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FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794
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Posted on 01/17/2003 5:19:13 PM PST by SierraWasp
Fresno State plans conference on tactics of environmental activists.
By Jim Steinberg
The Fresno Bee (Published Friday, January 17, 2003, 7:46 AM)
A scheduled conference on revolutionary environmentalism next month at Fresno State has prompted Clovis police to advise concerned car dealers to consider hiring extra security. California State University, Fresno, emphasizes that the Feb. 13-14 conference is designed to consider the phenomenon of environmentalists' increasingly militant tactics, not to advocate those tactics.
The university describes the conference as an examination of "a growing movement toward 'direct action' tactics, such as arson and property destruction, by environmental and animal-rights activists."
The fact of those tactics "prompts a need for debate, discussion and an academic analysis of these trends," the university says.
Environmentalists have protested such things as sport utility vehicles, saying they use too much fuel and pollute the air. In a couple of cases, environmental groups took responsibility for setting fire to car dealerships.
An announcement from the university says faculty members will hold "an academic seminar on 'Revolutionary Environmentalism: A Dialogue Between Activists and Academics.' "
The university's Political Science Department organized the gathering, "and invited selected academic and activist representatives ... for dialogue within the university community."
At least some in the nearby Fresno and Clovis auto community fear that the gathering could spawn property damage along Shaw Avenue or elsewhere.
University officials say some of the environmentalists who will be visiting have been arrested during protests.
Clovis police Sgt. Tom Tucker said police cannot be on all car lots 24 hours a day.
"If I'm a car dealer, I recognize that police can't be everywhere at once. So I hire a set of eyes for $7 an hour to call police if there is a problem," he said.
Bill Hedrick of Hedrick's Hallowell Chevrolet, near the university on Shaw Avenue, said Clovis police told his dealership "we should add security."
The general manager of another Shaw Avenue dealership declined use of her name, but said Clovis police had called all dealers. The police told this dealership "we are beefing up patrols and recommend that you hire guard service," the general manager said.
"I'm so angry," she said. "Why are they doing this? They said for educational services. Are they educating college students to be terrorists?"
Michael Dunlap, interim Fresno State police chief, said his department has shared information about the conference with the Fresno and Clovis police departments and the Fresno County Sheriff's Department.
"We are keeping them aware of what we are visiting upon them," he said.
"Folks are coming here who have an agenda."
Still, Dunlap said he understands the university is motivated by scholarly examination.
Ellen Gruenbaum, dean of Fresno State's College of Social Sciences, said conference organizers decided to close the event to the public: "They don't want to promote controversial ideas."
She said the conference will attract a wide range of environmentalists, including, but not limited to, those who employ extreme tactics.
Gruenbaum said such tactics can include sabotage and have become "a dangerous trend ... We think that as social scientists, we should be discussing what is happening."
The conference will feature discussion and debate among academics and activists, she said, identifying Mark Somma, who teaches political science at Fresno State, as a key organizer. Somma could not be reached to comment Thursday.
Guests scheduled to attend include Rik Scarce, author of "Eco-Warriors: Understanding the Radical Environmental Movement," and Rod Coronado, a speaker on animal rights and direct-action environmentalism and a former spokesman for the Animal Liberation Front. Others expected to attend: Kim Marks of EarthFirst!; James Leslie Pickering, former spokesman of Earth Liberation Front; Capt. Paul Watson, author of "Seal Wars: Twenty-five Years on the Front Lines with the Harp Seals" (with Martin Sheen); and Gary Yourofsky of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals.
The reporter can be reached at jsteinberg@fresnobee.com or 441-6311.
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FreeRepublic , LLC PO BOX 9771 FRESNO, CA 93794
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Just because they haven't been buying one-way tickets and taking flying lessons on how to take off, but not land... does that mean we just wait around for them to step over some line, or what? Where do these creeple people get OFF?
I'd really like to know!!!
You can hate me all you want for driving an SUV - two of them in fact. You damage my property and I'll damage you in a heart beat.
LVM
It's good to see signs of intelligent life expressing appropriate disgust and outrage at these seditious bastards!
Thanks Mac! If I were able to get to Fresno State University to FREEP this CRAPOLA, along with the local FBI office for not rounding them up, I would!!!
This is beyond outrageous... It's getting downright DANGEROUS!!! The Bee just calls them "activists!"
They're about as legitimate as "activists," as the PEW Research Center is a legitimate polling organization!
PEW POLLS STINK!!! THESE "ACTIVISTS," CUM TERRORISTS, STINK!!!
For years I swore my vechicles would be "bumper sticker" free. I changed that after CNN's little piece on "Yasser AraRat, the Warrior." Warrior? Anyway, I found a place that was giving away "CNNLIES" stickers. On two SUV's now.
Thinking about doing a weekly, monthly (?) theme of my own making for the back windows of my SUV's.
"Stop Terrorism - jail an Environmental Activist today!" might be a good start.
LVM
Yes they are.
Prior to the WTO riots in Seattle the Ruckus Action Network, part of EarthFirst! recruited from the local Jr. Colleges and Universities skulls full of mush volunteers to attend a camp in Snohomish, Washington, to learn how to be disruptors.
They taught the little bast@rds how to make urine bombs, fecal bombs, sit-in techniques, window breaking 101, graffiti slogans, etc. All of this was done with full knowledge of the local gendarmes. The leaders even made all the local talk shows bragging about their camp of destruction.
We need to get series about this issue.
There are a lot of those hanging around the Community colleges!
But we also have some good hardworking students!
Some heat ought to be applied to the College Administration and the Deans !
I agree. Up here they are overshadowed by the freaks.
"Some heat ought to be applied to the College Administration and the Deans !"
The problem schools, like Evergreen State , Seattle Central Community College need to fire all the administrators. They're bigger kooks than the troubled yutes that attend the schools
I love you havin two SUV's Mac! I saw clips from the latest Detroit auto show which included the new strain of "Muscle Cars" and a Cadillac with a V-16!!!
I can't wait for 'em to build the world tallest buildings on "Ground Zero!"
Arrogance? HELL YES!!! In their envious little contorted faces with it!!! Let 'em hate it!!! More power to 'em if they can match it, but to heck with 'em if they attack it!!!
There can be no "Ugly American" that can match the poisonous envy of the success hating anti-American, Enviro-terrorist or Middle Eastern terrorist pukes!!!
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