Green Scare: How Animal Rights Activists Are Being Branded 'Agro-Terrorists'
from the give-a-dog-a-bad-name dept
As Mike wrote just under a year ago, so-called "ag-gag" laws are being passed in a number of US states. Idaho has just joined the club:
Idaho's governor has signed a bill into law that makes it illegal for undercover investigators and whistleblowers to expose animal cruelty on factory farms and slaughterhouses.
As Mike also noted in his post last year, the standard rationale for bringing in this legislation, which conveniently makes it hard for animal cruelty in factory farms to be documented by activists, is "terrorism" -- specifically "agro-terrorism". That's also the case in Idaho:
The bill, SB1337, was backed by the state's billion-dollar dairy industry after Mercy For Animals exposed dairy workers beating, kicking, and sexually abusing dairy cows. Under this new law, the whistleblowers who exposed the cruelty face criminal penalties worse than those who committed the abuse.During a hearing before the Idaho Senate last Friday, Senator Steve Blair said: "I learned a new term when doing this research. It's called agro-terrorism... A lot of it happened very recently."
Both of the quotations above come from posts on GreenIsTheNewRed.com, which describes itself as follows:
Blair read from the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act. But what he didn't mention is that this term he learned, and its counterpart "eco-terrorism," were made up by the industry itself.This website focuses on how fear of "terrorism" is being exploited to push a political and corporate agenda. Specifically, I focus on how animal rights and environmental advocates are being branded "eco-terrorists" in what many are calling the Green Scare.
When an entire website can be devoted to this phenomenon, it's clear that this is no occasional rhetorical trick but part of a concerted campaign to stigmatize all kinds of legitimate dissent that happens to be inconvenient for powerful industry groups. Expect to see much more of it.
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Filed Under: ag gag laws, ag-gag laws, agro-terrorists, free speech
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As for the animal cruelty thing it's much like all the Govt abuse that we are seeing lately. Unless a whole shitload of people don't go protesting prepared for blood things will not change. I'd say we'll need to see blood spilled on both sides of the 'power chain' before things start getting fixed.
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Of course any governments that *do* enact laws to stop climate change had better make sure than no corporations lose profits as a result, too.
Because corporate profit is more important than a planet that humans can live on.
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If the greenies are trespassing to get the video and other proof, then go ahead and charge them with that. If they have any actual courage of their convictions, they're likely prepared to face such charges and are willing to take the punishment for it. But to make just talking about what they found a crime in and of itself (with a much more significant penalty than mere trespassing) is a bright-line violation of the 1st Amendment.
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"Anyone calm enough to level an accusation of 'terrorism' -- instead of running for their life -- is lying."
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Edward is spinning in his grave...
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But what about the children?
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First amendment, anybody?
The judge is bound by those kind of unconstitutional lobby-paid not-really-laws, but I hope that there are enough people with a brain in the typical jury to nullify.
Vapid hope, I know.
The American political system is so thoroughly corrupted that it's hard to believe.
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Guess these people are terrorists to
And that guy who shot the 47% video of Mitt Romney in the last presidential election, that guy's a terrorist to!
And Upton Sinclair, who wrote 'The Jungle', which exposed a lot of unsanitary practices in the meat industry to millions of Americans? He wasn't a hero who helped improved public health and safety, he was a terrorist to!
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How are you supposed to catch someone committing a crime if it is a crime to report it?!
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Well, then it is clear-cut terrorism. It is quite obvious that those terrorists are threatening to cut into the profits of exactly those companies who are paying the politicians for putting the laws they hand them into effect.
They are threatening everything that the U.S.A. stands for. Or rather lies on the ground for.
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snubbed by new press shield law
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/21/chuck-schumer-glenn-greenwald_n_5008524.html
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This just in
Molly The Cow was sentenced to 20 years in prison for breaking SB1337. She was wearing a hidden camera in her bell, showing the abuses of her fellow bovine at the hands (and other parts) of her masters. She said she did it to expose the wrong doings of the ag industry, but the court deemed it otherwise. Judge Giveme Moore said of Molly, "She showed udder contempt of this court!"
3 news stations and 24 newspapers were closed down for showing the video and reporting the issue.
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bear in mind the entertainment industries coined the phrase 'piracy' to mean anyone who copied media disks or downloaded them from the internet, even though the term is far removed from the original meaning. it was done to be a 'crowd puller'. it was done so that anyone sued would be made to look as if he/she had actually let off a nuclear bomb rather than copied a movie disk. the sensationalism had the required effect. i assume this is the reason for the terms in the article. nothing sounds better than over-exaggerating when an industry wants something brought to the attention of politicians, all of whom are drooling at the mouth, waiting for a way to get the next 'campaign contribution' flowing into the coffers!!
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Let's be fair about this
Next I imagine we're going to see organized crime states such as New Jersey pass laws that make it illegal for anyone to film or record the process of offering and/or taking bribes. After all, we wouldn't want the "etho-terrorists" (as in ethics) to win.
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Sheesh, talk about a non sequitur.
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Law being challenged in court
Next, we'll see the same laws guarding coal, oil, and fracking.
http://ecowatch.com/2014/03/19/rachel-maddow-waterkeeper-alliance-photos-duke-energy-coal-ash-dumpin g/
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