[ The tragic impacts of the September 11 attacks stretch far
beyond the nearly three thousand people who lost their lives 20 years
ago. Over the last two decades, government forces have trampled on
civil rights and liberties in the name of 9/11.]
[[link removed]]

UBIQUITOUS SURVEILLANCE AND CIVIL RIGHTS INFRINGEMENTS: A TRAGIC
LEGACY OF 9/11  
[[link removed]]


 

Toni Smith-Thompson
September 10, 2021
Gotham Gazette
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
* [[link removed]]

_ The tragic impacts of the September 11 attacks stretch far beyond
the nearly three thousand people who lost their lives 20 years ago.
Over the last two decades, government forces have trampled on civil
rights and liberties in the name of 9/11. _

NYPD counterterrorism, photo: Ed Reed/Mayoral Photography Office //
Gotham Gazette

 

Deeply entrenched aspects of our society like the ubiquitous
surveillance state that follows us wherever we go, the military
mission creep that’s infected our domestic law enforcement, and the
unbridled police power that departments wield are all direct results
of actions taken in the name of preventing another attack. 

Arab, Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian communities were the
first to feel the repercussions of that fateful day. They were
illegally mass-arrested
[[link removed]], beaten, and
killed
[[link removed]] in
the days and weeks immediately following September 11.

Eventually, the abuses justified by 9/11 impacted all of us – though
they still fall disproportionately on AMEMSA communities and other
Black and Brown people. Many of the things we don’t think twice
about today would have seemed unimaginable to Americans before the
twin towers fell. 

Here in New York, it’s now taken for granted that tens of thousands
of cameras
[[link removed]] watch
nearly every move we make. The same is true
[[link removed]] in
cities and towns across the country. 

The New York Police Department – the largest police force in the
country – proudly touts
[[link removed]] its
all-seeing Domain Awareness System as “one of the world's largest
networks of cameras, license plate readers, and radiological censors,
designed to detect and prevent terrorist acts, but also of great value
in criminal investigations” [emphasis added].

Those last eight words reflect a key component of the 9/11 legacy.
Attacks like the ones on September 11 are incredibly rare
[[link removed]],
but that doesn’t mean tools purportedly designed to stop them are
used sparingly. Instead, nearly all of the weapons, laws, and agencies
ostensibly created to stop attacks inevitably get wielded for other,
much broader uses.

The military equipment deployed during two decades of endless war, for
example, always comes back to the streets of America, most often
[[link removed]] in
poor Black and Brown neighborhoods. Whether
[[link removed]] it’s
mine-resistant tanks that rumble through our neighborhoods, drones
that hover above us, Stingrays that spy on our cell phones, or x-ray
vans that can see through our walls, the military’s tools of war are
now used to brutalize and keep tabs on Americans.

Whole agencies that were created to defend national security are now
deployed against people without any even alleged ties to violence.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement, for instance, was created in 2003
to “better protect national security.” But that mission is hard to
square with ICE agents raiding work places
[[link removed]],
staking out courthouses
[[link removed]],
and invading the homes
[[link removed]] of
mostly Black and Brown immigrants who – by ICE’s own admission –
rarely pose a threat to national security.

While new bureaucracies like ICE quickly broadened their mandates,
police departments seized on 9/11 to accumulate more power and cloak
their actions in increased secrecy.

Raising the specter of terrorism, the NYPD successfully convinced
[[link removed]] a
judge in 2003 to weaken the rules meant to prevent the department from
surveilling New Yorkers engaged in lawful activities. 

Then in 2012, the Associated Press revealed
[[link removed]] that
the NYPD had dispatched undercover officers into predominantly Muslim
neighborhoods and used informants, known as "mosque crawlers," to
monitor sermons, even when nothing illegal was taking place.

The NYPD put entire neighborhoods, hundreds of mosques, and numerous
student groups under surveillance based on their demographics, not on
any evidence of criminal activity. After six years of this unlawful
spying, the NYPD admitted
[[link removed]] this
work never produced a single lead or sparked one terrorism
investigation.

After a lawsuit brought by the ACLU and the New York Civil Liberties
Union, the rules preventing unlawful spying by the NYPD
were strengthened
[[link removed]] and
the unit responsible for snooping on Muslims was disbanded. But the
message was clear: 9/11 fears can and will be used to justify police
power grabs. 

Blanket surveillance is not just invasive and ineffective,
it’s actively harmful
[[link removed]].
Communities targeted by surveillance are publicly criminalized and
vilified, which can lead to physical abuse by law enforcement,
incarceration, deportation, and other life-shattering consequences.

While the occasional act of law enforcement overreach gets exposed and
reigned in, it’s far more common for police activities to remain
hidden, with national security trotted out as the excuse. This means
the harmful consequences of law enforcement overreach are often hidden
as well.

The NYPD reacted to proposed legislation that would force it to reveal
the invasive surveillance technology it uses to spy on New Yorkers
by promising
[[link removed]] –
without any evidence – that this information would be used by
terrorists. Now this legislation is the law of the land, but the NYPD
is still [[link removed]] using the fear of terror to
subvert it.

The NYPD also uses this rationale to cover up
[[link removed]] its
tracking of protesters. The department is not alone. Across the
country, law enforcement agencies know that evoking September 11 is a
tried and true strategy for hiding what they’re up to.

What the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks has made abundantly clear 20
years later is that the freedoms and rights we trade away in the midst
of an emergency are exceedingly difficult to claw back once that
emergency has faded from the headlines.

_[Toni Smith-Thompson is a Senior Organizer at the New York Civil
Liberties Union (NYCLU). On Twitter @mstonij
[[link removed]] & @nyclu
[[link removed]].]_

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
* [[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web [[link removed]]
Submit via email
Frequently asked questions [[link removed]]
Manage subscription [[link removed]]
Visit xxxxxx.org [[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]