BiteBack’s Interview with Rik Scarce, Author of ECO-WARRIORS

First published in 1990, Eco-Warriors has just been newly re-published.

[excerpt from Eco-Warriors:]

“As Eco-Warriors was first published in 1990, I had just begun my Ph.D. studies in sociology at Washington State University. I planned a dissertation that would build on my knowledge of radical environmentalism developed through researching and writing my book, and I maintained contact with several of the activists I got to know over the previous years. One of them was Rod Coronado, who ended up housesitting for my family while we traveled to the East Coast in 1991.

We returned to find that the ALF had broken into a research facility at WSU, freeing some coyotes and making away with several mink and mice. Computers were destroyed, and the damage totaled $100,000. Months later, Coronado was named a suspect in the raid, and in May 1992 I was subpoenaed to appear before a federal grand jury. Believing I had spoken with those involved in the break-in, the government wanted me to testify about what it thought I knew.

Eventually I ended up in a federal courtroom, where I insisted to the judge that if I had spoken with the activists involved in the WSU raid, everything they told me was protected by a promise of confidentiality that I, as a researcher akin to a journalist, would not reveal the names of those with whom I spoke or what they said to me. My interviews, if any (I never admitted to that point), were protected under the Constitution's free press clause. The government was equally adamant that Coronado was only my friend, that it was impossible for us to have a professional, researcher-subject relationship. Ultimately, two federal courts ruled that I had to testify. My only option was to go to jail.

Years later, my grand jury experience seems surreal. The only people in the room besides me were one or more prosecutors, twenty-three grand jurors, and a court reporter. No judge. No attorney representing me. It was a grand inquisition. But for the fact that the grand jury is mentioned in the Constitution, you would think it would be outlawed as antithetical to the U.S. justice system.

When the prosecutors began asking questions, I answered a number of them because doing so wouldn't make me divulge my sources. But it was my sources the government was after, and I ultimately refused to answer more than 30 of its questions. My sealed lips prompted the judge to find me in "contempt of court." Contempt is its own class of crime, neither felony nor misdemeanor. I was never read my Miranda rights. Never arrested, tried, or convicted, when I still refused to answer those questions, the judge jailed me. For 159 days. Only when the judge gave up hope that I would testify further to the grand jury was I released, and I never did answer the prosecutors’ questions.

Ultimately, no one was prosecuted for the WSU break-in, though three others besides me were also held in contempt. The FBI listed Coronado as among its “most wanted.” He was finally captured in 1994 and sentenced to 57 months in federal prison for crimes including involvement in an arson attach at Michigan State University—the first-ever federal ALF prisoner.”

THE INTERVIEW

Bite Back: You spent 159 days in the Spokane County Jail. How important was the support you received during your time in jail?

Rik Scarce: Support was very important to me in several ways. First, knowing that people knew about my case was a big deal to me, since I was a political prisoner—their letters confirmed that the word was out about my case. Second, knowing that people cared meant that I wasn’t alone, nor was my family. Third, people told me what I did really mattered to them—they didn’t just care about me but about issues like freedom of the press as well. Finally, just hearing from people was a great distraction and helped the time go by quicker.

BB: At the time of your jailing in 1993, Jonathan Paul had just been released after spending five months in jail for refusing to talk before an Oregon grand jury, and federal agents were on the hunt for Rod Coronado. Here we are, almost 15 years later, and Rod Coronado and Jonathan Paul (among many other activists) are again the targets of federal prosecution. Has anything changed over the years in how the government targets the radical animal rights and environmental movements?

RS: Well, one thing hasn’t changed: Rod and Jonathan and others are still as passionate about their beliefs as ever! I don’t care what the cause is, it takes a huge amount of devotion to stick with it for so long, especially when activists tend to burn out a lot faster than Rod and Jonathan have.

As for what has changed, well, the laws have gotten even more draconian. My attorney told me after the first federal “animal terrorism” legislation was signed into law, “It’s a mark of a fascistic government when it adds laws outlawing acts that are already outlawed.” Laws like those that have been passed at the federal and state level are really disturbing. They’re unnecessary and are created for political purposes only, with no sense of justice or proportion. Their only purpose is intimidation and oppression.

Then there’s September 11. Since then, the radical environmental movement has been identified as the nation’s foremost domestic terror threat. They’re talking about small, diffuse bands of people and individuals who have never killed or physically harmed anyone, but they’re major terror threats? Amazing how quickly the government forgets about racist and homophobic groups that exist to hurt other human beings.

BB: You’ve been ordered several times to appear before grand juries. Do you have any advice for activists when faced with a subpoena?

RS: First, get an attorney. Actually, first, when they come knocking and haven’t shown you the subpoena, don’t say a thing. When they subpoenaed me the first time, I had no idea it was coming. A cop and an FBI agent chatted me up for an hour. I didn’t say much—they were pretty wound up as I recall and did most of the talking themselves—and at the end, BAM!, here came the subpoena. So, first, don’t say a thing.

Second, get an attorney. It was a big deal to me to be told by a friend shortly after I was subpoenaed, “Well, you need a criminal defense attorney.” “I need a WHAT?” You’ve done nothing wrong but you need someone expert in defending you! Next to the subpoena itself, that fact was the biggest wake-up call for me. It was further affirmation that I had moved up to the big leagues (and I had never “played” this “game” even at the Little League level before—I’d never been involved with the law).

Attorneys well versed in grand jury work know the angles. To them, and to the prosecutors, it’s all a game. There’s strategy, tactics, playing pieces (you’re a pawn, by the way), rules. Geeze, are there rules! You cannot possibly pick up the game on your own, not from where you sit. Get an attorney, even if you don’t plan on saying a thing to the grand jury. You need to know how not to talk—that’s part of the game.

BB: In investigating ALF actions against the fur industry in the early 90s, the federal government subpoenaed dozens of people. Then, as in the grand juries that have been convened since, the majority of activists refused to cooperate, and we don’t know of a single case when imprisonment convinced an activist to testify. Why do you think the government still uses grand juries against us?

RS: Defense attorneys say, “A prosecutor could get a grand jury to indict a ham sandwich for murder” (sorry, all you vegans out there!). That metaphor tells you all you need to know. Grand juries have become prosecutorial lap dogs. I think I was asked one question by a grand juror, and it wasn’t even a question—it didn’t take question form, just a statement—and I sat there and didn’t respond to it. The grand jurors don’t really matter much.

But grand juries are the government’s ideal prosecutorial tool. They can use hearsay to hand-down an indictment—hell, they can use illegally-obtained evidence, not that there’s much of a distinction between the legally- and the illegally-obtained in the post-Patriot Act era. They’re the mailed fist, the giant’s club, the nuclear weapon in the government’s arsenal. And they figure if they keep lobbing nukes at social movement activists, eventually the explosion will create their kind of havoc.

BB: In Eco-Warriors, you explain that groups like Earth First! were born from activists frustrated with “the failure of compromise.” In recent years, the mainstream animal rights movement has been pragmatic—for example, pushing cage-free eggs, and more humane methods of slaughter. How do you explain the continued faith in compromise?

RS: Compromise is the cornerstone of the American political system. Well, that’s what they teach in Poli Sci 101. It’s not, of course. What have the Republicans compromised on in the last few years? They’re in complete control, and fuck you if you don’t like it. They have no sense that anyone else, any other point of view, is relevant or should be taken into consideration. Look at how they’ve rolled back our already weak environmental laws. And we’re talking about the tiny distinction between Republican and Democrat; any political group outside of that little sliver doesn’t even have a seat at the table.

So I think it’s naïve to argue that the “no compromise” ethic has no place in American politics. It IS American politics today. The thing is, when radical environmentalists espouse no compromise, they’re espousing political positions that are so far outside of the generally accepted norm that they’re easily dismissed. That’s what happens when Earth First! or the ALF uses that slogan—“Oh, that’s just the wilderness (or animal) freaks.” Extreme movements have always been treated that way. They’ve been dismissed and, when they created enough of a ruckus, the attention they received was of the oppressive sort.

But it’s one thing for the Quakers or the Shakers to be put down. They weren’t talking about the future of the planet. Radical environmentalists are, and I’ve always felt that ignoring their message is something society does to its immense peril. Now we are seeing that even hardened anthropocentrists are admitting that it will take extreme measures to stop global climate change—the measures Earth First! called for twenty years ago. They’re seeing that people are dying from the poisons in the massive amounts of animal products they’re eating, and now they have to do something.

Mainstream society lives through self-interest, and that fact is a major reason why environmentalists and animal advocates are so foreign to the culture. Saving the planet and fighting for animals is about “the other,” about something that this society uses and abuses and doesn’t think twice about.

But now society’s no compromise ethic is coming to roost. Society has been forcing the planet to compromise for a long time. It was never compromise in a meaningful sense, of course. Industrial society took and the environment paid. But the environment kept an account book, and now the bill is coming due. This society seems to only award self-interest, and it only expects us to act in some other way when the need for doing so is staring us in the face. That lack of deep, communal ethics and of foresight is a tragic thing—it means the bill paying takes a greater human, environmental, and economic toll.

BB: In Eco-Warriors, you present a group of hunt-saboteurs trying to protect elk from trophy hunters in California as examples of a “new” type of activist who moves between the environmental and animal rights movements. Do you see potential for more alliances between the animal rights and environmental movements, and links with other social justice movements?

RS: Some, especially among the old guard of Earth First!, really got angry at me for asserting that radical environmentalists and animal liberationists shared a lot of common ground, but I didn’t know I was saying anything unique. I just looked around and wrote about what I was seeing and being told. It was there in the Earth First! Journal and around the Earth First (and animal rights) campfires. Activists were making the connections between the movements themselves.

So the alliances happen through individual actions and through cross-communicating concerns and ideas. It is very rare that a wilderness concern cannot also be seen as an animal rights concern. The usual distinction is that one emphasizes ecology and the other emphasizes individual rights and pain, but those matters are rarely black-and-white.

As for the links with other social justice movements, I think you’re getting at the most exciting thing happening in social movements period. Ever since the Seattle WTO protests, activists have found affinities with one another, and they’re building alliances. Not everyone will be comfortable in those alliances; for instance small dairy farmers are victims of globalization and have become a part of what’s simply called The Movement. But neither radical wilderness advocates (because they don’t like cows where there should be wild animals) nor animal rights advocates (because they eschew animal products) feel great about those connections. What to do? The Movement seems to be of such strength and mutual good will and understanding that a lot of folks are overlooking potential divisions and focusing on the massive, powerful threats that unite these groups rather than emphasize what divides them.

BB: In the updated edition of Eco-Warriors, you argue that radical activists continue to be relevant, “The radicals’ warning screams from wilderness treetops and laboratory torture chambers call us to issues that otherwise would go unnoticed.” But you also write, “Things have only gotten worse for the planet.” Are you optimistic about the future?

RS: No, I’m not optimistic. There aren’t enough radicals, enough educators demanding that society give back. There aren’t enough activists taking to the streets to join together in creating the “power relationship” that David Brower—the Sierra Club’s first executive director and a very reluctant compromiser—saw was the only way to right environmental wrong.

Nope, we’re heading down what I think will be a surprisingly short and violent and steep slope to a new and very unpleasant future for humanity and for the planet. The climate has changed too much—and will continue to—the destruction of habitats has gone so far, the pollutants are too widespread, and the powerful are so arrogant that I think we’re at the edge. We’ll fall over it in the next decade or so. I honestly don’t dwell on it much. I don’t like apocalypse. But we in the U.S., and in the West (and in China and India) do not have the leadership to even soften the landing. We’re past the time of turning away from the precipice. The crash will not be pretty.

BB: What excites you about the animal rights movements today? Is there anything that concerns you?

RS: I guess I have lots more concerns than positive points to dwell on. I’ve always been uneasy about “direct action” in its newer, exclusively destructive sense. It fascinated me when I was writing Eco-Warriors. I mean, destroying property and risking serious prison time on behalf of animals or ecosystems—it’s an amazing ethical leap, an amazingly telling moment in human history. But neo-direct action increasingly frustrates me. I do think direct action is important, but it’s the old-style that gets me excited—it’s civil disobedience, illuminating people about the immorality of some social group.

Animal liberation’s rhetoric has gone beyond simply pointing out the immorality of how society uses animals to its political and economic sides as well, and I think that development is really important. But let’s keep in mind that other movements have done the same thing. Gandhi and King each identified the immorality of their opponents’ stances as what underlay the politics and the economics. The animal rights movement is a moral one, despite any other factors—even ecological ones—that might veneer that morality, and I think the movement has to ask harder questions about how to confront the immorality it opposes.

These questions have been argued over so much for so long by so many, but they can never be ignored. And there are other questions that need to be discussed more extensively, too: What has destructive direct action done for the movement? Has it garnered new adherents in sufficient numbers and promoted more widespread understanding of animal use and abuse? How many labs have been permanently shut down by raiding them? I know that many in the movement will point to the key issue being ending animals’ suffering, not gaining support for the movement, but can those two things be separated?

Finally, I think deeply committed activists can do more for their cause out of jail—or out of prison—than they can from the inside. (Jail is where they send you when you’ve been arrested for CD; prison is where you’re stuck for years when you’ve been convicted of arson.) It breaks my heart to think of the folks who are rotting in prison, people who love animals and love the land as deeply as they do. To return to my pessimism about the future, I think that a serious social debate over our relationship with the planet, and the serious, thoughtful action that only that kind of debate can bring about, is the only thing that might save the planet at this point.

BB: In the updated conclusion to Eco-Warriors, you mention some major events in the 15 years since the book first came out, including the Seattle WTO protests in 1999, Judi Bari and Darryl Cherney’s $4 million court victory against the FBI, the emergence of the Earth Liberation Front, and the arrival of SHAC in the U.S. What has been the significance of the SHAC campaign?

RS: Some aspects of the SHAC campaign are what I have in mind when I argue for the transformative power of open protest. Through picketing and leafleting and bringing attention to Huntingdon’s immoral behavior, people around the world have come to understand Huntingdon’s long reach and the complexities of the world of vivisection. So in that sense SHAC represents a break with much that came before it, and certainly it alters the recent trend line of exclusively destructive activities by the ALF.

There’s a lesson in that shift, I think, though I don’t know that it will be followed up on. It is that there are a lot of people out there who are deeply disturbed by vivisection and generally by Western societies’ cavalier use of animals. They are sympathetic to what the ALF says and much of what it does. They’re not reformers, but they’re not the revolutionaries who are willing to break the law, either—they can’t see themselves risking prison time. Where is their place in the animal liberation movement? My hope is that by openly protesting and by getting results, the movement will begin to turn toward the non-destructive path that I’m convinced will have the greatest long-term impact.

Those protests have gone on for years, now, as well, and that’s a remarkable development. Lasting change is like that, unfortunately: it takes time. Time translates to more physical and emotional pain, I know, but if it results in deep, permanent changes and raises awareness to new levels, it’s worth it. It actually slows and potentially stops the killing.

One other notable thing about SHAC is its global reach. I’m back to The Movement when I say that: a worldwide effort to take back our lives by fighting oppression in all of its forms. It began in Seattle and it’s growing daily. I don’t know whether SHAC activists see themselves as part of The Movement or not, but they’re definitely demonstrating the power of, and the need for, that kind of a global reach.

BB: You claim that some of the tactics used in the campaign against Huntingdon Life Sciences “are among the most controversial of any pursued by radical environmentalists.” From your perspective, what has been the impact of “controversial” tactics?

RS: As for the controversial tactics—such as implying in anonymous notices that individuals, and not just their property, would be attacked—I think that such rhetoric, even if it’s not followed-through with, is damaging to any social movement. I find the implication or threat that a person will be harmed by animal rights activists to be hypocritical and highly destructive to the movement. The hypocrisy comes in treating the vivisectors as if they were the animals, objects to be mistreated, abused, and perhaps even killed. Any claim to the moral high ground is lost when people write, much less say, such things.

And how could the movement possibly benefit from those sorts of tactics—how could the animals benefit? We see massive state action against people who destroy property and against movements that advocate those sorts of tactics. What do you think would happen if a person so much as got scratched by an animal liberator?

BIO

Rik Scarce is Associate Professor of Sociology at Skidmore College. He is the author of Eco-Warriors: Understanding the Radical Environmental Movement (Left Coast Press, 2006), Contempt of Court: A Scholar’s Battle for Free Speech from Behind Bars (Alta Mira Press, 2005) and Fishy Business: Salmon, Biology, and the Social Construction of Nature (Temple University Press, 2000). Currently, he is working on a socio-ecological history of the Hudson River.

Thanks to Biteback for permission to republish.