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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsDoD Training Manual: Protests are "Low-Level Terrorism"
...yeah, but I'm not worried about the NDAA...DoD Training Manual: Protests are "Low-Level Terrorism"
The Department of Defense is training all of its personnel in its current Antiterrorism and Force Protection Annual Refresher Training Course that political protest is "low-level terrorism."
The Training introduction reads as follows:
"Anti-terrorism (AT) and Force Protection (FP) are two facets of the Department of Defense (DoD) Mission Assurance Program. It is DoD policy, as found in DoDI 2000.16, that the DoD Components and the DoD elements and personnel shall be protected from terrorist acts through a high pirority, comprehensive, AT program. The DoD's AT program shall be all encompassing using an integrated systems approach."
The first question of the Terrorism Threat Factors, "Knowledge Check 1" section reads as follows:
Which of the following is an example of low-level terrorism activity?
Select the correct answer and then click Check Your Answer.
O Attacking the Pentagon
O IEDs
O Hate crimes against racial groups
O Protests
***
The "correct" answer is Protests.
The rest: http://open.salon.com/blog/dennis_loo/2009/06/14/dod_training_manual_protests_are_low-level_terrorism
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Newest Reality
(12,712 posts)What is underneath the mask is revealed as it is slowly peeled off.
Revealing. Shocking? Well, not if you find yourself connecting the dots. The system is poising itself to protect itself from us, not to necessarily protect us as we had assumed.
That's my POV.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,161 posts)
jwirr
(39,215 posts)threatened. Wish I could channel some of those old pre-WWII Germans and ask it they felt the way we do now. Did they see themselves being place in the role of enemy when what they really were was good citizens?
This also goes a long way in explaining why the police are treating Occupy the way they are. The 99% are the enemy. That is us.
BeHereNow
(17,162 posts)Protests over hate crimes?
BHN
Tierra_y_Libertad
(50,414 posts)L0oniX
(31,493 posts)
also I'm blind in one eye and that bug in your posts always gets me.
T S Justly
(884 posts)Boston_Chemist
(256 posts)Keeping the people terrified and cowed into submission.
BeHereNow
(17,162 posts)Sounds to me like they are weaving the net to reach as
far and wide as they want, when they want, to include who ever they want.
BHN
quakerboy
(14,868 posts)That does have some aspect of truth.
What was the goal of the Tea party gatherings where they brought and proudly displayed guns?
Even here on DU, as we talk about OWS, how often does someone say something about the 1% quaking in their boots?
Causing fear(low level terror) in the opponent.
Low level terrorism. Same as, for instance, a boycott of Target due to their anti-gay political donations. We hope to bring the fear that enough customers will leave to effect their bottom line. Truth is even if every DU member quit going there, it would hardly effect their bottom line, and certainly not the CEO's compensation. But if we can show strength they will fear that more might leave them, and change their ways.
That said, the suppression of nonviolent protest would go far past "low level terrorism". The way OWS has been treated, the way the Convention protestors were treated before them, that would go right to mid-level terrorism in my opinion(progression- nonviolent to harming someone, with people being killed as high level). The way that it has been handled by law enforcement officers has clearly been set out to intimidate, with the hope of terrorizing citizens into not exercising their rights to speech.
TBF
(36,670 posts)I don't recall seeing pepper spray being utilized ...
Well except for this one:
BeHereNow
(17,162 posts)bhn
themadstork
(899 posts)Political discord, boycotts, or suggesting that the wealthy elites may be worried about the security of their financial position in the midst of economic discontent - has the integrity our public discourse degraded such that we actually associate such acts with real terrorism?
I was talking to a couple of conservatives once that thought DDoS attacks could be construed as acts of terror. It got to the point that I began to think they might construe me looking at them in the wrong way as an act of terror.
'Terrorism' is used in a way nowadays that the term is almost completely disconnected from the way a serious historian, political scientist, or sociologist might use it.
coalition_unwilling
(14,180 posts)another person's freedom fighter.
Put another way, there's a damned good reason why the hottest selling t-shirt in Karachi in 2002-03 had a picture of Osama bin Laden on it. Hint: it wasn't that Karachi youth were on board with the Bush Junta's campaign.
I kid you not, if you look at U.S. government communciations from 1955-75, you will find them referring to the National Liberation Front (aka 'Viet Cong') as 'terrorists'.
And, to show I'm even-handed, the British referred to Jewish resistance like the Irgun Zwai Lum in Palestine pre-1947 as, you guessed it, 'terrorists'.
If patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel (Samuel Johnson), why then terrorism is that refuge's anteroom.
Odin2005
(53,521 posts)One of the high-level Federalists actually used the word "terrorism" to describe the activism of the D-Rs and their sympathy for the French Revolution, paving the way for the Alien and Sedition Acts.
coalition_unwilling
(14,180 posts)rhetorical deployment throughout history might go a long way to demystifying some of the mystical power it seems to possess.
Although I have my doubts. People (among them David Ray Griffin) have noted that 9-11 now has a 'sacred' quality to it that defies demystification. Even knowing that the coup that deposed Allende in Chile happened on September 11, 1973 does not dispel the sacred aura that has infused 9-11-2001. Oh well, we can only keep trying.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,161 posts)which is the word used in dozens of pieces of legislation which justifies indefinite detention and very forceful response by the militarized police.
The use of "terrorism" to define protesters is a way of indoctrinating police/military that citizens are the "enemy".
And a way to totally neutralize any concept of the right to protest.
quakerboy
(14,868 posts)and unfortunate.
They seem to have done a darn good job of indoctrinating the police that citizens are the enemy. Seeing as they are universally willing to treat us as such. Or at least there has not, to my knowledge, been a single case of any member of the police gang refusing to move on an occupy group, nor of a police officer stepping in to prevent a police officer assault on and occupier, nor of a police officer moving to arrest a police assaulter of an occupier.
BeHereNow
(17,162 posts)I do not see boycotts, the right to peaceful public assemblies to exercise free speech as anything even close to terrorism.
That's why I asked the question: "Who thought up that term to apply to protestors?"
Sorry, but I think this is another slip down the slippery slope, manufactured
by same folks who brought us the Patriot Acts. Designed to protect them-
not us.
BHN
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)And I wasn't always interested in politics, economics, and all that which affects us so much. However, even before I got interested in any of that, I did notice one thing about this country:
LOITERING LAWS.
Even before I was aware enough to see something wrong with these, I felt that the sole purpose of these was to allow law enforcement to keep people from congregating and protesting.
Now that I know better, I know I was right. This country's laws are designed to disallow people from protesting. They're designed to keep the system intact, and unchangeable. This is why the Occupy Movement is so important. America's people are so used to thinking of protests as illegal, that they actually get scared when they see protests. Even on DU I've read statements from Democrats who are afraid of such things.
We've got to get people realizing that the Constitution allows congregation and protest.
Fire Walk With Me
(38,893 posts)Isolate, Alienate, Deprive. Tools of deep negativity, of the predatory, of Bad Intelligence.
Sarah Ibarruri
(21,043 posts)That's why Occupy is so important to me. It does SO MANY things!
One of those things Occupy does, but which no one ever brings up, is that it gets Americans accustomed to the concept that protest is healthy, good, positive, not illegal, and is NECESSARY! It makes Americans aware of their rights. It makes people realize that this country belongs to them and they have the right to defend and protect it in real ways (not in fake ways, such as doing regime change around the globe). Occupy is vitally important.
Hell Hath No Fury
(16,327 posts)In fact, I have been one half my life. 
I think I need a t-shirt.
dixiegrrrrl
(60,161 posts)
mike_c
(37,051 posts)eom
I must be because I have a "We are the 99%" sticker in my car window.
Douglas Carpenter
(20,226 posts)indepat
(20,899 posts)action by any administration is "a'gin' us (those in power), hence is labeled the enemy and hence, a terrorist. 
Betty Karlson
(7,231 posts)Hang on, all ye meek people. You WILL inherit the earth.
sad sally
(2,627 posts)At what point do those luminaries start equating al-Qaeda supporters with, say, radical anti-capitalists in the Occupy movement? What exactly is the difference between such groups in the minds (excuse me, in what passes for the minds) of the people who run this country?
That difference seems to be getting smaller and smaller all the time, and such niceties as American citizenship and the legal tradition of due process seem to be less and less meaningful to the people who run things in America.
What does seem real to them is this “battlefield earth” vision of the world, in which they are behind one set of lines and an increasingly enormous group of other people is on the other side.
Here’s another way to ask the question: On which side of the societal fence do you think the McCains and Grahams would put, say, an unemployed American plumber who refused an eviction order from Bank of America and holed up with his family in his Florida house, refusing to move? Would Graham/McCain consider that person to have the same rights as Lloyd Blankfein, or is that plumber closer, in their eyes, to being like the young Muslim who throws a rock at a U.S. embassy in Yemen?
Read more: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/indefinite-detention-of-american-citizens-coming-soon-to-battlefield-u-s-a-20111209#ixzz1gNzWqycm?du
L0oniX
(31,493 posts)
G_j
(40,569 posts)
muriel_volestrangler
(106,212 posts)...oh shit ...
So, as a new 'low-level terrorist', do I now get thrown in Guantanamo's basement?
meow2u3
(25,250 posts)Someone needs to tell the DOD that protesting is a First Amendment right until it becomes violent. The only terrorism I see is state (or municipal) terrorism committed against peaceful protesters exercising their rights.
Aerows
(39,961 posts)and exercising one's first amendment rights is "low-level" terrorism?
Next they will be telling us that if we are the slightest bit critical of our government and our politicians that we are guilty of "low-level terrorism". Oh there is something here that is "low-level" alright, but it isn't the people protesting and it isn't "terrorism".
NavyDem
(570 posts)The term low-level terrorism is absurd. That being said, in an overseas port a protest can be used as a distraction for nafarious means. Very little of the Force Protection training that I went through on active duty had any kind of focus on US soil. It was all geared toward countries where we did not have a direct military presence.
Blue_In_AK
(46,436 posts)This is bullshit.
AntiFascist
(13,751 posts)TheKentuckian
(26,314 posts)mick063
(2,424 posts)When it became apparent that the armed forces were conducting total warfare upon the populace, defections from the military grew at an increasing rate. This from a populace that has never known freedom.
When our military and police are called upon to violently quell the movement, a large percentage will not stand for open warfare upon the populace. I am a veteran. I swore to defend our constitution from all enemys foreign and domestic. I can't see it happening on a large scale. Our young fighting men and women will choose wisely. Most will ultimately be on "our" side.
I have faith that a small number of power brokers will not be able to turn our military upon the people.
What does scare me......we are the most armed nation on earth and those that warship the second amendment as a deity are those that are most likely to be coopted by the power brokers. These "militias" are the scary ones. Fox news will harness their anger. They will murder in the name of Christ and feel ordained to do so.
When we see the Confederate banner flown again in battle, the second civil war will have begun.
TheKentuckian
(26,314 posts)which is why they are being militarized.
I'm personally concerned the populace isn't well armed enough, I'd like to see a law passed that any hardware that can be sold to any foreign country be legal for citizens to own as well. The populace should be a check on the military otherwise none can exist.
lunatica
(53,410 posts)DoD -------> 
WillyT
(72,631 posts)
scentopine
(1,950 posts)their existence. Let there be no mistake - 99% of us are now considered the enemy of the state. And the state is run by Wall Street Politburo.
The tax payers are buying the tools being used to suppress them.
Democrats are every bit as guilty as republicans in this regard.
Torture - "it's just a quaint idea, like the Geneva Conventions, so let's decriminalize it."
AT&T spying on Americans with NSA and CIA at their side - "yawn, what's on TV?"
Presidential orders to execute Americans - "only fringe loonie left thinks this is bad idea"
Pot Smoking? - "they are breaking the law, they get what they deserve"
These are the principals of the new democratic party.
LOL! what are you going to do vote for President Gingrich?
Millions of us who choke back the vomit of democratic endorsements of these principals, need an alternative political leadership to support.
Until then, we won't shut the fuck up about it. I guess that makes us all terrorists.
Jim_Shorts
(371 posts)I think the line between police and military is being erased as we speak - Homeland Security, The Patriot Act - getting an eerie feeling about where all this is headed.
Odin2005
(53,521 posts)
MsPithy
(809 posts)The Animal Rights Movement, which they have lumped together with eco-terrorists.
Not only that, in the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, AETA 2006, terrorism includes NON-VIOLENT interfering with CORPORATE PROFITS.
http://www.greenisthenewred.com/blog/aeta-analysis-109th/
treestar
(82,383 posts)They may as well label it with numbers.
Take any government bureaucracy and you'll see phrases used that mean some specific thing or concept but have little to do with the regular use of the words. Only people in the department and lawyers know what they are talking about.
For many purposes, the criminal code uses a term "crime of violence." It is defined as certain sections. It does not mean "crime of violence" so much as it means the crimes described in the sections it refers to.