Recognizing the "Liberator" Agenda

When animal rights hoodlums such as the ALF raid an animal housing facility, they are not there primarily to free animals from confinement, or to "save" them from experimentation or slaughter. No. Such acts are meant to damage the businesses targeted, whether they be medical or pharmaceutical research labs, or poultry farms, fish pens, or mink or fox farms. There is no compassion for the animals on the part of the "liberators" who surely understand that their act of releasing the animals from confinement is a cruel, rather than a kind, act. Animals such as mink that have been confined all their lives are at least initially, helpless in the wild, and without food and shelter they will suffer and die over a considerable time period. They also have the potential to become environmental dangers as their unnatural introduction can cause harm to native species in the ecosystem. In the UK, mink have become predators of native birds, to the detriment of the countryside.

Primates and laboratory rats and mice cannot survive on their own and may additionally be disease vectors, having been part of long-term scientific research. The immediate result of the release of such animals is fear, pain and suffering on their part, whether they are hit in traffic, or cower in vegetation, not knowing how to fend for themselves. They are not "liberated" in the sense that they can usually go about finding food, shelter and mates as if they had been out all their lives in suitable habitats.

Recently, such an incident occurred in Norway, where the local ALF released 3500 mink from pens in a sneak attack. The owner and his neighbors were said to have recaptured 2000, and were shooting as many of the rest as possible, to prevent their suffering and to prevent any predation they might cause to other stock such as poultry or rabbits. The timing is significant; it is the season in which mink are commonly slaughtered for their pelts. The loss of breeding stock is also meant to damage the business. Breeding records are lost when animals are removed from numbered containers.

Let no one be persuaded that the ALF has ever acted out of compassion. They act out of a desire to harm people's livelihoods, to cause fear, and to gain media attention in order to raise public awareness that they are in the area and that people should be intimidated into giving up their livestock businesses. This is eco-terrorism, and it is every bit as unjustified in civil society as any other acts of vandalism, arson, or economic intimidation. IWMC wishes the Norwegian fur farmers well in their efforts to recover from this latest attack, and calls for anyone with information about this crime to contact the local authorities so that the perpetrators can be apprehended before they strike again.