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Mubarak Dahir is editor of the Express Gay News, a publication affiliated with this paper, and can be reached at mdahir@expressgaynews.com
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HOME > VIEWPOINT > EDITORIAL
By: MUBARAK DAHI COMMENTS
 
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to manipulate and control political dissenters.
In the 1960s, political protesters, including civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr., were routinely under surveillance. The government at times tried to use this information in a game of political blackmail, threatening to disclose personal details collected from spying on activists as a way to dissuade them from their political activity.
And during the Vietnam War, the government routinely collected information against American anti-war protesters who were deemed "un-American" and "un-patriotic."
The government has a long history of spying on gay and lesbian political activists, too.
In 1961, the FBI investigated meetings of the Mattachine Society, one of the country’s first organized gay rights groups. In 1965, government agents took photos of protesters at the first public demonstration of gay and lesbian people in front of the White House.
And old-time activists still remember the days when the FBI routinely followed them around.
Luckily, at least one gay group realizes the gravity of being spied on by the government, and how it can cast a chilling effect on free speech and political activity.
The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network, a Washington, D.C.-based group that fights the military’s ban on gay soldiers, has filed a Freedom of Information Act request to learn if it or other gay groups are being spied on by the Bush administration.
The president and his apologists already have come up with all kinds of convoluted excuses for why he is flaunting the law and ordering illegal spying on Americans.
But we should see through this dangerous power play and insist that our government stop undermining the Constitution.
The government has no legitimate reason to spy on citizens without court approval. Secretive surveillance is a dangerous tool that can too easily lead to squashing political dissent and unpopular political speech.
Santa Cruz students kissing members of the same sex in front of military recruiters is no threat to our security or freedoms. But a government that spies secretly on such displays of political protest certainly is.
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