Quote:
Originally Posted by dippin
First of all, I am always amazed at how little people know about things that they like to speak so strongly about. Hate crime legislation is not based on race, sexual orientation, etc. of the victim, but on the intent of the attacker. So this BS about "a crime shouldnt be worse because of the victim's race, etc" is simply misinformation. Even in the stric test hate crimes legislations the determinant is not simply race, gender, etc. but the intent. That is, hate crime is not a white man killing a black man. It is a white man killing a black man because of his race. And penalty enhancements based on intent are already present throughout our legislation for other crimes.
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Hate crime legislation exists because an assault charge where one person beats up another because he cheated on poker is a qualitatively different crime than one where one person beats another solely because of the color of his skin, or his religion, or so on, and as such needs to be treated differently under the law.
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So the whole point of the legislation is to address intent. We already do that when we discuss the different degrees of crime, the legislation merely adds something regarding prejudice.
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Unfortunately, the PC lobby has allowed us to miss what really constitutes a hate crime. And it isn't murdering someone because they are
[insert your favourite prejudice here]. That's just murder. Plain and simple. To punish someone more harshly because they have acted on their prejudice is to
DESECRATE the memory of all the other victims of murder who were killed for other reasons. It is little more than spitting on them. Somehow,
THEY weren't worth as much as the hate-crime murder victim. It's a disgusting attitude. It also makes martyrs of the hate-crime victims family and denigrates the sorrow of the "normal" victims' families.
A hate crime is
INCITING a crime out of prejudice, and should be punished harshly. If I convince someone that killing an American is ok because they are an American, that's a hate crime.
I should be punished for the action of inciting hatred of Americans. The guy who listens to me is just a murderer and should be punished as such.
Anything else is a preferential treatment of an identifiable group and is anathema to a set of laws based on equality of all.