Animal Rights Intimidation Continues With Scarce Condemnation From "Mainstream" Liberationists
Here is another example of the growing radicalism that is sweeping the animal rights/liberation movement. Theft, threats of violence, intimidation--all to thwart medical progress in the name of saving the animals. What I find telling is this: Whenever I post an article such as this, the e-mail comes pouring in about how I am demonizing a peaceful movement. But when I ask my correspondents to condemn these tactics, they almost never will.
The only people who can reach the violent radicals are co-believers. But they are sitting on their hands. It seems to me that makes them complicit in the escalating criminality and terrorist threats.
posted by Wesley J. Smith @ 8:39 AM
4 Comments
4 Comments:
I don't doubt that violence and intimidation happen, but am generally skeptical about the motives in these types of situations. Perhaps because I was a college student in California in the early 1970s and saw firsthand that those inciting violence among social justice movement participants tended not to be members of those movements. I think the violence is coming from elsewhere. I see Ingrid Newkirk as presenting straw opposition to a medical research establishment that has next to no respect for animal life. (This is not a non-issue; Johns Hopkins has a program addressing alternatives to animal research).
As I have mentioned before (I think), I have been researching the Portland-based group, the National Animal Interest Alliance, and animal use organization that has comandeered our county animal shelter under the guise of first, an unnamed animal welfare group and ,later, a "responsible breeder's" group. 9 of 16 NAIA board members are research scientists, among them famed cat vivisectionist, Adrian Morrison. My experience in about 14 years of observing NAIA is that it is about as deceptive as they come, taking the "moral high ground" to avoid having to discuss public issues publicly. NAIA flatly denies pound animals go for research , but we have admissions. A point I ponder in Portland is "Do research scientists have greater moral value than pet owners?"; a rhetorical question, but one the Oregonian seems to have answered in the afirmative. Adrian Morrison authored a piece that appeared in a 1996 edition of NAIA's newsletter urging that the media needed to be eduated on the evils of animal rights extremism. This has come to mean anyone who questions the status quo-anyone who speaks out on behalf of pet owners and animal-friendly law gets painted with the "extremist" brush. or is ingmored even when the issues he/she raises are widely significant in that they affect a large segment of the community (such as cat owners). Case in point: In the fall of 2003, Jan Kowalk, a Portland Resident's cat, Panda, was trapped by a neighbor, taken to the county shelter, and killed within 24 hours, before she had a chance to redeem him. Through its, spokesmen, the county animal control agency assured Oregonian readers that Panda was "tresapassing" and the trapping and killing was undeniably legal; although I am a lawyer and would qualify as a cat policy expert, I was not permitted to express my views on due process issues in either an opinion piece or a letter to the editor. Then the paper went on a tirade against people who allow their cats outdoors, suggesting because cats can kill birds, those who let their cats outdoors are morally inferior and deserve to lose them. If I hated animals and worshipped research scientists, I would still abhor the intellectual dishonesty and the press participation. You usually are on the side of the individual. I just hope you explore the big picture for this undertaking.
Thanks.
CCE
Those may be issues worth discussing. But note that you don't condemn the intimidation and violence of ARL extremists. You merely acknowledge that it happens and question whether animal liberationists are really behind it. You seem to prove my point.
I think I implied that I condemn the violence, at least I meant to. I hope you are really open to discussing issues and not "case building". I will say, however, that I attended the annual animal law conference at Lewis and Clark Law School where panels of animal lawyers seemed to condone violence. I questioned them on their reasoning and the consensus seemed to be that that was one of the only ways to open up the issue for discussion.
I just read William Jordon's "A Cat Named Darwin; How a Stray Cat Turned a Man into a Human Being". It is a story about how much a person can love a pet and how important pets can be to single people. And I would add, senior citizens and children. You are among those fortunate enough to have a love match; many out here do not. The importance of pets to people should not be left out of any discussion of scientist's "rights" to shelter animals imho. That is where I am coming from. Let your thesis be your thesis and not Adrian Morrisons'. Please look at the nuances.
Also, I think the source of the violence DOES matter: if it stems from a medical research establishmenet that does not want to discuss issues-such as public institutions that will not divulge public record-and resorts to violence-or focusing on violence-in order to avoid legitimate discussion about legitimate public issues, then I think some degree of condemnation for that revered establishment might be in order. Animal law conference participants spoke to sneaky tactics on the parts of some research labs. And I have seen public records manipulation and altering at our NAIA-run county animal shelter. I would hate to see you condemning anyone who questions unfettered animal research as "complicit" in violence, while not questioning what may have led some people to believe engaging in such tactics is the only way their legitimate concerns can be heard. From where i sit, I see the medical research establishment engaging in some of the same corporate shenanigans you have condemned elsewhere. I must say that I am a bit shocked over your willingness to quickly conclude I am among the criminally complicit. I don't think you are seeing the big picture yet on this particular issue.
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