Hi everybody,

Since it seems like such a quiet week here in enviroethics land, I thought
I'd stir up some more trouble.  :-)   But I promise, no Unabomber
references here.

Maria Stella wrote:
>this list, despite its name, seems to have been designed  as a
>subtle and open corporate propaganda with an academic face, against
>environmetnalism.
>There is no other way to explain why the so-called "eco-terrorists" are
>the only ones mentined, leaving corporate and state terrorism away from
>attention.  If this is not sheer propaganda, then what is it?
>Indeed all innocent and honest opinions should be heared, even the ones we
>don't like, but are they really innocent and honest?

I was particularly interested to read Maria's post, and I wholeheartedly
agree that "state terrorism" is a topic worthy of the list's attention.  I
share her sense of moral outrage at the (unnamed) members of this list who
seemingly ignore this important topic on a daily basis.  (What's wrong with
you people?)  <grin> I hope to begin rectifying this situation with this
post.

A friend of mine recently forwarded me a link to a report done on fur
farming and trapping (see "Fur and Freedom: in defence of the fur trade,"
by Richard North, With a Foreword by Roger Scruton, at
http://www.iea.org.uk/wpapers/fur.htm ), and I was surprised to read in
Roger Scruton's foreward to the report that "the government has announced,
through the recent Queen's Speech, that it intends to ban fur-farming in
this country."  It occurs to me that this statement of the government's
intentions with regard to the fur industry must surely qualify as an
example of state terrorism.

Particularly of interest in light of some of our recent discussions about
hating the rich is the following paragraph in Scruton's foreward:  ".  .  .
one might conclude that the RSPCA - or at least its campaigning arm - does
not in fact care about mink at all. It has merely conceived a hatred, first
for those who wear fur, secondly for those who follow hounds (mink-hounds
included).  On the mistaken view that fur-wearers and hunt followers are
both toffs, and that toffs ought to be persecuted, you might just begin to
see sense in this combination of attitudes. But it is surely not the basis
for wise or humane legislation."

As a not-for-profit corporation, the RSPCA here seems to me to be
conducting a campaign of corporate terrorism, much as Maria describes in
her recent post, that is aimed at a class of people who are here being
singled out as toffs and who are subsequently being unfairly discriminated
against.  Such "toffism" on the part of the RSPCA is intolerable, and it is
a shame that such blatantly toffist policies toward mink trappers and fur
farmers is not being discussed on this list.  Where are any comments on
RSPCA-related ethics?  Where is the sense of moral outrage?

>It seems that this list is not really willing to challenge any state or
>corporate form of terrorism, and this raises specific and
>general (for other lists) suspicions as to what some
>contributors really want to achieve by fishing people's opinions.
>E.g., why is Monsanto's GM terrorism (conveyed indeed as a threat to the
>environment etc etc and also as a reality) not discussed in this list?
>Where are any comments on WTO-related ethics?
>Why this obsession with ONLY corporate-interesting issues - people that
>threaten the welfare of corporations, rather than the opposite?

I agree with Maria that the time has come to challenge the state on this
issue of banning fur farming.  Why is there not an uproar in Britain over
this authoritarian attempt to shut down an entire industry devoted to
wholesome animal husbandry?  What is this if not ecoterrorism, and where
are the comments from this list? Some members speak as if they were paid by
not-for-profit environmental corporations for promotion of their goals
indeed.  Even if they don't they feed these environmental corporations with
'academically' laced arguments.

And as Scruton wryly observes, "The decision that a trade should be
criminalised, without any proof of its immorality or any suggestion that it
is socially divisive or environmentally destructive, and only because a
pressure group has said so, is a novel departure in English government."
That "novel departure" sounds like state terrorism to me . . . .

>When one watches the sociological dynamics of this list from outside for a
>long time, there are very important conclusions that one can make, as to
>who, distort, paraphrase, monopoplize, etc, and what they
>may represent. In theory, and why not in practice, any
>list involving politically sensitive topics is the most obvious place
>for "THink Tanks" to monitor people's opinions so as to form the proper
>arguments for further propaganda. Some list members could well be staff of
>these "think tanks". Even if this is not so, and this obsession with
>particular subjects is innocent and totally accidental,  we could all be
>members of a
>big cyber-experiment where we are being watched as goldfish in a bowl by
>just anybody. Perhaps the freedom of Internet communications has a price
>after all.

Aha! it's one big conspiracy on the list . . . .  the (again unnamed)
"greenies" must be supplying the environmental "Think Tanks" with arguments
as part of a big cyber-experiment in environmental propaganda.  Whew!
that's a relief.  At least now we know what's going on behind the scenes on
the enviroethics list.  :-)

Well, seriously now everyone, the North report on the fur industry at least
makes for *very* interesting reading, and Roger Scruton's foreward alone is
worth the price of admission.  I'll include it here to give people a taste
of the report.  Scruton writes:

"Foreword

	"Nobody has succeeded in explaining why it is wrong to farm animals
for their fur, but acceptable to farm them for their meat, or why the
wearing of fur-coats is so heinous compared with the wearing of leather
shoes. For some years, nevertheless, groups which claim to speak for
'animal rights' have been campaigning for a ban, and it is presumably not
insignificant that one such group - the Political Animal Lobby - made a
large donation to the Labour Party before the last election. In any case,
the government has announced, through the recent Queen's Speech, that it
intends to ban fur-farming in this country. It is wrong to take cash for
questions, but OK to take cash for policies.
	"The muddle in which we find ourselves as a result of the movement
for 'animal rights' is well illustrated by the RSPCA, one of the
campaigning groups which is opposed to fur-farming. A circular recently
came round from that organisation telling all members to write to the Prime
Minister supporting his policy to ban hunting with dogs. I was mildly
astonished to discover that the animal illustrated as the heart-stopping
beneficiary of this humane initiative was not a bright little fox-cub, but
a mink, its lethal incisors bared, and its close-set evil eyes clearly
focused on some enemy - presumably one of those sanctimonious RSPCA
inspectors who make even gentle old ladies bare their fangs. The circular
told us that the use of dogs to hunt mink is unacceptable, and recommended
instead that the animals be caught in traps, and subsequently dispatched
(presumably after a day or so of leisurely retirement behind bars) by a
humane killer.
	"At the same time, the RSPCA's ostensible reason for opposing the
fur trade is that it is intolerable to mink to be trapped behind bars.
Putting the two campaigns together one might conclude that the RSPCA - or
at least its campaigning arm - does not in fact care about mink at all. It
has merely conceived a hatred, first for those who wear fur, secondly for
those who follow hounds (mink-hounds included). On the mistaken view that
fur-wearers and hunt followers are both toffs, and that toffs ought to be
persecuted, you might just begin to see sense in this combination of
attitudes. But it is surely not the basis for wise or humane legislation.
	"As Richard North demonstrates, the arguments against the fur trade
are entirely spurious, and would, if valid, rule out the trades in beef,
pork, poultry, eggs and leather, not to speak of cat-gut and neat's foot
oil. The decision that a trade should be criminalised, without any proof of
its immorality or any suggestion that it is socially divisive or
environmentally destructive, and only because a pressure group has said so,
is a novel departure in English government. That the decision should come
at a time when Parliament has become ostentatiously permissive in all
matters pertaining to traditional morality, suggests that we are passing
through a period of unusual hypocrisy, in which morality has become a
matter of fashionable posturing rather than a submission to conscience.
	"All who are concerned about the interface between morality and
politics should read this pamphlet, which explores the way in which humans
feed their dislike of other humans by sentimentalizing other species. It
reminds us that we should be thankful that animals do not have rights; for
this means that some of the living beings we encounter are not
self-righteous prigs.

Professor Roger Scruton

Malmesbury, January 2000"
from http://www.iea.org.uk/wpapers/fur.htm

I submit that the banning of fur farming and the banning of fur trapping
and fur hunting could be thought of as a form of (state+corporate)
Eco-terrorism too and that the banning of these activities affects or
threatens to affect each and everyone of us.

Jim T.


>
>Agent Orange, DDT etc, Nuclear Power, Depleted Uranium bomps, Human Bovine
>Hormone and much of Genetic Engineering and greenhouse gasses could be
>thought as a form of (state+corporate) Eco-terrorism too as they affect
>or threaten to affect each and everyone of us.
> Any "ecoterrorist"
>activity that has been mentioned here, including the Unabomber, is pale
>and minimal compared to the fact that right now we all have agrochemicals
>floating in our fatty tissues just because some wanted to make money.
>On Sunday i decided, after ~6 years in the UK, to dear to swim in the
>river Thames. People only asked me if i am still alive. Then i found out
>that Tritium is "legally" being disposed off in the river Pang, one of the
>most beautiful tributaries to the Thames. One day after, Greenpeace
>discovered and photographed corroding barrels of radioactive waste in the
>English Channel (in which i have frequently swam). Huge amounts, shoved to
>the channel in the 60s. But it keeps on up to an extent today.
>
>If this is not Ecoterrorism, what is it? And in any case, why doesn't
>anyone speak about it in this list, but find it easier to crucify the
>Unabomber? (by the way i dont' see why he shoudl be mentally ill,
>although he could well be. Anyone with a
>trace of sensitivity  in this society would not find his motivations
>irrational, despite the fact that his actions were hair raising- we know
>now much more hair raising stuff anyway to originate from more official
>and 'sane' sources and with crazily much more victims).
>
>It seems that this list is not really willing to challenge any state or
>corporate form of terrorism, and this raises specific and
>general (for other lists) suspicions as to what some
>contributors really want to achieve by fishing people's opinions.
>E.g., why is Monsanto's GM terrorism (conveyed indeed as a threat to the
>environment etc etc and also as a reality) not discussed in this list?
>Where are any comments on WTO-related ethics?
>Why this obsession with ONLY corporate-interesting issues - people that
>threaten the welfare of corporations, rather than the opposite?
>
>I think it was through this list that i read what is Monsanto doing right
>now
>to a US farmer: The farmer has found GM rape in his rape field (he was
>breeding rape for 30 years). He sued Monsanto. Then Monsanto sued him for
>"stealing" "their" rape and claimed all his harvest value. The farmer said
>that beside his field GM rape seed is flying around by the tones, due to
>the wind, when the fields are sown.
>Then, "accidentally", GM rape is forced to be "by mistake" sown to Europe,
>in the hope perhaps that once Europeans suspect that now the GM genes can
>be anywhere and there is no point in stopping GMO farming, their
>resistance
>will cease. What is this if not ecoterrorism, and where are the comments
>from this list? Some members speak as if they were paid by corporations
>for promotion of their goals indeed. Even if they don't they feed
>corporations with 'academically' laced arguments
>
>According to the (of Bible significance perhaps book)  "Global Spin"
>by Sharon Beder, corporate attacking of individuals with vain litigation
>is an acknowledged corporate strategy aiming to cease any protests by
>demoralization and financial excaustion.
> In this case it is of course obvious.
>What is not so obvious, is that many newsgroups, mailbase lists etc etc,
>could very well be fields of observation and data collection of corporate
>and state eyes, and of course fields of propaganda masked as innocent
>opinions, dillemas and questions. That's why some cannot stand the list,
>despite the fact that it has an extremely worthwhile and sophisticated
>cast of members. When Europa satellite is bombarded with Plutonium, nobody
>thinks it is a worthwhile topic of marginal concern. So goes for Sebia and
>Iraq bombarding with depleted Uranium, polluting giants (e.g. Sellafield
>etc), etc etc.
>When one watches the sociological dynamics of this list from outside for a
>long time, there are very important conclusions that one can make, as to
>who, distort, paraphrase, monopoplize, etc, and what they
>may represent. In theory, and why not in practice, any
>list involving politically sensitive topics is the most obvious place
>for "THink Tanks" to monitor people's opinions so as to form the proper
>arguments for further propaganda. Some list members could well be staff of
>these "think tanks". Even if this is not so, and this obsession with
>particular subjects is innocent and totally accidental,  we could all be
>members of a
>big cyber-experiment where we are being watched as goldfish in a bowl by
>just anybody. Perhaps the freedom of Internet communications has a price
>after all.
>I hope you can see that i am not covered by the message below, but i have
>to remark that it includes a solid opinion of what's unethical, which is
>an extremely rare event in this list.
>
>
> Maria-Stella
>


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