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animal rights campaigners jailed
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Merrick
Merrick
2148 posts

Re: animal rights campaigners jailed
Jan 22, 2009, 14:04
It seems to me that a lot of what gets said about anti-vivisection campaigns boils down to 'well yes it's bad, but it doesn't warrant *that* extremity of action'.

Which is fine if that's your view, but I have a problem when it gets mixed up with a position that says such action can never be justified for political ends.

Frankly, we all believe it can, it's just that vivisection is, for most of us, not one of those cherished exceptions.

pooley wrote:
they acted in an equally as vile way as the people they (and I) opposed.


handofdave wrote:
Doesn't really jive to claim moral superiority and then resort to totally scummy underhanded methods


The same can be said of, say, French resistance fighters killing people driving trains of Nazi supplies.

I am NOT saying the vivisectors are as bad as Nazis; but we are discussing tactics of campaigns rather than what the campaign is about.

handofdave wrote:
It also generates a lot of bad publicity that damages other activists who are acting above board


Popel Vooje wrote:
Property desctruction is necessary evil in order to publicise the issue


I think there's a major misunderstanding here. Who said it was about raising publicity? They didn't send out any press releases or anything, and appear to have tried to stay secret.

It wasn't about publicity, it was a direct attack on the company. It was an attempt to intimidate people out of working for the animal testers and thereby make the company harder to run.

pooley wrote:
You would be hard pressed to find anyone that does not know about it, and fairly hard pressed to find someone that doesn't object to it.
This issue is a prime example of something that is allowed to continue through publis apathy.


handofdave wrote:
smashing things up typically goes this way: Someone from the state, or the corporate world, offends and infuriates a segment of the population. A segment of that segment protests. A segment of THAT segment takes it upon themselves to demonstrate their anger with violent action. That violent action typically involves property damage that targets unrelated third parties. The larger world looks on and sees gangs of destructive anarchists raging. There is a backlash against the aims of the protesters in general, as most people end up connecting the vandalism with the goals of the legitimate protest.


Tell that to the suffragettes.

handofdave wrote:
violent protest can and frequently does create a backlash against the protesters, even the peaceful ones, and serves to further isolate and stigmatize people who have legitimate grievances that the wider populace would otherwise support.


I find it interesting you characterise property damage as violent protest.

I also find it interesting that you think such damage never advances a cause (again, tell that to the Suffragettes), and that if only people restrained themselves from property damage then the wider public would get behind the cause without much delay.

People going out defending wild nature by blowing up dams, how long would they wait to see the wider population's outrage reach a level where dams are demolished?

handofdave wrote:
The tactics must gain the sympathy of a wider audience, tho, if they are to succeed.


That's simply untrue.

The reason there's the campaign that started this thread - SHAC - is because of the successes of similar campaigns against people who bred animals for vivisection - Shamrock Farm monkeys, Hillgrove cats and Newchurch guinea pigs.

Do you really think the ANC would've been any kind of force in South Africa if they'd worked peacefully for educating the wider population?

Would Sinn Fein have had a seat at the table in Northern Ireland if they'd worked only in boycotts?

I am NOT saying these things are essential to a successful campaign, nor am i saying every violent act undertaken in these campaigns - or necessarily the entire campaigns - are justified. But the idea that the violence didn't help the campaign is clearly false.

handofdave wrote:
If the only aim is to satisfy the anger of a small group then the result will likely be public antipathy and further retrenchment of the status quo.


But, down here below your high horse, we know that's never the aim of any such campaign.

handofdave wrote:
The LA riots after the aquittal of the cops that beat Rodney King only served to wreck the neighborhoods of the people living in them.


They certainly did damage those neighbourhoods, but to say that was their only effect is also plain nonsense.

Ask Officer Powell and Officer Koon whether they regard their retrial's 30 months sentences as being the same as their original acquittal.

That's just the obvious quantifiable thing, before we consider how it affected every other racist cop and what they chose to do in future to potential Rodney Kings.
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animal rights campaigners jailed (pooley)		 Replies:
Re: animal rights campaigners jailed (Popel Vooje)
Re: animal rights campaigners jailed (handofdave)
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