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Following the passage of Arizona’s ban on cockfighting, an unidentified group is circulating a press release claiming that those in favor of cockfighting are using the Internet to harass and target animal rights activists who supported the measure.
"Taking a page from the anti-abortion movement’s book on terrorism, Arizona cockfighters have posted a list of animal activists’ names at a website on the Internet," the press release claims.
Antiabortion terrorism? Try animal rights terrorism. Assuming the press release is accurate, these people are doing to animal rights activists exactly what the activists have been doing to medical researchers, fur farmers and others for years. Animal rights activists regularly post to the Internet the names and phone numbers of medical researchers, journalists who write disapproving articles, fur farmers and others.
This is what happens when social movements self-righteously believe they are so obviously correct that they may break the law with impunity and attack indiscriminately both persons and property who get in their way. Officials with animal rights organizations such People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals issue fawning press releases and articles defending the activities of groups such as the Animal Liberation Front, but animal rights activists are the first ones to cry foul when their tactics are turned back on them.
Not that I support taking direct action against animal rights activists. As I have said before, the main thing that such direct action does is discredit animal rights activists in the eyes of most Americans. The reaction to the recent destruction of more than $12 million in property at Vail proved that point. Even those local environmentalist and activists who opposed the new Vail development condemned the action and the attack did more than anything to unite that community behind the ski resort. Engaging in direct action against animal rights activists only risks giving them sympathy on a potentially national stage that they simply don’t deserve.
Source:
Cockfighters use Internet to target animal activists. Citizens Again Cockfighting, Press Release, November 6, 1998.