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VIVISECTORS' CONFERENCE UNDER SIEGEAnti vivisection campaigners from around Aotearoa/New Zealand gathered in Wellington in late November to protest against a two day vivisectors' conference. The conference was organised by Anzccart (The Australia and New Zealand Council for the Care of Animals in Research and Teaching) which is an animal research industry front group set up to promote and defend the use of animals in experiments. One hundred and seventy vivisectors attended this year's Anzccart conference at the convention centre in the Te Papa National Museum.
A SPECIAL WELCOMEThe day before the conference was due to open, a group of activists charged into the Royal Society building where Anzccart is based. There was a brief but noisy occupation of the building. The activists left before police arrived, to taking a box of Anzccart documents with them. On the morning of November 18, more than forty protesters gathered to welcome vivisectors as the conference opened. A huge amount of noise was kept up for an hour and a half, and was audible clearly from inside the conference. Later that day, a group of activists made a surprise visit to the Wellington School of Medicine where thousands of animals are tortured in cancer research experiments. Activists armed with drums and other noise making devices blockaded the foyer of the building and occupied it. The police forced them out 25 minutes later. The protest continued outside the building. While the police were dealing with that, another smaller group armed with cameras attempted to make a surprise inspection of the lab animal breeding unit at Victoria University across town. Unfortunately they were spotted by security guards before they could gain entry and had to make a quick getaway.
NOISY PROTESTSThat night, the vivisectors hid behind tight security while they had their conference dinner at the Skyline restaurant on a hill above the city. Some activists had managed to get hold of some unknown device that caused very loud explosion type noises. The dinner was disrupted by a bomb threat phone call, followed by two loud bangs. After midnight several loud bangs were set off around the house of Mike Berridge, a well known local vivisector who hopefully had no sleep that night. On Friday at noon there was another big noisy protest outside Te Papa Museum. Just before activists arrived, some naughty person set off the fire alarms and the building was evacuated. Several fire engines arrived and about 500 people (including the vivisectors) poured onto the forecourt of the museum where the protest was about to begin. Unfortunately the vivisectors had been told to remove their conference badges so we couldn't identify them. Some pro testers mingled with the crowd handing out leaflets, while the rest of us kept up the drumming and chanting. Later on, when the police had re-admitted people into the museum, a group of protesters split off from the main group and marched around to the back of the museum where they could get even closer to where the vivisectors were having their lunch. Detectives from the national Threat Assessment Unit were seen across the road from the protest observing everyone present. The protest ended with only a few minor confrontations. A few hours later there was a final protest as the vivisectors left the building. A dozen protesters were surrounded and heavily outnumbered by police at this final protest so were unable to do anything but shout at the vivisectors as they left.
ENTER THE ALFWe received reports from the Animal Liberation Front, who were also active during the week. Several Wellington vivisectors were visited at their homes in the middle of the night just before the conference was about to begin. Two vivisectors from the Malaghan Institute, who live together, had their house sloganised and the front window smashed. John Miller, vivisector and head of the Victoria University animal ethics committee (which oversees and approves experiments at the university) had his house covered in ALF slogans, a brick through the front window and his car covered in paint stripper. And the Royal Society building (where Anzccart is based) was covered in anti-vivisection slogans. The morning after the conference, a huge "vivisection is scientific fraud" slogan had appeared on the walls of the museum. Reports from within the conference said the vivisectors felt under siege for the whole two days. The atmosphere inside the building was one of paranoia as dozens of police and security guards patrolled the conference centre, and security guards prevented the vivisectors from the windows in case protesters threw rocks at them! Word had spread that Wellington vivisectors were having their homes trashed and every vivisection lab in Wellington had increased security for the week. The protests were the first time in two years that activists from the length of the country gathered in one place and the grassroots animal liberation movement in Aotearoa is hopefully stronger following the protests against the conference. A relatively small group of activists from around the country managed to cause chaos and stress for the vivisection community without suffering any arrests themselves. They also started on plans for more coordination of local anti-vivisection campaigns around the country. Next year in May, factory farmers from around the world will be in Auckland for the World Pork Expo, and we have started preparing for another national gathering of animal activists to make sure the Expo is another disaster for the animal abusers. Wellington Animal Action P0 Box 6387 Te Aro, Wellington Aotearoa/New Zealand ANARCHY ON-LINE (AN IRREGULAR COLUMN ON THE WEB AND HOW TO USE IT)#3: I'M HOOKED, WHAT NOW?OK, so you've faithfully followed the hallowed advice of yours truly and now you're jacked in and ready to turn on. But where to start? The first thing you want to do is start to increase your knowledge about computers - hardware, software, configuration, security etc. You also want to get connected to the anarchist presence on the web. I could publish paperbacks of website addresses, half of which would be out of date by the time this went to print, but instead I'll tell you how to find such things out for yourself.
In my humble opinion there is no more important aspect of the Internet than the ability to send text, graphics, even music to someone half way around the world in a fraction of a second. Once you have an e-mail address you can subscribe to emailing lists at sites like www.onelist.com or www.egroups.com, who host our very own anarchynz list. Communicating by e-mail allows you to contort free thinkers from around the world and share tips, hints, URLs (website addresses) etc. It also offers the possibility of simple, informal, decentralised and international organisation, witness the events of June 18 and November 30, 1999. There are two main ways to use e-mail. If you have regular access to a secure computer, you will usually be provided with on off-line e-mail account by your internet provider. This allows you to read and write messages while off-line which are sent and received by your mail program while you are surfing. This is useful if you are paying by time for your access. If you have only occasional access to the web, or wish to have alternate email avatars (for infiltrating virtual fascist groups etc) you can use an on-line e-mail account. This is a website which receives and stores your e-mail for you until you claim it with a login name and password, much like a virtual P0 Box. Many sites offer free email as a way of attracting more "hits" (the rating system by which commercial servers attract advertisers). Using less popular ones like www.disinfo.com and ratties.zzn.com avoids the slow response you get when more popular servers are busy. Another way to find e-mail servers leads me onto my next topic...
SEARCH ENGINESThese are on-line databases of information about thousands or millions of websites. Some of the more popular are www.altavista.com and www.hotbot.com, but there are subject and locale specific ones like www.disinfo.com. A tip for using these: pop down to your local library and familiarise yourself with the on-line catalogue. Engines work on the same principle, referring you to websites instead of books. You can also use engines to search for other engine's. Don't be afraid to try lots and see which give the most satisfying results. And make sure you share your findings around. A final word on search engines: if you have a website or homepage, they have no idea it exists unless you enter it into their database! Also, the more links on your page to other good sites, the higher up the list of search results your URL will be. So it pays to exchange links with other webworkers - viva la mutual aid! Strype |
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