I once hung out with some radical animal-rights types, two of which admitted to having been tried for this kind of thing. I was surprised at how blank they were when recalling the judge’s words to them — “He, like, said we were terrorists, dude” — and how callous they were about having trashed, and almost burned (they got busted in the act), the home of a CEO of some eeeeviiilll cosmetics company. They really couldn’t get their heads around the idea that this guy was a human being, for all his supposed “crimes”: for them he was a thing, a simple set of “bad” actions, and undeserving of their empathy. A fascinating moral calculus, perhaps, but not one for most of us: we need fewer Captain John Browns in our small world, not more.

Those sanctions were not working and were hurting the wrong people. Bush practically admitted as much when he was forced to invade to dislodge Saddam. The sanctions were not going to do it. Now that you have a new president, maybe (hopefully) he’s a better human being. Give him a pardon and let him out.

How about you turn that there rifle towards the enemy, son?

“The guy who started shooting up the church? I don’t know if his act of mass murder qualifies as an act of terrorism. Terrorism implies trying to change a mindset and I haven’t really seen evidence that his plan was thought out any further than killing liberals.”

I never implied you support killing people. I am just confused why everyone is making this about re-labelling the ELF/ALF when I am simply pointing out that Really Killing People isn’t being labelled terrorism (when it obviously is, unless you want to argue your above statement again) while destroying Corporate Property is loudly denounced as terrorism. Where in there am I saying that destroying property isn’t terrorism?
However I am very frightened of a future where property damage is legally equated to terrorism, and I think you should be too.

My point is about the values, or lack thereof, of the capitalist mind.

Did you really mean to compare comment moderation to imprisonment? Treating imprisonment in such a trifling way undermines all your arguments.

Tdawwg,

Obedience to law without any moral or ethical evaluation of the law’s validity is a cornerstone of fascist ideology. I’m not making that up.

@Antinous @113

There’s no moral imperative to obey bad laws, just conventional convenience in doing so.

Well, there’s the simple human law of self-preservation, and the calculations of whether the consequences of disobeying said bad law would be more detrimental to one than the consequences of obeying the same. There’s a strong moral good in not impairing one’s wellbeing that can sometimes salve one’s chafed moral sensibilities. Thoreau puts it wonderfully in “Civil Disobedience”:

If the injustice is part of the necessary friction of the machine of government, let it go, let it go: perchance it will wear smooth–certainly the machine will wear out. If the injustice has a spring, or a pulley, or a rope, or a crank, exclusively for itself, then perhaps you may consider whether the remedy will not be worse than the evil; but if it is of such a nature that it requires you to be the agent of injustice to another, then I say, break the law. Let your life be a counter-friction to stop the machine. What I have to do is to see, at any rate, that I do not lend myself to the wrong which I condemn.

Hellz yeah! Your mileage, of course, may vary.

Now, if you want to talk about the people locked up in US funded “Black Sites” around the world? I’ll agree with you. However…again from an ALF website…

ALF discusses the “Revolutionary Cells.” One of their examples?

“an animal liberationist shooting a vivisector dead on his doorstep”

Sure, these are just law-abiding people.

Now, getting to your other point, that of drug offenders? I think that the majority of our drug laws are unjust. Of course, I’m not going to shoot someone on their doorstep over it.

Let’s stop painting this guy as a saint.

That said, there has been no evidence that he was aiding terrorists, so we can stop calling him THAT too.

Antinous – You’ve been incredibly biased through all of this but enough is enough man. NOWHERE did I compare comment moderation to imprisonment.

“Unilateral contracts are non-binding, just like those signed under duress.”

is kind of ironic coming from a person here to enforce rules placed over everyone that uses the Boing Boing comment system.

That is what I said. I was commenting on YOUR words…and I really do find humor there. Terribly sorry that you can’t see it but I CHALLENGE you to show me where that compares comment moderation to imprisonment.

Go ahead man, I’ll wait.

There actually is not a purpose to restricting someone’s communication when that person has not proven in any way over the last 8 years to be of any sort of threat or danger to society. Daniel McGowan had been serving his time at a LOW security level federal prison in Minnesota before being moved to the CMU at Marion. He had no violations or problems there, and they already had access to all of his communications. There was NO evidence that he was passing along any messages that were in any way illegal or hinted at promoting “terrorist activities.” He has a website and a lot of friends and supporters. He had been writing publicly about his experiences in prison, he wrote about supporting legitimate above-ground non-profits that do GOOD. Prior to incarceration, he had also been employed by one of those organizations – one that helps women dealing with domestic abuse.

Just like you say the murderer isn’t writing letters to other men telling them to murder their wives, why make the assumption that the person convicted of arson would be doing something like that – especially given their conviction dealt with actions many years before?

From my own experience, the people I know doing time have no interest in getting in trouble. They just want to get out and have a happy, normal life with the people they love.

Another thing – when one is told by a judge that your support website (one that does not promote any sort of illegal activity in ANY way) should be taken offline and that you are being punished (by having to report to prison earlier than needed) because you went on Democracy Now to talk about your case, that’s political.

@ ceronomus

“They are in a wing of a MEDIUM security prison. They can still receive mail, they still see their attorneys.”

You really don’t get it. They are NOT in a MEDIUM level unit. The level of the prison has NOTHING to do with the actual unit. It is a completely separate entity with its own rules that are not part of the medium prison AT ALL. It’s not just a “wing” – the people in this unit do not leave the unit. They do not interact with anyone other than the people in the unit. Food is brought to them, they do not go to the food hall with the rest of the prisoners in the medium security prison.

Yes, they can see their attorneys, but you better believe the visit is being illegally monitored.

Did you even read my previous post about the restrictions???

Given the context of the discussion, it certainly appears to me that you’re comparing the misfortune of being disemvoweled or unpublished (which you haven’t been) with the misfortune (deserved or not) of the subjects of this post. If I’m wrong, you have my apologies: if I’m right, you’ve trivialized your own arguments.

My question to you is: Is there a reason that you’re particularly heated up about this subject?

He’s in jail. He SHOULD be in jail. He should not have his communications with his attorney monitored.

Oddly enough, I’m betting that we can only agree on that last part.

“ab5tract – Killing someone is an act of murder. Not all murder is terrorism. They are separate things. SOME murders are tools of terrorism, but these are not wholly intertwined concepts.”

Can you please explain what needs to be added such that the politically motivated murder of Unitarians is terrorism and not mass murder?

They restrict communication with the inmates.

Takuan, considering that these are existing prisons with special units, that argument falls flat. That argument really just looks to be intentionally inflammatory.

So I’ll turn one of your statements around. How do you know that this is an action taken because Islam is the “fashionable” issue?

As for my being heated? There are people in this thread actively trying to pick fights. If you wonder why ANYONE gets heated in this thread, you should perhaps look to that as the reason.

Samsam said: “Sure. A disgruntled employee who was fired burning the place down. A co-worker going postal. The jealous lover of the CEO ramming her jeep through the lobby.”

so person A destroys some weyerhaeuser equipment because they hate the company for firing them.

Person B destroys the equipment because they want to stop an old growth forest from being destroyed.

Person A gets 6 months for destruction of property, and person B gets 20 years and is labeled a terrorist?
are you really going to claim that person B not being punished for his/her politics?

That the charity guy is in jail, yet the man who funded, backed, and sold weapons to Saddam throughout the 80′s and 90′s (Bush Sr.) is not, is the greater abuse I’m referring to.

We have to keep our eyes on the ball.

So, for me, the distinction between hurting people and destroying property is as basic as any other moral principle.

The government erodes this distinction to uphold the property of the ruling class, at the expense of the lives and the possessions of the subject classes.

Obedience to law without any moral or ethical evaluation of the law’s validity is a cornerstone of fascist ideology. I’m not making that up.

No, that’s quite wrong. Obedience to laws is a cornerstone of all civilized political life in the West and the East. Quoth Aristotle, “All men need the polis, save beasts and gods.” Part of the polis is having laws and obeying them; when in default of the law, penalties are exacted and other legal processes are enacted. This is a basic organizational fact of all settled literate civilizations everywhere throughout history. Our first texts are law codes.

Fascism shares obedience to the law with other forms of civilization: indeed, Fascist ideology priortizes, fetishizes (as I do not) obedience–to the State, the Leader, the People, and the Law. But there are critical differences between Fascist and other societies that your extreme logic quite elides: to use your words, “Treating [Fascism] in such a trifling way undermines all your arguments.” Or at least this one.

I see your point MDH, but it doesn’t mitigate what these folks did…

I can work up outrage about past US foreign policy, but I still can’t work up outrage over an arsonist having his mail checked.