Groups like Animal Liberation Front and Earth Liberation Front were all over the news in the late 90s and early 2000s, ALF was even considered number one domestic terrorist threat not that long ago, but now you barely hear about them. Any recent cases?
This isn’t a Cafe Society topic – I reported it for a forum change.
Thanks, it would probably fit better in General Questions.
[Moderating]
Moving to GQ.
And please, there is factual content to this question: Let’s keep the thread on that, and if you want to debate anything, start a GD thread for that.
It is a little tough to say the last time as Sea Shepherds interfering with the Whaling of Japan & Iceland is lumped in with Eco-Terrorism as is spiking old growth trees. The eco-terrorist acts in the US seemed to have faded out by 2010. At least in part due to FBI & the ATF.
There have been a few documented and several suspected.
In 2017, activists burned holes in the Dakota Access pipeline, and claimed responsibility for burning heavy equipment along the pipeline route.
In May of this year, several pieces of heavy machinery that was being used to clear trees in Hawaii were burned. I don’t think any group claimed responsibility, but it’s not a stretch to say the likely reason was a protest against the development and not a random act.
There are always a few controversial housing developments that burn down each year under suspicious circumstances during construction. Typically investigators are unable to determine if it was a protest against the development, some personal or random act, or an accident. But it’s again likely that at least some of these would fall under eco-terrorism.
There was an attempted* firebombing of a Kentucky Fried Chicken in March of 2015 that was being investigated as ALF linked. Someone spray painted “ALF” on their sign as part of the attack so the possible connection kind of suggested itself.
You can play around more with the advanced search of the global terrorism database at the START (National Consortium for STudy And Response to Terrorism) site. That was just what I found from searching a couple years back, in the US, with the perpetrators being ALF, ELF, or Earth First. There’s more digging that can be done. There’s certainly other affiliated or sympathetic extremist groups that could be searched on.
- “I thought you brought the matches?!?”
I don’t see any claims what happened at the pipeline was classified eco-terrorism.
The FBI defines eco-terrorism as “the use or threatened use of violence of a criminal nature against innocent victims or property by an environmentally-oriented, subnational group for environmental-political reasons, or aimed at an audience beyond the target, often of a symbolic nature.”
Burning holes and destroying equipment at the pipeline certainly meets the standard of violence against property. The women involved held a press conference to publicize their actions with the stated reason being to protest the pipeline (i.e., environmental-political reasons). They are members of a group (Iowa’s Catholic Worker social justice movement), and at least one other member applauded their efforts.
I assume your quibble is with “subnational group”, because this was two women, not one of the named groups like ELF or PETA. I would dispute that, because the “lone wolf” terrorist is still said to commit terrorism in most other contexts. What gets called a “group” is dependent on the interpretation and agenda of the person describing the act.