Around the globe, communities are seeing the rise of authoritarianism driven by corporate interests in the form of anti-terrorism bills, laws, and regulations. In the United States, we saw (and continue to see) deliberate efforts to use anti-terrorism as a way of silencing those who challenge capitalism. In addition to the Patriot Act, which enacted after the 9/11 attacks in New York City, made changes to surveillance laws that made it easier for the government to spy on ordinary Americans by expanding the authority to monitor phone and email communications, collect bank and credit reporting records, and track the activity of innocent Americans on the Internet. They also created the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act which labeled and charge anyone who created economic damage or interfered with the operations of an animal enterprise a terrorist. This means animal rights activist across the board became suspect because the law was so vague it allowed animal enterprise the power to ‘prove’ an activist caused damaged to their business/enterprise. This put a chilling effect on the entire movement in the U.S. and sending several people to federal prison for simple acts such as running a website that focused on an animal testing lab. (See Shac 7) We can see similar actions taken by the government around the world, in Brazil, in Germany, in China, just to name a few. Recently, the Philippines just passed an anti-terrorist law, known as The Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020. The law was signed by President Rodrigo Duterte on July 3, 2020 and effectively replaced the Human Security Act of 2007 on July 18, 2020. This law’s intent law is to prevent, prohibit, and penalize terrorism in the Philippines. Just like all of the terrorist laws in other countries, this one is also so vague in it’s language that it gives the government the power to treat anyone as a terrorist and will be used silence and target dissent. This video has been created by a group of people in the Philippines, known as Local Autonomous Network (LAN), to document what is happening and to call for international solidarity and shared with A Radical Guide to help raise awareness and support around this issue. No matter where we are in the world, we are in this together and will stand together to dismantle these oppressive systems of capitalism and colonialism.
