Countering Violent Extremism
'CVE stands for Countering Violent Extremism. It refers not to literal countering violent extremism, but a specific US federal government program started for the purpose of expanding US federal counter-terror activity into civilian life,[1] including Hollywood, social workers, psychologists, psychiatrists, community organizers, and low-level law enforcement.
The program has been criticized for targeting law-abiding citizens/demographics for mass surveillance and for using specious criteria, and junk science[2] to justify their initiatives.
Current status and activities
The American CVE program still operates, mostly through medium-sized network of small organizations founded by Mitchell Silber, including ICSVE and a now-defunct organization called Light Upon Light.
Silber co-authored a 2007 NYPD report which was removed from the NYPD's website after a lawsuit.Cite error: Closing </ref> missing for <ref> tag The report which Silber co-prepared identified habits such as growing a beard and wearing Islamic clothing as signs of "radicalization".[3]
The CVE program in general was more or less rejected by Middle Eastern, South Asian, Muslim, and Arab communities in the United States, some of whom were subject to CVE-related spying.
Silber's former CVE organization Light Upon Light had heavily advertised and promoted the reactionary and right-wing incel forum named incels.co, now known as incels.is. They had also promoted it's founder Diego under a pseudonym named 'Alexander'.[4]
Status and successors
However, most self-described CVE organizations nowadays appear to be outside the United States, and include a large network which consists of RAN, Moonshot CVE, and many others. It is unknown the degree to which any of these organization still have any formal connection to Obama's initial program, but all United States ones mentioned have recently received federal government grants.
A similar program to CVE was founded during the Trump administration within the DHS and was called TVTE. Biden replaced this program with a similar DHS program called the Center for Prevention Programs and Partnerships (CP3). Both TVTE and CP3 have been critized for the same reasons CVE is/was.[5]
References
- ↑ https://www.aclu.org/documents/problems-violent-extremism-and-violence-prevention-programs
- ↑ https://www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/why-countering-violent-extremism-programs-are-bad-policy
- ↑ Dandia, Asad. "When "Jewish Security" Means Muslim Surveillance". Jewish Currents. Retrieved 5 June 2023.
- ↑ https://archive.is/OyzdX
- ↑ https://www.aclu.org/documents/problems-violent-extremism-and-violence-prevention-programs