http://www.theherald.co.uk/features/49541.html
Charging the cranks won't touch terror
Beth Pearson October 26 2005
ONCE a controversial bill has struggled through dissent from MPs,
criticism in the press, tough questions about what "glorification"
might mean and what freedom of speech means to the government, the
least one can ask for is a little added value by way of compensation.
So it is that Charles Clarke's new terrorism bill will apply to
animal-rights activists as well as al Qaeda supporters.
On the face of it, this is a good thing for the government. It's a
clear signal to the hugely profitable and taxable life sciences
industry that, no, you haven't been forgotten. This is especially
important since the last legislation brought in to tackle animal-rights
activists - an offence of economic damage in the Serious Organised
Crime and Police Act - has resulted in only one prosecution since it
came into force in July this year.
Clearly, something needed to be done - regardless of how tasteless
one finds the economic lobbying of drugs companies. But this? First,
there is a fundamental problem with categorisation. The animal-rights
campaigners in question are those who send out death threats, assault
scientists, make hoax bomb announcements, vandalise property and
desecrate graves to make a point about medical experimentation on
animals. Their point is a valid, if widely contested, one which we
tolerate being expressed in a non-violent way, but their actions are
illegal and morally unjustifiable.
The terrorists who chum them in the bill are those who carry out
suicide-bomb attacks in public places, aiming to indiscriminately kill
as many people as possible and thereby create widespread fear.
Sending death threats to the head of research at a biotechnology
company is not indiscriminately killing members of the public, but
apart from this distinction, it isn't clear that an anti-glorification
measure as part of an all-new, correctly-titled (if hypothetical)
extremist bill would do much good.
There is one recent instance of what may be termed "glorification" of
the actions of animal-rights extremists. Indeed, had the bill proposed
by Clarke passed into legislation by the time US doctor Jerry Vlasak
arrived in the UK last year, it's possible he could have been arrested.
The fanatical spokesman for the sombre-sounding but equally fanatical
Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) was invited to
speak at a conference by Shac, a UK-based animal rights group that has
been linked to, and denied, extremist activity, after making comments
like: "I don't think you'd have to kill - assassinate - too many
(doctors involved with animal testing) . . . I think for five lives, 10
lives, 15 human lives, we could save a million, two million, 10 million
non-human lives."
During Radio 4 an interview, Vlasak declined to withdraw the remark: "I
am simply saying it [violence] is a morally acceptable tactic and may
be useful in the struggle for animal liberation." You don't have to go
far to find similar statements made by people also involved in the
animal liberation movement but without the public profile.
Vlasak is certainly endorsing, perhaps glorifying, violence in the name
of animal rights but surely a key issue is whether, in the context of
militant animal liberationists, this can be considered a form of
provocation. Nothing that we know about the set-up of such
liberationists suggests it is.
While there is an argument that groups such as a Qaeda issue propaganda
to convince young members to carry out attacks, there is no evidence of
similar recruitment in animal-rights extremism. Rather, the attacks are
carried out by small cells largely isolated from and condemned by
mainstream protesters. There is no hierarchy of leaders mobilising
youngsters to do the dirty work - they borrowed this "leaderless
resistance" model from the Ku Klux Klan. Those cells that carry out
so-called "direct action" operate anonymously, autonomously (thereby,
perhaps, giving credence to the theory they are in it for the
morality-veneered violence more than the morality) and without
communication. In short, there's absolutely nothing to suggest that
"glorification" plays any part in this informal movement.
The people who commit the crimes are difficult to catch precisely
because of the non-existent infrastructure. This is why only one person
has been arrested since the last legislation was introduced - not
because there isn't enough legislation. Likewise, the remedy is not to
bring in more, inappropriate legislation, because there will be no-one
to charge under it. Though it does create the appearance that something
is being done.
I don't pretend to know how to identify and charge those who think
nothing of battering a research scientist about the head because they
prefer rabbits to humans, but this much is clear: seeking justice for
victims such as the family of Gladys Hammond, whose remains were stolen
by body-snatchers in a successful attempt to stop the family farm
breeding guinea pigs for medical research, cannot be achieved by
charging cranks such as Vlasak, then simply adding up the numbers.
****
TC