FBI Officer Speaks at Law School, Lists Food Not Bombs on “Terrorist Watch List” [pdf] (2006) | Hacker News Reader

FBI Officer Speaks at Law School, Lists Food Not Bombs on “Terrorist Watch List” [pdf] (2006)

foodnotbombs.net

42 pointswahnfrieden23 comments

i understand the messiness of this, i really do, but i’ll forever believe no one should be able to dictate whether or not we can share food with each other.

there are few things more fundamentally human than “sure, i’ll share my food with you.”

of all things we’ve been collectively indignant about (and gods we are all guilty of screaming about something or other) i feel like this one genuinely deserves our indignation. powers are quite literally making it more difficult to share food.

Food Not Bombs was absolutely genius in choosing this to highlight some truly deeply ingrained broken fundamentals. sharing food.

Police in Houston have recently renewed their fight against Food Not Bombs and have ticketed at least one group more than 40 times for over $10,000 for the illegal violation of “FEEDING HOMELESS” (quote from the charge)

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/housing/...

> Houston Police Officer Jeff Richard asks Food Not Bombs volunteer Shere Dore and another man if they will pass out food at a city-sanctioned location instead of the Houston Public Library’s Julia Ideson Building.

I was curious what this was about.

The article cites this page[1] on Houston Health Department's website which I thought was pretty clear and concise guidance. 61 Riesner St is listed as the city-sanctioned address.

I then wondered: How far is this city-sanctioned location from the Julia Ideson Building mentioned in the article?

Google Maps suggests it's just under a mile away; an 18-min walk or 5-min drive[2].

So the brouhaha is that this group racks up 40 citations for refusing to conduct affairs at a nearby city-sanctioned location in defiance of standing ordinance, then parades the civil disobedience on a t-shirt logo as a mocking gesture in court for the selfies because..."the work being done could also be seen as beautiful, fit for the steps of neaby City Hall"?

One step forward, two steps back...color me unimpressed.

[1] https://www.houstonhealth.org/services/permits/food-permits/...

[2] https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Julia+Ideson+Building,+550+M...

From the article, the actual offense is distributing food without permission of the property owner where it's being done.

That doesn't seem like an entirely unreasonable law -- assuming, of course, that permission is routinely given when the location is publicly-owned (which I wouldn't bet on)... but what a shitty thing to write on the citation.

If you feed more than four homeless people total, you're a criminal

There is a permission to feed homeless on public property process that orgs have followed, and the result is police giving absurd restrictions to make it useless for achieving the goal (eg requiring the location to be far away and dangerous so that homeless populations won’t travel to it). Police fight it through abusing their power and criminalizing alternatives. Here’s a better article https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/article/houston-may...

It is also illegal to be homeless in Texas as of 2021: if you lie or sit in public spaces, it’s a misdemeanor

> The Houston law they were charged with violating — an ordinance against giving away meals unless you have permission from the property where you’re doing it, even if the property is public — was put in place by City Council in 2012 but largely had gone unenforced for over a decade, municipal records show.

Sounds like the best step forward is to reach out to a local property owner for permission.

> Sounds like the best step forward is to reach out to a local property owner for permission.

That's the point of the law. The property owners won't give permission because they would rather the homeless not be fed and go elsewhere. There are already locations where meals are given to the homeless; this is to discourage bringing the food to wherever the homeless may be in the event that they're not wanted there.

Do you also think the homelessness problem should be solved by asking local property owners for permission to use any available housing?

So if there's a rule, follow it? It's illegal to be homeless in Texas, but it's legal to ask permission to sleep on a local owner's property. Sounds like what you're recommending. Do you think that is working?

Btw the process for feeding on public property was pursued and made impractical by police due to unreasonable restrictions. The permission process is broken by design.

This is from March 2006. Was the power point ever obtained or published?

There are various materials

Here’s an earlier one https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2016/mar/25/fbi-files... another Food Not Bombs group placed on terrorist watch for sins such as criticizing the Iraq war

Note that groups such as proud boys, patriot front etc are not on the terrorist watch list

I'm having trouble finding which groups are on terrorist watchlists, but the implication that right-wing or white nationalist groups or individuals are ignored is false, and was false even under Trump:

Top law enforcement officials say the biggest domestic terror threat comes from white supremacists. - https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/12/us/politics/domestic-terr...

The Countering Violent Extremism change has not been officially announced, and white supremacy extremist groups are still listed as threats in other counter-terrorism programs. - https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-terror-watch-program...

Dozens of people listed in TSDB, mostly those flagged in connection with past concerning white supremacist connections, were present in Washington, D.C., during the January 6, 2021 storming of the Capitol building - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terrorist_Screening_Database

Listing three categories of cause groups potentially linked to terrorist activity, Rasner named white supremacist groups, Islamic terrorist groups, and Anarchists - this submission

I didn’t say white supremacist groups are ignored. I said specifically proud boys and patriot front are not on the list

> groups such as proud boys, patriot front etc

yes those specific ones and others. your links don't dispute those specific and notable examples

Why is this important?

There's irony in watching an organization with "not bombs" in the title. But that would also be the perfect cover, so who knows?

You're joking, right? Why is a completely innocent and legal organization being tarred with the Al-Qaeda brush, no doubt for their political beliefs, just a few years after 9/11 important?

You're asking why it's important news that govt seeks criminalizing feeding homeless? And you're suggesting Food Not Bombs orgs may deserve the domestic terror label?

But why does that matter? Maybe they have a reason or maybe not. It's just some list, right? Do people on the list lose rights or something?

https://www.aclu.org/sites/default/files/assets/watchlist_br... answers in detail

The biggest likely consequence I see there is inability to fly, which is not good but there are many unfair things about flying.

Also, how does that apply to an organization?

its members are surveilled individually as i shared in the other pdf. please stop responding to me i'm not interested in your uninformed thoughts on how the terrorist watch list is toothless

I don’t personally agree with the approaches that Food Not Bombs take, but _domestic terrorism_? How would you define terrorism, and how does this organization relate to that definition?

I'm obviously missing something. What happens to people on that list?

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