How do you go from a story about a beating to "make fun of"?  Idiot.

Hate crimes in general are stupid. If you intentionally commit a crime against someone, why should the motivation of it make for different punishment?

Pocket Ninja: What about if I make fun of headline submitters who don't understand how to use "a" and "an" correctly? Is that a crime, too?

What are you?  An pedant?

machoprogrammer: Hate crimes in general are stupid. If you intentionally commit a crime against someone, why should the motivation of it make for different punishment?

It's a good measure of the malice held by the offender.

Came to make 'an hero' comment, leaving satisfied./geek tab?

An done in one.

doglover: It's the mens rea or some shiat like that in lawyerese. But I do agree hate crimes are just thought crime. If you decide to beat someone up because they're alone and look weak, that's a crime and you will go to jail. But if you decide to do the same thing to someone and they belong to a different social group, you're going to jail for even longer.

The point of hate crimes isn't to punish you more for attacking someone different than you, it's punishment for a predisposed prejudice the offender already had against the victim which contributed to the offender's motivation to commit the crime. Basically, the record/testimony shows that the offender is a racist/homophobe/sexist/whatever and this contributed to the crime happening in the first place, so they deserve to be put away for longer as an example.

oblig.

So "hate crime" is another one of those words that have lost all meaning.

racist
sexist
misogynist
hate crime

/sigh

would this video and service help them? it helped Richmond.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNhjHtMXLkA

In before the Gothapotomous.

INeedAName: Their is a mistake in the headline. I don't no if anyone caught it, butt it really pisses me on  off.

Sorry, pet peeve.

Lt. Cheese Weasel: [www.filehurricane.com image 494x395]
oblig.

I thought emo was the new closet gay?

doglover: Hate crime is thought crime.

That post is A Mind is a Terrible Thing to Waste crime.

This is one of the best examples I can think of when it comes to how idiotic hate crimes are.

Make fun of an juggalo? That's okay, carry on.

doglover: Zeno-25: it's punishment for a predisposed prejudice the offender already had against the victim which contributed to the offender's motivation to commit the crime

Exactly, a thought crime.

If it's illegal to hate blacks, go break up the KKK and toss Rush Limbaugh in jail.

If it's illegal to hate whites, go break up the Black Panthers and toss Spike Lee in jail.

It it's illegal to hate latins, go break up the AZ militia and toss Adam Carolla in jail.

If it's illegal to hate (group here), go break up (their enemies's group) and toss (outspoken bigot) in jail.

But you can't because it's constitutionally protected to have the right to an opinion and express that opinion. Even, and this is important, if that opinion is horrifically amoral. It's not a crime to be a hater.

But with hate crime legislation, it is. If you are a hater and you commit a crime, hate crime laws basically say "Your opinions are illegal, too." Assault is assault. I don't care about the reasons, the law's job should be to stop it from happening again, not to make some assaults less assaulty because the assaulter wasn't racist enough. Being murdered by and equal opportunity killer doesn't make you any less dead than if they hated your social group. A crushed orbital socket doesn't magically heal faster if the guy who crushed it is the same color as you.

Hate crime is thought crime.

The thing you're missing is that, for example, if you assault a (black/Latino/gays/whatever) just because you hate (blacks/Latinos/gays/whatever), it's not just an assault.  It's also an explicit threat against every single person who shares that trait.  Same difference between writing "KILROY WAS HERE" on a wall and writing "DIE HOMO DIE" on it.  When you commit a hate crime, you're trying to "send a message".  So hate crime laws punish you for sending that message on top of the punishment for the other crime.

doglover: .....If it's illegal to hate (group here), go break up (their enemies's group) and toss (outspoken bigot) in jail.....

If it is illegal to hate Christians, go break up atheist gatherings and toss Richard Dawkins in jail.
If it is illegal to hate Muslims, go break up evangelical Christian churches and toss Rick Warren in jail.

Hey!  This is fun!

HeartBurnKid: doglover: Zeno-25: ...

Same difference between writing "KILROY WAS HERE" on a wall and writing "DIE HOMO DIE" on it.  When you commit a hate crime, you're trying to "send a message".  So hate crime laws punish you for sending that message on top of the punishment for the other crime.

Oh  that graffiti was done by a gay existentialist German,  it actually means "The Homo The",  I just forgot to put up the placard explaining it.

doglover: Pocket Ninja: doglover: Hate crime is thought crime.

Exactly. That's why the law makes no distinction whatsoever between the man who plans to murder someone and then carries out that murder and the man who murders someone in a fit of rage or as the result of an accident. The motivation and thought behind the crime never matters at all, only the final act.

Not quite. Hate crime makes it a double crime. Not only can you get murder 1 for your intent to kill a man in cold blood, you can get extra penalties on top of that.

It's gilding the lily, or shiatting on the turd, or any other metaphor that means it's a useless addition.

We didn't need to make anything extra illegal. It's already illegal enough to assault, injure, and kill people. Plus what if the guy who attacks you is the same color? Same sexuality? Same music tastes and fashion? He's getting a slap on the wrist while if he'd been a different color he'd be getting more punishment? Wouldn't that make YOU feel cheated?

By this logic we should throw out all mitigating and aggravating factors of any crime.  While some jurisdictions such as England sometimes have mandatory additional penalties for crime motivated by religion or ethnicity, other places just use it as an aggravating factor.  There are many aggravating factors such as abusing a position of trust or authority, using specific tools to commit the crime, a high level or cruelty, previous criminal convictions, etc.

These things give us the ability to make a reasonable assessment of the mind of the accused at the time of the crime and allow us to distinguish in sentencing between someone punching a guy in the face because he threw a bottle at you, and blindsiding a guy in the back of the head because he's black.  The rationale is that a crime motivated by passion or anger in the heat of the moment is somewhat less likely to be repeated by that offender than one motivated by ethnicity and that one is objectively worse than the other.

doglover: wejash: Criminal punishment often takes into account a concern for keeping more dangerous people out of society for longer periods.

Because locking people up even longer is a good idea and doesn't just breed career criminals and make jail even more dangerous than it already is for guards and inmates alike.

God forbid we try to reform people or educate them. Nope let's just pile on more years to every conviction because reasons and then just spend all our time and money feeding people who could be productive members if they were just de-programed and given half a chance.

That's a different argument and says more about the penal system than the process of criminal conviction and sentencing.  Generally I do agree though, which is why I was a member of the Howard League while in England. http://www.howardleague.org/

Zeno-25: doglover: It's the mens rea or some shiat like that in lawyerese. But I do agree hate crimes are just thought crime. If you decide to beat someone up because they're alone and look weak, that's a crime and you will go to jail. But if you decide to do the same thing to someone and they belong to a different social group, you're going to jail for even longer.

The point of hate crimes isn't to punish you more for attacking someone different than you, it's punishment for a predisposed prejudice the offender already had against the victim which contributed to the offender's motivation to commit the crime. Basically, the record/testimony shows that the offender is a racist/homophobe/sexist/whatever and this contributed to the crime happening in the first place, so they deserve to be put away for longer as an example.

This is where I don't quite understand the idea of hate crimes.   If I rob a store for money to buy drugs vs. money to buy an xbox vs. money to buy food for my children, should the sentence/punishment be different in all of those cases?  The punishment to rob a store should be harsh enough to deter the act no matter the motivation.  If the punishments given for robbery are not a good enough deterrent for every reason to commit the robbery, then the punishments need to be re-examined.

I understand you are trying to assess the threat of the individual.  Did he kill the black man because he was black (then he was a threat to every black man) or did he kill the black man because he slept with his wife (then he was only a threat to the 1988 denver broncos offensive line...she was a bit of a whore).  In each case he only killed one person, but with the idea of hate crime punishments, he is being punished for the potential to murder all black men.

If the motivation behind a crime is important in how punishment is decided, then mandatory sentencing should be a glaring contradiction, since it takes into account NO motivation on the crime.  Was he selling crack in the black neighborhoods because he hates blacks or because he needed money for his kids.  Doesn't matter, he was selling crack - mandatory sentence.

I understand the difference with crimes vs. accidents (murder vs. manslaughter), but we are talking about crime vs. crime

Could we not make "human being" a protected class, then every crime becomes a hate crime and the issue goes away?

So if I beat the crap out of them because they are arseholes that is one thing but if I beat the crap out of them because they are arsehole emo's that is worse?

Hate crime laws are stupid.

HeartBurnKid: The thing you're missing is that, for example, if you assault a (black/Latino/gays/whatever) just because you hate (blacks/Latinos/gays/whatever), it's not just an assault. It's also an explicit threat against every single person who shares that trait. Same difference between writing "KILROY WAS HERE" on a wall and writing "DIE HOMO DIE" on it. When you commit a hate crime, you're trying to "send a message". So hate crime laws punish you for sending that message on top of the punishment for the other crime

We already have laws about intimidation.  It should be a seperate crime and you should have to prove they were sending a message to said group.

And for that matter crimes like assault, murder, etc have varying sentences.  Judges already have discretion on the sentence.  Any law about "hate crimes" should recommend that peopel commiting "hate crinmes" gets the higher end of the sentence.  It isn't a whole new crime.

Hyjamon: .....I understand you are trying to assess the threat of the individual.  Did he kill the black man because he was black (then he was a threat to every black man) or did he kill the black man because he slept with his wife (then he was only a threat to the 1988 denver broncos offensive line...she was a bit of a whore).  In each case he only killed one person, but with the idea of hate crime punishments, he is being punished for the potential to murder all black men.

If the motivation behind a crime is important in how punishment is decided, then mandatory sentencing should be a glaring contradiction, since it takes into account NO motivation on the crime.  Was he selling ...

Well said.

Hey if we can put an 18-year old on the sex offender registry for sleeping with his 17-year old girlfriend, what's wrong with prosecuting thought crime?  "Feel good" legislation is retarded, even if it is "for the children".

wejash: doglover: Pocket Ninja: doglover: Hate crime is thought crime.

Exactly. That's why the law makes no distinction whatsoever between the man who plans to murder someone and then carries out that murder and the man who murders someone in a fit of rage or as the result of an accident. The motivation and thought behind the crime never matters at all, only the final act.

Not quite. Hate crime makes it a double crime. Not only can you get murder 1 for your intent to kill a man in cold blood, you can get extra penalties on top of that.

It's gilding the lily, or shiatting on the turd, or any other metaphor that means it's a useless addition.

We didn't need to make anything extra illegal. It's already illegal enough to assault, injure, and kill people. Plus what if the guy who attacks you is the same color? Same sexuality? Same music tastes and fashion? He's getting a slap on the wrist while if he'd been a different color he'd be getting more punishment? Wouldn't that make YOU feel cheated?

The "hate crime = thought crime" is a slogan but not terribly thoughtful.

Criminal punishment often takes into account a concern for keeping more dangerous people out of society for longer periods. Or other sanction for those we deem more likely to re-offend.

If violent offenders driven by racist motives are like pedophiles who cannot resist the urges that drive them, then the measures could make sense as society's protection vs those who have a history of not resisting their desire to take illegal actions.

two killers: one is a racist who kills randomly anyone who is a certain color; the other is an equal opportunity killer and just kills anyone randomly.  Both have committed murder, both have the potential to kill again.  One will be charged with a hate crime; the other will not.  Why is their even a difference?  Can't the judge give them a sentence to keep them both removed from society long enough without one needing to be called a hate crime?

Hyjamon: wejash: doglover: Pocket Ninja: doglover: Hate crime is thought crime.

Exactly. That's why the law makes no distinction whatsoever between the man who plans to murder someone and then carries out that murder and the man who murders someone in a fit of rage or as the result of an accident. The motivation and thought behind the crime never matters at all, only the final act.

Not quite. Hate crime makes it a double crime. Not only can you get murder 1 for your intent to kill a man in cold blood, you can get extra penalties on top of that.

It's gilding the lily, or shiatting on the turd, or any other metaphor that means it's a useless addition.

We didn't need to make anything extra illegal. It's already illegal enough to assault, injure, and kill people. Plus what if the guy who attacks you is the same color? Same sexuality? Same music tastes and fashion? He's getting a slap on the wrist while if he'd been a different color he'd be getting more punishment? Wouldn't that make YOU feel cheated?

The "hate crime = thought crime" is a slogan but not terribly thoughtful.

Criminal punishment often takes into account a concern for keeping more dangerous people out of society for longer periods. Or other sanction for those we deem more likely to re-offend.

If violent offenders driven by racist motives are like pedophiles who cannot resist the urges that drive them, then the measures could make sense as society's protection vs those who have a history of not resisting their desire to take illegal actions.

two killers: one is a racist who kills randomly anyone who is a certain color; the other is an equal opportunity killer and just kills anyone randomly.  Both have committed murder, both have the potential to kill again.  One will be charged with a hate crime; the other will not.  Why is their even a difference?  Can't the judge give them a sentence to keep them both removed from society long enough without one needing to be called a hate crime?

You're trying to take this to the very extreme.  In both cases, depending on the jurisdiction the punishment is at the maximum anyways.  In many countries murder is already going to have the mandatory life sentence attached to it.  Motive still exists as an aggravating factor.  You're far too hung up on the term 'hate crime'.

How about this: Two murders (both victims killed with intent).  One murder sees the victim shot in the head over a gambling debt.  The other is tortured for several days until they die.  Is one not objectively worse than the other?

Throw in a third murder: two men beat another to death because he's Muslim.

How about a fourth: A man kills another man with intent after extreme provocation (ie, being shown pictures of a loved one who has been raped and killed).

There's a scale, some of these are worse than others.  "Hate crime" is simply a factor used in determining the motive of the accused.  Some motives are considered worse or more dangerous than others.  The reason for aggravating and mitigating factors is that legislation does not seek to include every single possible criminal scenario (since this is impossible).  These factors help to determine if one crime is worse than another.

AngryDragon: Hyjamon: .....I understand you are trying to assess the threat of the individual.  Did he kill the black man because he was black (then he was a threat to every black man) or did he kill the black man because he slept with his wife (then he was only a threat to the 1988 denver broncos offensive line...she was a bit of a whore).  In each case he only killed one person, but with the idea of hate crime punishments, he is being punished for the potential to murder all black men.

If the motivation behind a crime is important in how punishment is decided, then mandatory sentencing should be a glaring contradiction, since it takes into account NO motivation on the crime.  Was he selling ...

Well said.

Hey if we can put an 18-year old on the sex offender registry for sleeping with his 17-year old girlfriend, what's wrong with prosecuting thought crime?  "Feel good" legislation is retarded, even if it is "for the children".

Except the part you quoted absolutely contradicts what you just said.  We CLEARLY do base judgement on motivation in most cases, and as the person you quoted pointed out, really should be doing so in almost all cases.  The hell, man.  The hell.

Dissociater: Hyjamon: wejash: doglover: Pocket Ninja: doglover:

You're far too hung up on the term 'hate crime'.

Maybe, but that is the issue I am discussing, the existence (or necessity) of the term.  We are talking about the motivation before the crime and we already have terms that address those (manslaughter, murder 1, murder 2, ...) and the sentences already allow judges to keep an individual in jail long enough in proportion to their likelihood to commit the crime again.

we also have ways to tact on to those: example we have assault and aggravated assault.  And as someone mentioned upthread, if someone kills a white person because they are white, then charge them with murder 1 (for the murder) and terrorist threats (for the 'sending a message' part)

You mention legislation does not seek to include every single possibility, but that is what hate crime legislation is doing.  They are targeting a certain possibility that can be addressed by other laws on the books.  Now, I imagine we agree that the judges do not want/need/care for hate crime legislation and they are largely a tool of politicians to win votes, that is why they should be removed.  They are "feel good" legislation, politically motivated only.

We all can come up with different combinations on WHY someone was murdered and their potential threat to do it again, but for certain combinations that are equally unwanted in society, we give it a special name "hate crime" for it.  quick example: I could hate everyone from an SEC college/lives in Minnesota/shops at Piggly-Wiggly/CEO's for banks. I can  murder someone from one of those subsets and have the potential to do it again.  Yet, they will not be labeled hate crime.

Better (real) examples:  SF 49'er fan gets stabbed at the Falcon's playoff game in Atlanta.  That should be a hate crime for the same reasons as racially motivated ones.  Or SF fan gets beaten up at a Dodger's game.  Yet it isn't.  I am just arguing that hate crimes need to be abolished or greatly expanded.

Is it a hate crime if I make fun of hate crime offenders?

/I hope not, because...

machoprogrammer: Hate crimes in general are stupid. If you intentionally commit a crime against someone, why should the motivation of it make for different punishment?

Do you think there should be different punishments for manslaughter vs murder? A person is dead in both cases.

Oh boy, another autobiography of an imbecile thread.

Hyjamon: two killers: one is a racist who kills randomly anyone who is a certain color; the other is an equal opportunity killer and just kills anyone randomly.  Both have committed murder, both have the potential to kill again.  One will be charged with a hate crime; the other will not.  Why is their even a difference?  Can't the judge give them a sentence to keep them both removed from society long enough without one needing to be called a hate crime?

Actually, I'd give the racist one a lesser sentence, since he'll kill less people than the equal opportunity killer.

100 people. 10 blacks. Racist kills only the 10. Equal kills all 100.

liam76: HeartBurnKid: The thing you're missing is that, for example, if you assault a (black/Latino/gays/whatever) just because you hate (blacks/Latinos/gays/whatever), it's not just an assault. It's also an explicit threat against every single person who shares that trait. Same difference between writing "KILROY WAS HERE" on a wall and writing "DIE HOMO DIE" on it. When you commit a hate crime, you're trying to "send a message". So hate crime laws punish you for sending that message on top of the punishment for the other crime

We already have laws about intimidation.

We do.  Hate crime laws are part of that.

It should be a seperate crime

You never heard of a "special circumstance"?  They're fairly common in law.

and you should have to prove they were sending a message to said group.

You do have to prove it.  I know the "not-Republican" brigade likes to claim that any crime on a black/woman/gay/etc. is sentenced as a hate crime, but that's not true.

HeartBurnKid: liam76: HeartBurnKid: The thing you're missing is that, for example, if you assault a (black/Latino/gays/whatever) just because you hate (blacks/Latinos/gays/whatever), it's not just an assault. It's also an explicit threat against every single person who shares that trait. Same difference between writing "KILROY WAS HERE" on a wall and writing "DIE HOMO DIE" on it. When you commit a hate crime, you're trying to "send a message". So hate crime laws punish you for sending that message on top of the punishment for the other crime

We already have laws about intimidation.

We do. Hate crime laws are part of that.

It should be a seperate crime

You never heard of a "special circumstance"? They're fairly common in law.

So why blur the lines?  Why is it an additional crime and a "special circumstance".

HeartBurnKid: You do have to prove it. I know the "not-Republican" brigade likes to claim that any crime on a black/woman/gay/etc. is sentenced as a hate crime, but that's not true

No.  There is no requirement in hate crime legislation that you have to prove they are "sending a message".

I am not arguing that any crime against a minority is a hate crime, but when the rate of hate crimes when the victim is black and the perpetrator is white is 1/45 and the rate when the colors are reversed is 1/1245 we have a problem.