous.”

3. The court made clear that Congress can’t simply say, “Trust us, we’re the government.”The court focused much of its arguments on the scope of the legislation, and how it has, and will be, applied. The government responded to concerns about over breadth by promising to only prosecute “extreme cruelty.”

   In this ruling, the Supreme Court unequivocally rejected those promises.

   “The First Amendment protects against the government; it does not leave us at the mercy of noblesse oblige,” Roberts wrote.
   
   “We would not uphold an unconstitutional statute merely because the government promised to use it reasonably.” [emphasis added]

   Similar questions are at the heart of opposition to the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, legislation so broad it is being used to target activists for chalking slogans on public streets.

   When I testified before Congress against the AETA, I argued that it was vague and overly broad, and therefore must be rejected on Constitutional grounds. In response, supporters included a provision that says nothing in the law shall be construed “to prohibit any expressive conduct (including peaceful picketing or other peaceful demonstration) protected from legal prohibition by the First Amendment.”

   This ruling is an important one because it makes incredibly clear that the government’s promises, whether only to prosecute depictions of “extreme cruelty” or only to prosecute those who support “extreme” activism, are meaningless.

Some activists have incorrectly portrayed the Supreme Court as ruling that animal cruelty is protected speech. Far from it. The court did not challenge the intent of this legislation, or its value. It simply said that this particular approach, this particular legislation, was too vague and too broad.

To put it another way, this ruling is not about supporting these despicable videos, it is about not prohibiting others. And that’s a sentiment which will ultimately benefit supporters of both mainstream and “radical” animal rights activism.

It’s always a challenge to explain the “Green Scare” and this website quickly and succinctly. I was playing around with YouTube’s new “SearchStories” channel, and gave it a shot by focusing on misplaced government priorities. And it’s 35 seconds! Let me know what you think.

Oh, and there are plenty of links on the YouTube page, explaining each line of the video.

An FBI affidavit has just been released in the investigation of the 2004 Animal Liberation Front break-in at the University of Iowa. It shows the stream-of-consciousness approach the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force took to the investigation, including surfing MySpace and Facebook and using an informant to identify activists on YouTube.

The affidavit from October, 2009, also shows the shaky pretext used to justify charging Scott DeMuth with Animal Enterprise Terrorism, jailing Carrie Feldman in a grand jury witch hunt, and raiding the home of Peter Young.

For example:

• A confidential informant was used to identify individuals in a YouTube spoof video created prior to the Republican National Convention in the Twin Cities. The video, like many others that have been made for mass protests, shows faux “Black Bloc” activists getting ready for the RNC. (The joke is that they are sipping coffee and reading the newspaper while wearing black masks.) The informant reportedly identified Carrie Feldman and Scott DeMuth as cast members in the skit.

  When the video came out, I posted about it on this site, and jokingly called it a “Homegrown Terrorist” training video. Months later, the government is calling it exactly that.

• The government says Scott DeMuth wrote in his diary about the ongoing political crackdown on environmental activists. For example, one alleged entry includes, “Fuck the Feds” and “Turns out the Feds have shit on P” (who the government claims is Peter Young). DeMuth also allegedly wrote “It’s almost been a year since Iowa,” which the FBI agents typed in bold font, implying that DeMuth must have been involved in the ALF raid.

  DeMuth allegedly wrote, “And the ABC [Anarchist Black Cross, a group that supports political prisoners] has gotten a fair amount of attention from the FBI. I don’t think I am at too much risk.”

• DeMuth’s Facebook, Livejournal and Myspace all “identify him with his interests of animal rights, anarchy and ecological extremist groups,” the FBI says.
• An FBI agent reviewed a MySpace photo of Carrie Feldman, posing with a white rat on her shoulder. Rats were removed during the Animal Liberation Front raid at the University of Iowa.
• Activists organized a Dangerous Media Tour, also known as “The Steal This Film Fest.” This public event, open to everyone (including the FBI, who were there taking photos) included information on making free phone calls and other hacks to resist “corporate rule.” The affidavit paints this is a covert terrorist gathering, but to anyone familiar with CrimethInc., Evasion, and the like, there is an entire punk subculture built up around similar petty scams.

I spoke with Lauren Regan of the Civil Liberties Defense Center to help me put this affidavit in context. “This is just an incredible example of how extremely flimsy the actual fact evidence is in these cases,” she said. “If they had stronger evidence against this kid [DeMuth], they would have used it.”

It doesn’t seem that the government has anything else to go on. When prosecutors filed an emergency motion to keep DeMuth locked up, they based it on labeling him an anarchist.

This is an important point to underscore. The date of this affidavit, October, 2009, places it before the Utah raid of Peter Young’s home, and before the grand jury. In other words, it is very likely that the entire case for the indictment of Scott DeMuth was based on this flimsy string of information, including lawful speaking events, Facebook, and YouTube.

Tea Party poster.

By contrast, the “number one domestic terrorism threat,” according to the FBI, is the animal rights and environmental movements.

Here is a side-by-side comparison of three recent right-wing cases which have not been labeled terrorism, and how they compare to activist cases that have.

• Militia member incites brick attacks on lawmakers’ offices. Mike Vanderboegh, former militia member from Alabama, urged readers of his blog to throw bricks through Democratic offices in response to health care legislation. “So, if you wish to send a message that Pelosi and her party [that they] cannot fail to hear, break their windows,” Vanderboegh wrote. “Break them NOW…” The call to action worked: in the week that followed at least 10 lawmakers had offices vandalized or received death threats.

  Six animal rights activists were convicted of “animal enterprise terrorism” for doing much less. They were part of Stop Huntingdon Animal Cruelty, and ran a website that posted personal information about executives tied to the controversial lab Huntingdon Life Sciences. They posted both news reports of both legal and illegal actions, and supported all of it. They also published essays about why they support non-violent direct action and sabotage. They were sentenced to between 1 and 6 years in prison. And the former militia member? He hasn’t even been arrested.

• Plotting to attack Muslims and police, and use a weapon of mass destruction. The Christian militia group called Hutaree is shown in one of their promo videos here. According to The New York Times, the defendants were “part of a group of apocalyptic Christian militants who were plotting to kill law enforcement officers in hopes of inciting an antigovernment uprising, the latest in a recent surge in right-wing militia activity.”

  The New York Times doesn’t call this racist, political violence “terrorism.” Yet a group of environmentalists who sabotaged property as part of the Earth Liberation Front, without harming or intending to harm a single person, were smeared as terrorists immediately upon arrest. The Times used the word in the headline, throughout the story, and in all subsequent coverage.

• Urging Tea Partiers to “reload.” Sarah Palin told a rally of 8,000 tea-partiers: “It’s not a time to retreat. It’s a time to reload.”

  Animal rights activists have been charged with terrorism for much less fiery speech. The AETA 4, for example, are not accused of property destruction or threats of violent. They are being charged under the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act for protesting and chalking slogans on the streets using children’s sidewalk chalk.

  To be clear, I am not arguing that Palin’s comments should be labeled terrorism. But what do you think would happen if an animal rights activists or environmentalist made the same comment, but about animal researchers?

The word terrorism is inherently malleable. There is not one true meaning of the word, no universal criteria for its application. However, these dramatic disparities extend far, far beyond any natural difficulties in using the term fairly.

People are being singled out for selective prosecution because of their politics and their threat to corporate profits. Once convicted, they are then being singled out again; Daniel McGowan, one of the Earth Liberation Front defendants, is in a secretive experimental prison called a Communications Management Unit.

Meanwhile, groups that pose a much more serious threat to human life, and have a demonstrated history of violence, go untouched. If the word terrorism is rhetorically and legally applied to non-violent animal and environmental activists, it must also be applied to much more dangerous groups.

That being said, it is not enough for us to respond by saying “They’re terrorists too!” or “We’re not terrorists, they are!”

Clamoring to label others as terrorists misses the point, which is that the word, the most dangerous and powerful term in the media and in our legal system, is nothing more than a fluid brand to attack the enemy of the hour.

Peter Young’s home was raided the FBI this week, and the search warrant repeatedly mentions his name in relation to “animal enterprise terrorism.” In the last article we looked at how this Utah raid is, ostensibly, related to the investigation of an Animal Liberation Front raid at the University of Iowa.

As with all of these cases, though, it’s important to put this in a bigger political context. Few attempts have been made to connect Young to Iowa (the government argued in court that Young was an “associate” of Scott DeMuth, the defendant in the Iowa case, because DeMuth identified someone in his journal as ‘P’).
Young says he has never met DeMuth, a graduate student whose research has included radical social movements.

However, attempts have been made to repeatedly label Young a “terrorist” not for underground crimes like raiding fur farms (which he was convicted of years ago) but for lawful, aboveground, First Amendment activity. For instance, he published The Blueprint, a listing of fur farms in the United States.

Young wrote in the introduction:

While past fur industry investigations focused on the treatment of animals, this one sought something else: names and addresses. Of all forms of animal rights outreach, the dissemination of “names and addresses” is at once among the most overlooked, and most potent…

The fur industry is among the most vulnerable targets in our sights. We rented a car, and set out to create the roadmap to its collapse.

Fur farmers responded by labeling this document, which is listing of public information obtained lawfully and disseminated lawfully, a “terrorist handbook.”

Multiple newspapers in Utah and Wisconsin published stories with industry soundbites along these lines. The Park Record in Utah reported:

“‘The Blueprint’ is a little disturbing. Basically, what ‘The Blueprint’ is, is a terrorist handbook,” a mink rancher in Coalville told The Park Record on Wednesday.

The man, who is in his 20s, spoke to the newspaper at his ranch on the condition of anonymity.

“All this is is domestic terrorism, and I have a target on my back,” he said in the interview. “They’re out there calling death threats in to ranchers. We spend many sleepless nights on the ranch.”

Most times he is armed, the rancher added.

All of this has the effect of increasing fear of animal rights activists as “terrorists,” and legitimizing any subsequent actions such as FBI raids of activists’ homes. As in all of these Green Scare cases, these media campaigns and this raid are, above all else, about instilling fear.

FBI raid of Salt Lake City house of animal rights activists. Photo by Jordan Halliday.

I just got off the phone with multiple housemates who were there witnessing the raid, and who were able to read the warrant. Details about all of this are still emerging, but at this point it is clear that the warrant was issued by the Southern District of Iowa, and authorizes the seizure of any books, pamphlets, computers and other materials tied to “animal enterprise terrorism.” [UPDATE: Here is copy of the warrant.]

Some background: In Minnesota, a graduate student named Scott DeMuth has been indicted on conspiracy charges under the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. The charges are related to a 2004 raid by the Animal Liberation Front at the University of Iowa.

Another Minnesota activist, Carrie Feldman, has been jailed for refusing to testify about her political beliefs and political associations before a grand jury. Feldman was a teenager at the time of the ALF crime, and says the grand jury is clearly an attempt to harass and intimidate the activist community.

So how did the FBI end up in Utah? One of the housemates, Peter Young, is repeatedly mentioned by name in the warrant. Young was one of the first people prosecuted for “animal enterprise terrorism” in connection to fur farm raids in the late 90s. (His co-defendant Justin Samuel is also mentioned in the warrant). He served two years in prison, and has been living in Salt Lake City, speaking at colleges, and writing on his website, Voice of the Voiceless. He is among the most vocal, public supporters of the ALF and direct action.

The only connection I can decipher between Young and the Iowa investigation is this: in an emergency motion filed against Scott DeMuth, to keep him in jail, the government calls DeMuth an “anarchist” and “domestic terrorist.” As evidence of this, they say he is an “associate” of Peter Young. As DeMuth’s faculty advisor has publicly explained, this is tied to his research as a graduate student.

There are about nine people living at the activist group house in Salt Lake. At least 15 computers were taken by the FBI, along with boxes of documents, notebooks, files, and address books. The house is well-known in the area as a gathering space for animal rights and other activists. No arrests have been made, and at this point it seems Iowa is being used as a pretext for a continued campaign of harassment and intimidation.

Among the items taken from the FBI’s terrorism raid: a postcard for Iowa 80, “the world’s largest truck stop.”

I’ll continue to update as this story develops. In the meantime, this is a good opportunity to plug the National Lawyers Guild hotline, 1-888-NLG-ECOL. Also, please write Carrie Feldman a letter as she continues to resist the grand jury witch hunt. Carolyn Feldman,
770 Iowa St., Dubuque, IA 52001.

A man intentionally flew his airplane into an IRS office in Austin as a part of suicide attack yesterday, and left behind a manifesto outlining his anti-government grievances, but politicians and the press are somehow unsure about whether it should be labeled terrorism. Meanwhile, a bill was introduced in Washington State this session labeling civil disobedience and First Amendment activity as “eco-terrorism.”

It’s not an isolated instance. Across the country, at the state and federal level, both pre-9/11 and post-9/11, corporations and the politicians who represent them have campaigned to label animal rights and environmental activists as the “number one domestic terrorism threat.” Even the most radical underground groups like the Animal Liberation Front and Earth Liberation Front have never harmed a human being.

Yet those who have murdered abortion providers and flown planes into building escape the label.

Let’s take a closer look at the systemic disparities.

These have all been labeled terrorism in the press, state houses or the courts:

• Washington “Eco-terrorist” Bill Includes Civil Disobedience and First Amendment Activity
• Utah Bill Would Make Environmentalists Like Tim DeChristopher “Eco-Terrorists”
• Animal Rights Activists Charged As Terrorists for Chalking Slogans on Public Sidewalks and Wearing Masks at Protests
  
• Canadian Politician Says PETA Throwing a Pie is Terrorism
• ELF Activist Receives Longer Prison Sentence Than Racists Who Attempted to Assassinate Obama
• Ag Industry Calls for Prosecutions of Undercover Animal Activists
• Appellate Court: Encouraging Civil Disobedience is Not Protected Speech

According to the FBI, none of these recent crimes are terrorism:

• Threatening to kill or injure police officers at a public tax protest assembly called a “Tea Party”
• Louisiana Man Convicted of Civil Rights Violation in Connection with Cross-Burning
• E-Mailing Threatening Communications to Judges
• Threatening Employees of Latino Civil Rights Organizations
• Man Held Hostages at Gun Point inside Post Office
• Homeland Security Says Timothy McVeigh Isn’t a Terrorist, But Peace Activists Are
  

Focusing scarce anti-terrorism resources on animal rights and environmental activists, while there are clearly domestic groups who have, and will continue, to carry out physical violence, puts all Americans at risk. Perhaps if the government spent less time preparing for attacks by environmentalists, events like this could be prevented.

Fifty years ago this month, four black students sat at a Woolworth’s whites-only lunch counter and refused to move. The following day 25 students did the same. A few days later, more than 300 showed up. The sit-ins quickly spread across the South and were a critical component of the civil rights movement. Decades later, the same conduct by animal rights and environmental activists are “terrorism” under a bill introduced in Washington State.

Senator Val Stevens has sponsored SB 6566, “an act prohibiting terrorist acts against animal and natural resource facilities.” The so-called “eco-terrorism” bill, like many others, ostensibly targets underground groups like the Animal Liberation Front and Earth Liberation Front. However, the bill is so broad that it explicitly targets non-violent civil disobedience and outlaws speaking out in support of “eco-terrorists.”

Here is the text of the bill. Among its provisions:

• Its sweeping definition of “eco-terrorist organization” could wrap up countless above-ground activists. It defines “animal rights or ecological terrorist organization” to mean “two or more persons with the primary or incidental purpose of intimidating, coercing, causing fear with the intent to obstruct, or impeding any person from participating in an activity involving animals” or natural resources. That last clause is the kicker. The bill’s definition of a terrorist organization includes any activist group that impedes business operations.
• Civil disobedience is “terrorism.” The bill explicitly mentions “Entering or remaining on the premises of an animal or horticultural facility if the person or organization” has “received notice to depart but failed to do so.”
• Speaking out in support of “eco-terrorists” is terrorism. The bill targets those who: “Participate in or support animal or ecological terrorism, including raising, soliciting, collecting, or providing any person with material, financial support, or other resources such as lodging, training, safe houses, false documentation, or identification, communications, equipment, or transportation that will be used in whole or in part to encourage, plan, prepare, carry out, publicize, promote, or aid an act of animal or ecological terrorism, the concealment of, or an escape from an act of animal or ecological terrorism.”

That final bullet point is the most dangerous section of the entire bill. It outlaws any activity, including communications, that “will be used in whole or in part to encourage,” “publicize,” or “promote” an act of animal or ecological terrorism.

“Encourage.” “Publicize.” “Promote.” There is absolutely no doubt that this language is intended to target the work of groups like the Earth Liberation Front Press Office, North American ALF Press Office, Bite Back Magazine, Earth First Journal, and others who distribute the communiqués of underground groups and vocally defend illegal tactics.

Make no mistake: that’s what this law is about. Speech. Sure, it includes stiffer penalties for property crimes and civil disobedience. The real danger, though, is the creation of a new class of law that explicitly exempts the First Amendment activity of those who support “terrorists.”

In my opinion, the law is so broad it could go even further, targeting those who provide “financial support” through legal defense funds. That’s debatable, of course, and that’s the problem; the law is so vague and broad that it is open to the exploitation of corporations, politicians and ambitious prosecutors.

Unfortunately, bills like this are nothing new. In fact, much of the language in this bill has been directly copied and pasted from a template bill created by the corporate-funded American Legislative Exchange Council. You can read ALEC’s “Animal and Ecological Terrorism Act” here. A similar ALEC bill in Tennessee was described by its sponsor as targeting “left-wing eco-greenies.”

This bill, and others like it, have literally been bought and paid for by corporations.

Meanwhile, if you replace “animal and ecological” with “civil rights” throughout this bill, it could easily have been used against those activists at the Woolworth’s lunch counter, the Greensboro Four. Fifty years of history have made it easy, and even expected, to support once-controversial social movements and radical tactics.

The site of the Greensboro Four’s historic “terrorism” has now been commemorated with the opening of the International Civil Rights Center and Museum.

UPDATE: The bill did not make it out of committee, and will not pass this session. We’ll stay on the lookout for future incarnations, as similar versions of this bill have been introduced in Washington State many times.

I was interviewed by Dara Greenwald for the Journal of Aesthetics & Protest about the Green Scare, and labeling political activists as domestic terrorists.

One area that was particularly interesting, and has not been discussed much on this site, is the implications of all this for artists. Check out the interview for a bit more on Steve Kurtz, the Boston LED-terrorists and the Graffiti Research Lab.

Here’s an excerpt:

DG: Do you have advice for artists and media makers who might care about these issues?

WP: Your work matters. That may sound silly or simplistic, but I have met so many amazing artists who sometimes look down on their own work as if it is not “real” activism. But you have so much power to educate and inspire, to shake up widely held beliefs and reinforce values that matter.

There have been so many days when I couldn’t feel more down, more hopeless about all of this, and then stumbled across a tiny, spray-painted stencil on the street, or a song, or a video, or a performance, and felt like I had a fire lit under me. So I’ll say it again: Your work matters.