| Some people need to be frightened by the way they live their lives.
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Lobo Siete Truenos (shaman)
The early months of 2008 have seen a major spike in underground
direct action, perhaps driven by increasing repression of known animal
rights activists by US law enforcement at the behest of affected industry.
Accordingly, support of the Press Office has flourished, and Press Officers
continue to conduct dozens of interviews with the mainstream media,
providing the animals' side of the story in news articles and accounts,
deliver inspirational and informative talks all over the world, and hopefully
inspire many more people to join the struggle against those who abuse,
exploit, torture, and murder non-human animals. There have been those who have criticized the Press Office for reporting
on, and refusing to condemn direct action taken on the behalf of animal
liberation that harmed or threatened to harm human beings. Not innocent
humans but those complicitous in the torture, enslavement and murder of
non-human animals. The Press Office has tried to maintain the perspective
not of the privileged, predominantly white participants who so commonly
make up the soldiers in the struggle for animal liberation, but that of other
historical movements that seek to end the obscenity and egregious
violence perpetrated on innocent victims. Other struggles, including the
fight against apartheid in South Africa, the fight to free black slaves here in
the US and the fight for the rights of indigenous cultures, have not had the
luxury or the option of avoiding the use of physical force to protect themselves, and have always used reciprocal violence as one tool in an
arsenal of tactics to alleviate oppression. In a battle for the moral and
ethical high ground, in the fight on behalf of the animals, the most
oppressed, abused and tortured beings the world has ever known, the
possibility of further human casualties exists.
Indeed, many animal rights
campaigners have already been killed in the struggle. We do not
encourage or call for the killing of (non-innocent) human beings, only state
that we believe it may be part of the struggle for animal liberation, just as it
has been an important factor in every other successful, and no less
important, liberation struggle.
Thus far, the animal rights movement is and has been the most peaceful
and restrained movement the world has ever known considering the
amount of terror, abuse and murder perpetrated upon innocent animals for
greed and profit. If by chance violence is used by those who fight for non-
human sentient beings, it must be looked at in perspective and in historical
context.
For the animals:
The Press Office
Never be afraid to do what's right, especially if the well-being of a
person or animal is at stake. Society's punishments are small
compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the
other way. ~~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
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Press Office Directive: The North American Animal Liberation Press
Office (NAALPO) was founded to communicate the actions, strategies,
and philosophy of the animal liberation movement to the media and the
public. Many of these actions are illegal under a current societal structure
that fails to recognize the rights of non-human animals to live free of
suffering, but validates and promotes the "right" of industries to do
whatever they want to animals for profit or research. Within these
conditions, those in the underground working for animal liberation often
cannot speak out directly. Nevertheless, their actions and message is
urgent and deserve to be heard and understood. Since animal liberation
actions either go unreported in the media or are uncritically vilified as "violent" and as "terrorist" with no attention paid to the suffering that
industries and individuals gratuitously inflict on animals, NAALPO seeks
to clarify the motivation and nature of actions taken in defense of animals.
The Press Office also tries to provide a historical, social, and
philosophical context for an objective understanding of the nature and
motivation of illegal direct actions taken on behalf of captive animals.
Are you or someone you know looking for a provocative, educational
speaker on the issue of animal liberation? Our Press Officers are available
to speak to groups of three to three thousand- just call, write or e-mail and
we’ll do our level-best to meet your needs.
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